APES DISLIKE WAR, BUT DO HUMANS? “They’re animals and they attacked” is the simplistic justification for Dreyfus (played by Gary Oldman) to launch war in The Dawn of the Planet of the Apes, directed by Matt Reeves. Just substitute Saddam Hussein and the Iraqis for “animals,” and the film would be accused of partisanship. But […]

A COFFEE IN BERLIN IS BLACK WITHOUT CREAM OR SUGAR Director Jan Ole Gerster, born in Hagen near the French border, has had enough of the rudeness of Berliners. So he has made A Coffee in Berlin to expose overly aggressive characters throughout the city, while his hero, Niko Fischer (played by Tom Schilling) puts

Dormant Beauty and Lullaby, released the same week in Los Angeles, present different situations but culturally predictable stories, posing the question who has the right to end life. Dormant Beauty (Bella addormentata), directed by Marco Bellocchio, dramatizes the famous situation in 2009, when Beppe Englaro announced his decision to take his daughter Eluana, in a

POLICEMAN REVEALS HOW ISRAEL DEALS WITH “TERRORISTS” For almost 40 minutes, Policeman (Ha-Shoter) begins by depicting camaraderie among a counterterrorist unit of the Israeli police force, focusing on Yaron (played by Yiftak Kllein). But soon deception and hypocrisy cloud his reputation: After urging his pregnant wife Nili (Maital Barda) not to incur bad luck by

For Lullaby, directed by Andrew Levitas, a Jewish man (Richard Jenkins) in New York chooses to end his life of suffering after 12 years of terminal cancer, though he was only given 6 months to live when diagnosed. His wife (Anne Archer) and children display self-centered emotional responses at first and then maudlin emotion, as

NIGHT MOVES IS A NOIR WHYDUNNIT Why would three eco-terrorists blow up a dam on a river in Oregon that already has several dams? That’s the question that bugs filmviewers if they care to stay to the ending of Night Moves, directed by Kelly Reichardt. Early in the film a documentary-within-the-film makes the case that

BURNING BLUE IS RELEASED TOO LATE FOR AN IMPACT In 2011, the “Don’t Ask/Don’t Tell” policy was abolished, filmviewers are reminded at the end of the poorly written Burning Blue which, if released earlier, might have influenced passage. D.M.W. Greer, the director, had written a play based on his own experiences that got attention on

AGE OF UPRISING PORTRAYS THE EARLY CLASH BETWEEN FEUDALISM AND CAPITALISM Michael Kohlhaas (played by Mads Mikkelsen), a 16th century trader who has accumulated considerable property and many servants, is on his way to sell two black horses and other commodities when he is stopped on a road over a bridge by a baron (Swann

THE IMMIGRANT DEALS WITH ELLIS ISLAND GRAFT IN 1921 Ewa Cybulska (played by Marion Cotillard) and her sister Magda (Angela Sarafyn) hope to make a new life together in America after their parents are killed in Poland during World War I. They take a boat to New York, disembark at Ellis Island, and are in

THE RETRIEVAL MAKES UP A STRANGE STORY Without titles or voiceovers, the plot of The Retrieval is difficult to discern because the actors, who have good diction in person, mumble their lines almost incoherently on screen. The best way to figure out the plot is to attend a screening followed by a Question-and-Answer session with