Article: Movies

BSN: Did you base the character on someone you know?
ML: Yeah, kind of my grandmother and my mother. My mother’s just not as big as Big Momma, but the voice that’s on Big Momma kind of comes from my moms and my grandmother.

However, I still part company from my colleagues in my staunch refusal to serve as a marketing arm of the film industry which would have us only mention movies currently in theaters. So, I’m strongly suggesting that after perusing my primary list based on Hollywood blockbusters, that you continue reading think about renting some of the equally-deserving lesser-knowns representative of other genres.

She was surprised to discover that nearly everyone she met had not only once known another Grace Lee, but they also seemed to have a similar narrow opinion of her. Each of these new acquaintances would invariably describe their Grace as modest, nice, quiet, smart, passive, accomplished and Christian.

The nerd wearing glasses is the painfully-shy, never-been-kissed wallflower. The stoner with weed-wacker hair, strumming a guitar is the moody loner. The flamboyant gay guy is a shameless flirt. The straitlaced Brit is a shrink. The Italian pizza delivery boy is a stud for hire. The infertile housewife can only hear her biological clock ticking. The solicitous porn star is a ditz spilling out of her dress. Need I continue?

Worse, his monstrous male lead is a seemingly just a serious version of the flip, introspective misogynist Allen himself usually portrays in his semi-autobiographical comedies. In sum, Match Point proves to be an intriguing enough adventure, provided you haven’t seen Crimes and Misdemeanors and don’t mind rooting for a despicable, amoral philanderer

Meanwhile, the movie fails to address adequately the question of whether such a selfish indulgence might ruin the lives of their wives and kids. Thus, it conveniently ignores all the very serious fallout visited upon the innocent victims of guys “on the down low� like we see regularly discussed on TV talk shows such as Oprah and Dr. Phil. In sum, Brokeback’s unapologetically gay agenda aggressively implores us to celebrate homosexuality for homosexuality’s sake. While this approach turns out to be a tad too simplistic for my taste, this cowboy flick’s fatal flaw rests with its extolling the virtues of man-on-man mating to the point of its just being boring.

By the time the ensuing, tense standoff ended with a bloody shootout about 20 hours later after a badly botched rescue attempt, 11 Israeli hostages, 1 policeman, and 5 of the terrorists lay dead. “They’re all gone,� was the ever-echoing refrain uttered by stunned, ABC-TV anchorman Jim McKay when he went on the air to inform the public. Munich, an emotionally-engaging, espionage thriller directed by Steven Spielberg, revisits the retribution eventually exacted in the aftermath of that awful tragedy.

Good Night, and Good Luck effectively recreates afresh the air of paranoia which had permeated the U.S. during the Cold War, transporting its audience back a half-century, imperceptibly weaving old newsreels in with painstakingly-recreated tableaus. Though the chain-smoking Murrow emerges as the hero, here, he is, nonetheless, upstaged by the technical wizardry which has him sharing scenes with archival newsreels of cultural icons like Robert F. Kennedy and Roy Cohn

The plot thickens when Bishop Taylor is stricken with an advanced cancer and left little time to get his affairs in order. When David learns that his father is terminally-hill, he puts plans for his next concert tour on hold and returns home to take care of his dad, over the objections of his avaricious hangers-on.

Susan Sarandon found acting almost by accident when she accompanied her ex-husband, Chris Sarandon, to an audition for Joe (1970). While he didn’t get the job, she did land a role, and thus began her critically-acclaimed career which has resulted in a quintet of Academy Award-nominations.