weekend watchlist: the plot to trick Hitler
Plus grownup romance and a bland dystopia, and more. (First published May 21st, 2022, on Substack and Patreon.)
Colin Firth
The Secret Garden movie review: weedy with misplaced eeriness
Pointless adaptation of the beloved children’s novel soaked in a gothic spookiness that seems to deliberately misunderstand the story. Neither literal enough nor magical enough. My heart was unmoved.
The Happy Prince movie review: in the gutter, looking at the stars
Writer, director, and star Rupert Everett’s labor of cinematic love, about the last years of Oscar Wilde, is a small wonder of contradictions: nightmarish yet sanguine, a bit sordid yet full of grace.
The Mercy movie review: a sea of troubles
An unsettling true story smartly told, from a moment in time at once uniquely its own and a harbinger of things to come. Colin Firth is subtle, unflinching, extraordinary.
curated: the Brexit talent drain is real
Colin Firth has taken Italian citizenship.
Kingsman: The Golden Circle movie review: deliver us from “edgy”
Save us from male artists who think they are dangerously, uniquely innovative. This stew of toxic masculinity and CGI-cartoon violence is nothing but tediously mundane.
Bridget Jones’s Baby movie review: how to infantilize women
The desperation, the neuroticism, and the idiocy of Bridget Jones continues to be appalling, not appealing. She is not the everywoman she is meant to be.
from Facebook: Mr. Darcy, Jedi Knight
[This post is not behind the paywall.]
Kingsman: The Secret Service movie review: forgets its manners
I cannot recall a film that left me with such a sour taste in my mouth by its end. Does the movie deliberately defy itself with obnoxious intent?
AWFJ 2014 award winners
The Alliance of Women Film Journalists is one of the orgs for which I help choose year-end best-ofs.
