By John H. Foote 91-year old Lina Wertmuller, the first woman ever nominated for an Academy Award as Best Director, will receive an Honorary Oscar next month as well as be awarded a Star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. Wertmuller, an Italian filmmaker dominated her country’s cinema in the seventies, especially Swept Away (1975)…
By John H. Foote (*) Rarely has either Steven Soderbergh or the extraordinary Meryl Streep made such a weak, empty film as this. Soderbergh emerged as the boy wonder of 1989, his film sex, lies and videotape earning him raves and the Cannes Film Festival’s top prize. But the years in between were mighty lean,…
By John H. Foote (****) For centuries Mary Magdalene was thought to be a prostitute who befriended Christ after he saved her from being stoned. In 2016, after centuries of exploration, the study of ancient texts and the papers that are hidden away in the Vatican library, Mary Magdalene was cleared of being a prostitute…
By John H. Foote At the conclusion of American Graffiti (1973) as the plane carries Curt high into the heavens, college-bound, the faces of the characters we have just spent two hours with flash onto the screen, their futures appear in a title card with their yearbook photo. With melancholy and deep sadness, we learn…
By John H. Foote Long ago Jack Nicholson passed Marlon Brando as the greatest screen actor of his generation. As good as his friend Brando was, Nicholson had greater range and was fearless with his image. He knew what audiences liked and could not care less, he took roles that interested him, that challenged him…
By John H. Foote (****) Arguably the greatest western ever made, the finest film of John Ford’s great career, and containing John Wayne’s ferocious, finest performance, The Searchers (1956) is an American classic, among the finest films to emerge from the fifties. Though admired and respected at the time, its lacerating, staggering power was not…
By John H. Foote (****) Though more recent than most of the films I like to Revisit, The Revenant is a masterpiece no less deserving of celebration for its artistry and daring. For his visceral, stunning performance in The Revenant (2015), Leonardo DiCaprio finally won a long-overdue Academy Award for Best Actor, and the truth…
By John H. Foote (***) Robert Eggers’ new film wowed audiences at Cannes and TIFF, the nightmarish black and white cinematography calling to mind the great films of the German Expressionistic period. Dread fills every frame, from the first blast of the lighthouse horn before the isolated tower comes into view through the fog, through…
By John H. Foote (****) If they crossed the comic minds of Charles Chaplin, the Marx Brothers, Monty Python and Mel Brooks, that might begin to give an idea about the daffy, dazzling comic genius of Jo Jo Rabbit. Easily the funniest American film I have seen since Sideways (2004), possibly the most divisive since…
By John H. Foote Based on a study of the history of the Academy Awards, inside knowledge and buzz, my own guy instincts and who I hope will be in the Oscar race, the Foote Forecast will appear every two weeks with updates in the categories listed. Understand Best Animated, Documentary and Live Action Shorts…