By John H. Foote (****) Streaming on Netflix It took two viewings of this new film from Spike Lee for me to truly understand the power, perhaps because as a white man I will never understand the black experience and what it was to be black and fighting the war in Vietnam. History has shown…
By Nick Maylor (*) I’m a big fan of Kenneth Branagh, both as an actor and a director. He’s shown tremendous talent in front of the camera and behind it. He has taken on many famous worlds of popular folklore. He’s directed in the realms of Shakespeare, Marvel, Tom Clancy, Disney Princesses, Agatha Christie and…
By John H. Foote (**) Al Capone has been portrayed often onscreen, most recently by the great Stephen Graham in Boardwalk Empire where the actor captured the ambition and fury of a young Capone. Robert De Niro is perhaps the most famous Capone on film in The Untouchables (1987), wielding a baseball bat with deadly…
By John H. Foote (****) Each year great films slip through the cracks, often to be discovered on Blu Ray or rep cinemas, though the latter has become less frequent. Queen and Slim was such a film for me, and one I regret not seeing sooner. If I had, the film would have cracked my…
By John H. Foote (***) Alcoholism has been portrayed truthfully on screen since The Lost Weekend (1945) won the Academy Award for Best Picture during the war years. Through history great actors such as Jack Lemmon and Lee Remick in Days of Wine and Roses (1962) and, perhaps best of all, Nicolas Cage in Leaving…
By John H. Foote (***) Clint Eastwood once stated that half of his job was done with casting, that once the actors were in place, he could relax and just let them do their job on set. He believes that actors are very creative people, hired to do a job and he expects them to…
By John H. Foote (**) Jack London wrote the great adventure novel “The Call of the Wild” in 1903 to great acclaim and it has been filmed many times since, both for the big screen and television. The best-known version is still the 1935 film starring Clark Gable as Jack Thornton, though that might change…
By John H. Foote Crazy to be even talking about next year’s Oscars, right? Not really. I promise you the studios are already in full swing setting up release dates, marketing campaigns, festival screenings and for your consideration campaigns for when the films are screened. Next year’s Oscar race is already in motion, the wheels…
By John H. Foote (BOMB) If I see a worse film this year than Fantasy Island, which is even worse than Dolittle somehow, I will be amazed. Beyond stupid, it is insipid, empty of imagination of any kind and vile, a complete about face from the silly TV series from which it has been adapted.…
By John H. Foote (*) Hollywood remakes of foreign language films almost never pan out, there is always something missing. This applies to this film, which played at Sundance, a remake of the Swedish picture Force Majeure (2014), it just never gets off the ground despite game performances from the two leads, Julia Louis-Dreyfus and…