[5] An aspiring writer decides to tell the stories of African-American maids during the turbulent ’60s, risking community scorn to publish the truth. The Help, based on the novel by Kathryn Stockett, weaves the stories of several black and white women in Jackson, Mississippi. Emma Stone plays the writer, with Viola Davis playing her first interview subject, a woman who recently buried her young adult …
[7] Humphrey Bogart escapes from San Quentin to try and prove he’s innocent of killing his wife. Lauren Bacall plays the woman who believes him and gives him shelter. He resorts to plastic surgery to hide his identity from the police and extortionists, but will he be able to discover who the real killer is? Or will he be forced to flee the country? Dark …
[5] Chris Pine, Lou Taylor Pucci (Thumbsucker), Piper Perabo (Coyote Ugly), and Emily VanCamp (Everwood) roam the empty western United States after a plague has killed most of the population. They do their best to avoid desperate stragglers, but have a harder time not turning on each other when the disease finally catches up with them. Carriers is well acted and captures a compelling post-apocalyptic …
[4] Jack Nicholson and Morgan Freeman play terminally-ill cancer patients who decide to make one last go at their ‘bucket list’ — a list of things to see and do before they die. I usually trust director Rob Reiner (When Harry Met Sally, The Princess Bride) to deliver the goods, but this one’s a misfire for me. The opening act is naturally a sad one, …
[6] Embeth Davidtz (Army of Darkness) and Alessandro Nivola (The Art of Self-Defense) play married Chicago art dealers who stay with Nivola’s North Carolina family while Davidtz negotiates to represent a controversial painter who lives nearby. Nivola’s parents and brother put up a wall of quiet disapproval to Davidtz, but it slowly comes down as they realize she’s not the ‘elitist’ they fear. In contrast, …
[7] Colin Farrell stars as a free-spirited young man who enters into a romantic triangle with a woman (Robin Wright) and his boyhood friend (Dallas Roberts). A Home at the End of the World, based on the novel by Michael Cunningham (The Hours), takes us through three decades in these characters’ lives. The first quarter of the movie shows us how Farrell’s character was shaped …
[4] Samuel L. Jackson stars as a homeless man trying to solve the murder of a young gay man who was the muse for a famous New York City photographer. Jackson’s character has a hard time getting anyone to take him seriously — not just because he’s homeless, but because he’s delusional. He believes an all-powerful man lives at the top of the Chrysler Building …
[6] Walter Huston headlines this Howard Hawks prison drama about a district attorney who becomes warden of a facility where he’s responsible for half the men’s sentences. Co-starring is fresh-faced Phillips Holmes as a twenty-year old who accidentally kills a man during a bar brawl. Huston sympathizes with the young man, but sends him to prison for a ten year sentence. Once he’s warden six …
[6] A selfish senator forces his closeted gay son to be the poster boy for his re-election campaign. Meanwhile, an AIDS activist plans to publicly ‘out’ the son during a college campaign stop. Trouble is, the senator’s son and the AIDS activist start to really fall in love. Poster Boy is ambitious in its storytelling, juggling multiple characters and subplots. While it loses focus a …
[7] Two young couples rent a Winnebago for a cross-country road trip, but jealousy soon turns their romantic adventure into a nightmare. Richard Hatch (Battlestar Galactica) and Doug Chapin play the men, both recently discharged from service in Vietnam and anxious to begin new lives. Hatch plans to marry his fiancée (Susanne Benton), but Chapin tries to talk him out of it, fearing marriage will …
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