Roustabout movie review
Elvis Presley takes a job as a roustabout at a carnival, gets slapped by a lot by girls with frighteningly waspish waists, and sings corny carny songs. In superbright Technicolor! Silly movie.
romance
Shrek (review)
If there’s any truth to the saying that cynics are nothing but disappointed optimists, then Shrek is the very embodiment of it, its cheery and confident optimistic heart beating underneath a tough outer layer that’s grim and twisted, one that seems at first to have given up on fantasy.
The Princess Bride (review)
To avoid the first Classic Blunder, you should: A. Never go up against a Sicilian when death is on the line; B. Never get involved in a land war in Asia; C. Never utter a line from The Princess Bride unless you want to be spouting quotes all day
Murphy’s Romance movie review
So wonderful and so rare a film, gentle and warmly humanistic, about two people falling in love depicted plainly, honestly, and — in a way that often eludes Hollywood — with amiable realism.
Double Indemnity (review)
In the wee hours of July 16, 1938, an insurance salesman Walter Neff sits down at a dictation machine in the offices of Pacific All-Risk in Los Angeles to record a confession. That guy Dietrichson, who died mysteriously? Neff killed him.
Harold and Maude movie review
Uplifting and unsentimental, with a fresh and warm appreciation for the eccentricities that make life interesting, this is probably the most charming movie about death that’s ever been made.
Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon movie review: arthouse action
Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon will make you fall in love with film all over again. Instantly one of the greatest ever adventure movies, it’s also a touching, tender story of love forbidden and denied.
American Beauty (again) (review)
Was American Beauty the single best film of 1999? I can’t decide. The second time I watched the film, on a widescreen video screener after it won the Oscar for Best Picture, I thought with horror: I named this sitcom one of my best films of the year? On a third viewing, also on the small screen, I saw once again all the brilliance that I saw the first time around, and more.
Holiday Inn movie review: two guys and a girl
God, I love those snarky 40s comedies in which there’s just a bit of meanness under the humor. Holiday Inn is, of course, filled with the kind of pretty Christmas songs and picture-postcard scenes of snow and horse-drawn sleighs that make for beloved holiday movies. But there’s also some darkness lurking here.
American Beauty (review)
The Lester that American Beauty offers us at first is anything but inspirational — in fact, he may be one of the most unlikable protagonists to hit the screen in a while. A ‘horny geek boy,’ as his teenage daughter calls him, a ‘gigantic loser’ as he calls himself, Lester tells us right as the film opens that he’ll be dead in less than a year. And we don’t care.
