Argo: The Great Escape
Photo: Warner In my reviews of Persepolis (2007) and A Separation (2011), I wrote that those films offer a well-needed opportunity to understand Iran. Argo, however, is not that type…
Buffy the Vampire Slayer
Empty-headed high-school cheerleader Buffy Summers (Kristy Swanson) learns that it is part of her destiny to slay vampires. Five years after this horror-comedy, writer Joss Whedon would create a superior…
Pearl Harbor
Hawaii, 1941; the attack on Pearl Harbor is coming, and two fighter pilots (Ben Affleck, Josh Hartnett) are at odds over an attractive nurse (Kate Beckinsale). This was meant to…
Shakespeare in Love: Bringing the Bard to Life
Gwyneth Paltrow. Photo: Miramax Let’s say William Shakespeare knew how to time travel. Let’s say he came to 1998, went to the movies and saw John Madden’s film Shakespeare in…
The Sum of All Fears
Roughly a year after the terrorist attacks that pulverized the Twin Towers came the first movie that dared show a similar event, with a story that had European neo-fascists plotting…