Theater/Film Reviews
-
A Steady Rain
The Chicago School of drama, led by such as David Mamet, Nelson Algren and Tracy Letts, involves pain, profanity and polarization, in almost-equal parts. It's well-represented in newcomer Keith Huff's "A Steady Rain," which opened last night in the Rep's Studio Theatre and will run through Feb. 5. It's tough theater, directed in proper style
-
A Dangerous Method
Michael Fassbender has been on movie screens everywhere, it seems, playing a variety of characters and handling all of them very well. "A Dangerous Method," in which he portrays Carl Jung, "Haywire," an action flick, and "Shame," in which he's a cold sex addict, all open here today. ("Shame" will be the next review.) They
-
Shame
Adolescent boys have little on their minds except sex. Brandon Sullivan is no longer a teenager, but he has nothing on his mind except sex. Something is quite wrong with the man, and that’s the story of “Shame,” another Michael Fassbender-Steve McQueen collaboration that opens today and leaves a feeling of dissatisfaction. Fassbender is a
-
Nuremberg
At the end of World War II, coming up on 66 years ago, Nazi leaders were put on trial in Nuremberg, Germany, charged with a variety of war crimes. The U. S. government commissioned Stuart Schulberg, a screenwriter and brother of Budd Schulberg, to shoot a documentary film of the trial, called, simply, “:Nuremberg.” A
-
Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close
Count on post-viewing arguments after watching “Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close,” a tear-jerker that counts on reactions to 9/11 as a starting place, with one’s feelings toward amazingly precocious children serving as kindling. We have Thomas Horn as 9-year-old Oskar Schell, only child of Thomas (Tom Hanks) and Linda (Sandra Bullock). Thomas dies on the
-
Pariah
As if high school years weren't difficult without any extra baggage, Alike (Adepero Oduye) is trying to deal with her growing knowledge that she is a lesbian. That's the premise of "Pariah," the well-made little film that is Dee Rees' debut as a writer and director. The taut movie opens today. Oduye, who was born
-
Red Tails
It’s a comic strip, but that isn’t all bad. George Lucas is involved, and Lucas loves the aerial warfare of World War II, when P-41s and P-47s and P-51s did battle with Stukas and Messerschmitts and Zeros, and our fliers outflew their fliers and shot them out of the sky in flaming crashes and huge
-
Bond. James Bond.
Three Sean Connerys and one Roger Moore — that's the 007 lineup for a four-night extravaganza of James Bond movies running Jan. 19-22 as part of the Webster Film Series. They all begin at 7:30 p.m. in the Winifred Moore Auditorium on the Webster University campus. "Dr. No" (1962) opens on Thursday, with "Goldfinger" (1964),
-
Space Junk
Human beings certainly have a single, and single-minded, excellence at one thing , They certainly can screw things up in terms of how they live. They have practically despoiled their home planet — water and air are polluted, and getting worse. Crops are loaded with chemicals; fish and animals are being destroyed. And now we're
-
The Iron Lady
If there’s a sure thing in the Academy Awards competition, it’s Meryl Streep as Best Actress for “The Iron Lady,” a biographical tale of Margaret Thatcher, long-time conservative prime minister of England. Once again, Streep depicts a real person, as she did with Julia Child in “Julia and Julia,” and once again she simply nails