Last year, The Debut, a highly professional and dramatic film about experiences of Filipino Americans in Southern California, presented some of the problems faced by various generations of Filipinos in the United States. This year, The Flip Side, a low-budget black-and-white movie directed by Rod Pulido, has the same objective but is far more amateurish in acting and […]
Before 1949, gays played a visible role during New Year celebrations in Shanghai. When Communist rule began, the gay contingent was gunned down, as the new regime believed that same-sex affection was a bourgeois aberration. Thus, release of the government-sponsored Fleeing by Night (Ye Ben) two years ago represented a revolution in Communist thinking. The story
Custom, whether based on norms of social etiquette or rules of religious authorities, can empower the few and make life miserable for the many. The Indian film The Fire and the Rain (Agni Varsha), directed by Arjun Sajnani, presents a case in point. The story is an adaptation of Girish Karnad’s play based upon “The
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When Equilibrium begins, a voiceover tells us, accompanied by stills of Stalin and Saddam Hussein, that World War III in the early twenty-first century so devastated the world that a new order arose to prevent World War IV. The new order, Librium (obviously named after the once-used tranquilizer for calming irritable bowels), embarked on a mission to
How does one become an accomplished actor or actress? What are the appropriate life experiences and coaching secrets? Esther Kahn, directed and written by Arnaud Desplechin, provides answers to both questions, at least for one Jewish tenement girl in London at the end of the nineteenth century, in a film 145 minutes in length. The story
Best-selling American films often have a lot of action in which a maverick hero defies everyone but nevertheless gets the job done spectacularly. xXx, directed by Rob Cohen, is the quintessential action film, with the hero Xander Cage (played by Vin Diesel) somehow evading gunfire while riding a motorcycle, skiing ahead of an avalanche on a
Imagine a comedy by Edgar Allan Poe! The Facts in the Case of M. Valdemar (1845), Poe’s short story, is anything but. Brought to the screen by director Gil Cates, Jr., as The Mesmerist, the attempt at comedy is a butchery of Poe’s genius. Fewer cinema patrons stayed through the entire screening that I attended, but some remained
Star Wars: Episode II–Attack of the Clones, as expected, features a lot of high-tech violence due to traitors and treachery. “Politicians are not to be trusted” we hear early in the film. The story begins ten years after Episode I with an attempted assassination of Senator Padmé Amidala (played by Natalie Portman), whereupon jedi Obi-Wan Kenobi (played
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Swept Away, directed by Guy Ritchie, begins when Anthony Leighton (played by Bruce Greenwood), a wealthy corporate executive, charters a small Italian fishing yacht for a brief vacation with his wife Amber (played by Madonna, the director’s spouse) and two other couples. The women are extremely bitchy, insulting the Italian crew on board, especially Giuseppe
Spider-Man, directed by Sam Raimi, is yet another recent film bringing a comic book character to the screen. Peter Parker (played by Tobey Maguire), an intelligent but nerdy high school senior in Queens, provides voiceovers at the beginning that the story is about Mary Jane Watson (played by Kirsten Dunst), a girl whom he has