Zabriskie Point (1970) :(((

This film was obviously aimed at 1960s LSD addicts, as they are the only ones who could understand what the hell director Michelangelo Antonioni was trying to say with Zabriskie Point (1970).  Lets look at some of the bands whose music is played in it: Pink Floyd, the Kaleidoscope, and the Grateful Dead.  Need I say more? The movie bombed at the box office, but has become a cult classic over the years. This is yet another sign that this...

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Jurassic Park (1993) **

I’m one of those people who as a child could have cared less about dinosaurs. I never had a desire to learn all of the dinosaur names or go to museums and look at their skeletal remains. When I visited the Field Museum in Chicago I was more interested in looking at the Aztec, Inca and Maya collections that anything else.  As such, it should come as no surprise that I just wasn’t that into director Steven Spielberg’s Jurassic Park (1993). Yes,...

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1900 (Novecento) 1976 **

  So this film is really long—really long: 317 minutes.  I’m not always opposed to films that take an inordinate amount of time to watch. I liked Shoah (1985), War and Peace (1967), and Fanny and Alexander (1983). But then there are films like director Bernardo Bertolucci’s 1900 (1976), which seem to drag on for way too long.  Granted, Bertolucci was working for a producer (Alberto Grimaldi) who locked him out of the editing room,...

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The Sting (1973) ***

Other than my husband, Mr. Clooney, there never was a sexier man than Paul Newman. As such, I would enjoy watching The Sting (1973) even if the story wasn’t extremely clever and the music memorable.  Thankfully, Oscar-winning director George Roy Hill’s Best Picture winner is all of those things and so much more. Nominated for ten Academy Awards (it won seven), The Sting is loaded with great performances and is a stylish production. The Oscar...

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The Story of a Cheat (Le Roman d’un Tricheur) 1936 **

Never heard of this film or its director, writer, and star, Sacha Guitry?  If you answered yes, you are probably not alone.  Guitry was a prolific French playwright who liked to make cynical films (he directed 33). So, how did such a busy director fall into obscurity?  He fell in with the wrong crowd—notably, he collaborated with the Nazis during WWII.  Guitry has only recently be reintroduced to the cinematic world due to a...

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All That Jazz (1979) **1/2

This is vanity at its most pretentious. Fellini had his 8 1/2 (1963) and director Bob Fosse had his All That Jazz (1979). Like Fellini, there is much to like about a Fosse production, but there are also, like Fellini, quibbles to be had, too.  Films with an autobiographical bent can sometimes become too fantastical, and, well, self-indulgent—there are elements of both in All That Jazz. Joe Gideon (Roy Scheider) is a successful director of...

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The Artist (2011) **1/2

When it comes to artistic achievement, director Michel Hazanavicius’ The Artist (2011) should be duly lauded. Nominated for ten Academy Awards, it took home Oscars for Best Picture, Best Director, Best Original Score (Ludovic Bource), Costume Design (Mark Bridges), and Best Actor (Jean Dujardin). Making a silent, black and white movie in 2011 took guts, and in the end it paid off for Hazanavicius and Dujardin. Still, that doesn’t mean I have to...

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