A TOUCH OF SIN IS A CRUDE SLICE OF CHINA TODAY If you want to understand contemporary China, you can take a tour, read books, or for real depth, you must see A Touch of Sin (Tian zhu ding), directed by Zhangke Jia. In French realism style, four main characters are portrayed as if in […]
Captain Richard Phillips (played by Tom Hanks), civilian captain of the unarmed ship Maersk Alabama, was carrying cargo in the pirate-infested Indian Ocean adjacent to Somalia in 2009. Pirates boarded the vessel and for 4 days held the brave captain, who cleverly saved his crew, until rescued by SEALs. Captain Phillips, directed by Paul Greengrass,
Based on the nonfiction book of Vincent Bugliosi, Four Days in November: The Assassination of President John F. Kennedy (2007), the film Parkland (the name of the hospital that received dying bodies of both John F. Kennedy and Lee Harvey Oswald) does not try to respond to the speculative JFK (1991), directed by Oliver Stone,
ELYSIUM PREDICTS A FUTURE FOR PLANETARY LIFE Science fiction often depicts boring we/they action films, and that’s what Elysium offers for the most part. But director Neill Blomkamp also provides a more serious agenda in which global warning has made life difficult, machines do the policing, and the rich have left for Elysium, a new
THE LONE RANGER TRIES TO APOLOGIZE TO TONTO First on radio, later on television, the series The Lone Ranger depicted Tonto (Jay Silverheels) in a very subordinate role. Now brought to the screen by director Gore Verbinski, Tonto is not portrayed by a Native American but instead by Johnny Depp, with the Lone Ranger (played
FRUITVALE STATION OF 2009 = MARTIN & ZIMMERMAN OF 2012? While America awaited the verdict in the Zimmerman trial over the death of Treyvon Martin, Fruitvale Station was released, providing an eerie parallel: A man with a badge is charged with the murder of a young black male. Directed by Ryan Coogler, Fruitvale Station begins
WHITE HOUSE DOWN EXPLOITS OBAMAPHOBIA Radical opponents of President Barack Obama wish that he would somehow be deposed. White House Down, directed by Roland Emmerich, fulfills that fantasy for a few minutes. But most of the time the action film focuses on the takeover of the White House, including hostages, and efforts of John Cale
HUMAN SEX TRAFFICKING IS PORTRAYED IN TRADE OF INNOCENTS Trade of Innocents, directed by Christopher Bessette, is about teenage prostitutes in Cambodia. Two Americans, Alex and Claire Becker (played by Dermot Mulroney and Mira Sorvino) go to Cambodia (though filmed in Bangkok) to liberate the girls after their own 7-year-old daughter had been kidnapped and
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LEONIE IS A BIOPIC OF THE WOMAN WHO MADE 2 JAPANESE MEN FAMOUS After graduating from Bryn Mawr, Leonie Gilmour (played by Emily Mortimer) applies for the job of editor for the poet Yone Noguchi (played by Shidô Nakamura) in New York and is hired. Yone soon declares his love, and she becomes pregnant with
KEN LOACH DEPICTS REDEMPTION IN THE ANGELS’ SHARE Director Ken Loach, long noted for social problem films, begins The Angels’ Share with an inebriated Scotsman who is among several in the next scene pleading guilty to receive the mercy of a Glasgow court, namely, hundreds of hours of “community payback.” One in particular, Robbie (played