I’m currently on my third straight day of being laid up with the flu. It hurts to walk and the idea of eating solid food makes me cringe, and also, I’m ever whinier than usual. On the positive side, though, in addition to watching innumerable hours of Star Trek, I’ve managed to squeeze in some…
moviereview
Devdas (2002)
I still don’t have enough of a Bollywood vocabulary to put this in its proper place, but to me, this is what I think about when I think about Bollywood movies — 185 minutes of romance, elaborate dance numbers, and over-the-top, no-holds-barred melodrama. It also has some really striking eye candy, both in the sets…
Bamboozled (2000)
The opening shot of Spike Lee’s Bamboozled features Damon Wayans, playing a thoroughly co-opted buppie television writer, nasally reciting the dictionary definition of “satire”. The movie ends with a montage of racist depictions of African-Americans in the media (take that, Birth of a Nation!). These two scenes probably tell you everything you need to know…
Shoot the Piano Player (1960)
I have really not been much of a booster of the French New Wave cinema of the 1960s. I tend to become exasperated with their intellectual high-mindedness and roll my eyes at their sentimentality. The one exception I’m finding is the films of Truffaut. Unlike Godard and Roemer, Truffaut actually seems to want to make…
Bangkok Dangerous (1999)
I rented this with no idea there was an Nic Cage-starring remake scheduled for release later this year. I actually got it out of my longstanding love for stylish Asian gangster movies and my affection for the big, dirty, too-hot town of Bangkok itself (the phones on the banner of my site are from a…