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![]() Butter is rancid, a comedy devoid of laughs and full of bile. No LOLs, no guffaws, not even a single smile gets triggered by its steady stream of condescension. Mean spiritedness in a comedy can work, so long as the movie brings the laughs. If it’s unfunny, then it’s just smug, catty and mean…
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A figment of Hollywood imagination
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![]() The good news about Rust and Bone is that it’s not about an orca trainer’s accident. It’s about her recovery. In any case, hers is only half the story, the rest being about an oafish stud with a small child in tow. What happens to father and son is tougher to take than what happens to her – …
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Communing Mammals: Human and Orca
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![]() True stories bear a burden when they get turned into movies. Stay true to the story and the movie will be less than spectacular. Punch it up and get accused of selling out. Lay the Favorite falls prey to the former as it recounts a real young woman’s underground education. The indomitable…
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Formidable Wife: Catherine's Tulip
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![]() Ghost stories should all be as good as Mama, as should Jessica Chastain performances. While the teens in Mama’s PG-13 demographic may not care about Chastain, we adults dragged along for the ride do. Fortunately everyone will value seeing a first-rate ghost story – spooky, startling, affectin…
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Nothing vulnerable about this Chastain
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![]() King of the Hill is a real life Little Rascals, what with pipsqueak brothers living alone during the Great Depression. Amazingly, it’s the truthy autobiography of A.E. Hotchner, Paul Newman’s pal and business partner. Even if fictional, it would still charm and enlighten, as it’s a perfect fi…
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Charming and Enlightening
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![]() I read On The Road by 21 because it was necessary. I saw On The Road this weekend to be entertained. Entertaining it is, though cultural legacy aside, mad words about mad living don’t make a great movie, not without great acting and a cinematic story, neither of which On The Road has….
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Hand Check!
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![]() Sweet soul music forms the soundtrack of this infectiously enjoyable Australian musical-comedy. Telling the truthy tale of four black girls from Down Under who performed American soul music for U.S. GIs and Marines in Vietnam, The Sapphires tickles, touches and torches in equal measure. Bla…
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The Sapphires' smoking hot What A Man
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![]() Elemental kid’s movie, just 40 minutes long, thy name is White Mane. It’s from France of all places, with French cowboys. Really. And wild French horses – white horses and white stallions. White Mane, the leader of a herd of wild Camargues, "was a proud and fearsome horse. All the other h…
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Wild Camargues on the run. Fabuleux!
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![]() French musical sensation Serge Gainsbourg explains himself in this surreal biopic. Largely unknown here in America, Gainsbourg was a cross between Dylan, Sinatra and Leonard Cohen in France. The women he squired – including Brigitte Bardot during her superstar heyday – comprise a good part of h…
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Musician's Beauty: Gainsbourg & Bardot
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![]() Like most industries, the modeling industry has a supply chain. Girl Model documents one tawdry strand, originating in the tiny villages of Siberia and ending in the glitzy salons of Japan. It’s not a pretty picture. It is full of pretty girls, many shockingly young. The Japanese like pub…
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Model scout: Regrets? She's got a few.
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