Ann Lemons Pollack
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American: The Billl Hicks Story
"American: The Bill Hicks Story," opens here today, offering an opportunity to watch a comic channel Lenny Bruce, who did it all and did it better more than a half-century earlier. There's nothing wrong in watching another person follow a similar path to too-early death, but reading reviews of the documentary on Hicks makes me
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City of Life and Death
"City of Life and Death," looks at the 1937 Rape of Nanking with a direct, unblinking eye, making it one of the most frightening, most stomach-twisting movies I've ever seen. Shot in black and white, which only emphasizes everything, it's mesmerizing in its power, even as it makes one's skin crawl watching man's inhumanity to
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Page One: Inside the New York Times
When a corporation commissions a movie about itself, you know there are going to be problems. It will be self-serving, self-conscious and a good old-fashioned puff piece. Mostly, however, movies like this are shown to boards of directors, focus groups, the employees, perhaps at an anniversary dinner or a retirement or family function of some
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Trollhunter
Remember “The Blair Witch Project,” that utterly inane mock documentary in which a bunch of kids supposedly filmed their own adventure in some woods where they went camping and met an other-worldly villain bent on killing them? Well, “Trollhunter,” opening today, repeats the nonsense, but in Norwegian, written and directed by Andre Ovredal. Once again,
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This Week’s Wine
"Que sera, sera, whatever will be, will be," sang Doris Day in "The Man Who Knew Too Much." That was in 1956, when hardly anyone knew about "sera," or "Syrah," pronounced similarly but approached differently. The former is a form of the Spanish verb, "to be," and adding "que," makes it work as the line
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Brunch: Vin de Set
There’s an old, disparaging comment about over-produced, under-composed musical theater, “No one ever walks away whistling the scenery.” And there’s a certain element of that at Vin de Set’s brunch. It’s truly a lovely series of rooms, and the large rooftop area, with a fine view of downtown, draws rapturous fans, at least when the
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Beginners
“Beginners” is an excellent movie that deserves the chance to be seen by a lot more people than its “R” rating will provide. It’s a very simple story, beautifully written and directed by Mike Mills, and based to some extent on his own life. Hal (the matchless Christopher Plummer) is 75 years old and has
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Bride Flight
There’s a lot of soap opera, and considerable sex, to “Bride Flight,” a Dutch romance involving three young women who emigrate from the Netherlands, battered and still weary from World II, to young, fresh New Zealand. Two have been married by proxy, the third is betrothed. All are looking for new lives. For some reason,
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Conan O’Brien Can’t Stop
Hardly anybody in show business had a tougher two years than Conan O’Brien in 2009 and 2010. However, given the opportunity to make chicken salad out of a cow’s ear, he leaped at it and went on a live tour, covering 30 cities in “The Legally Prohibited from Being Funny on Television” tour, which was
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101 Dalmatians
If parents are interested in encouraging children to understand, appreciate and like musical theater, Disney may not be the perfect place to start. But his simple tales are geared for little ones. "101 Dalmatians," which opened yesterday at Stages St. Louis, fits its target audience, is nicely staged, runs only 45 minutes, and kept an