It’s probably not one-hundred percent correct to say that Phantom Thread is unmistakably a Paul Thomas Anderson film, but it sure feels right. The new cinematic offering is meticulously crafted, resolutely erudite, psychologically complicated, packed with insightful acting, and careens … Continue reading Now Playing — Phantom Thread
Payment on Demand (Curtis Bernhardt, 1951). Bette Davis was a tough customer from the very beginning, but as she edged into middle age there was a special pleasure in watching her disdainfully browbeat all those wronged her. In Payment on … Continue reading Playing Catch-Up — Payment on Demand; The Florida Project; Money Monster
Even without director Steven Spielberg offering fairly unequivocal explanations of his motivation behind signing on for The Post — and working overtime to deliver a finished product as quickly as possible — it’s not difficult to ascertain the film’s sharp … Continue reading Now Playing — The Post
Molly’s Game, the feature directorial debut of Academy Award-winning screenwriter Aaron Sorkin makes a compelling case for his previous practice of turning his material over to others to shepherd it to the screen. More than most, Sorkin had the benefit … Continue reading Now Playing — Molly’s Game
The Rules of the Game (Jean Renoir, 1939). Considered one of unassailable greats of all cinema (or at least a foundational classic that demonstrated the way the spirited form could be applied to weighty social subjects), Jean Renoir’s farcical examination … Continue reading Playing Catch-Up — The Rules of the Game; Beatriz at Dinner; Miss Sloane
In the early nineteen-eighties, a 17-year-old named Elio (Timothée Chalamet) is, by many measures, enjoying a charmed life. He spends summers in a family house in Italy, where his professor father (Michael Stuhlbarg) goes to be closer to a recent … Continue reading Now Playing — Call Me By Your Name
There are, of course, a multitude of ways to commemorate the ending of a calendar year, from earnest list-making to drunken revelry in the frigid public square. In our household, we decided to revive a beloved practice to finish off … Continue reading Bad Movie Night — Geostorm/The Snowman
Storm Warning (Stuart Heisler, 1951). This drama about the power of the Ku Klux Klan in a small U.S. town plays as a odd hybrid of courtroom potboiler and lurid thriller. A woman named Marsha Mitchell (Ginger Rogers) is passing … Continue reading Playing Catch-Up — Storm Warning; Pickpocket; Bombshell: The Hedy Lamarr Story
Craig Gillespie’s Lars and the Real Girl is a small marvel of gracious, empathetic filmmaking. Centered on a lonely, withdrawn man who engages in a tender love affair with a life-size doll, the film is primed for harsh mockery. Instead, … Continue reading Now Playing — I, Tonya
It’s been a little more than forty years since simple letters in a crystal blue font first informed audiences they were about to see a story that happened in a distant galaxy quite some time earlier. Conceived and directed by … Continue reading Now Playing — Star Wars: The Last Jedi
Coffee for Two 