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Tender is the Night

“The interior writing style of F. Scott Fitzgerald is practically impossible to adapt to film. It takes work for us to invest and understand the interior life of these characters, and this adaptation fails to do that. Many of these characters are not as sharply observed as they are in his novel, and ” read more

A Farewell to Arms

“This left me like Elaine in the Seinfeld episode where she’s forced to watch The English Patient, just staring at the screen and seething, “No, I can’t do this anymore. I can’t. It’s too long….Just die already! DIE!” Looking at the critical reception of the day and the more recently, I” read more

The Barretts of Wimpole Street

“A remake of the 1934 version with the same director (who allegedly shot the exact same script) leading the charge, this version of The Barretts of Wimpole Street is a dull bit of coloring by the numbers. Director Sidney Franklin feels like he’s on autopilot, and so does much of the resulting drama” read more

The Man in the Gray Flannel Suit

“There’s an exchange late in The Man in the Gray Flannel Suit that sums up the movie better than I can. While discussing a speech for work Gregory Peck presses Jennifer Jones for her opinion on it, and she dubs it a bit boring. Peck responds, “Is that all, just boring?” Jones pauses for a momen” read more

Good Morning, Miss Dove

“The treacle and sentimentality is heavy with this one. Good Morning, Miss Dove is a film that whips itself into crocodile tears and pours syrup over every frame in its story of a spinster teacher finding herself as a town’s beloved member. There’s curious case of unknown emphasis here, as though” read more

Terminal Station

“If the main criticism of Terminal Station can be summarized it would be: grand ambitions thwarted by a series of never-ending problems. Much like with the Archers and Gone to Earth, producer David O. Selznick continually fought at cross-purposes with his director on the film, and created an alternat” read more

Beat the Devil

“From the first frame on this thing just screams “cult classic” with its pervasive close-ups of character actors, a compulsively watchable hang-out vibe, and a sense that all of the action is taking place with gigantic quotes around it. Beat the Devil, easily the oddest film in Humphrey Bogart an” read more

Justice League

“Let’s start with the good, Justice League is a leap above both Suicide Squad and Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice, and about on par with Man of Steel. So clearly, WB/DC may be heading in the right direction with the material, finally, but it’s still bogged down by numerous problems. Chiefly, t” read more

The Lure

“What a glorious mess this is! The Lure takes the familiar story of The Little Mermaid and presents it as a horror-musical set in 1980s Poland. If that sounds an exercise you’re willing to endure, and I really hope that you are, then you’ll find a lot to enjoy in The Lure, even when it doesn’t ” read more

Black Girl

“Ousmane Sembène’s first feature film is a searing indictment of the stain of colonialism, of how it continues to infect us in ways both crystal clear and subterranean. Black Girl is a brief but powerful debut feature film, and a modern classic worth discovering.   Sembène’s political fury ” read more

Ruby Gentry

“Equal parts swampland noir and southern-fried melodrama, Ruby Gentry is a pulpy mess of lurid proportions that buckles under the miscasting of the two leads. Jennifer Jones basically gives another version of the same performances she gave in Duel in the Sun and Gone to Earth, and can’t quite make ” read more

Carrie

“William Wyler’s adaptation of Theodore Dreiser’s Sister Carrie is marred by the constrictions imposed by the production code, and the material is never given the fully-realized treatment it deserves. There’s also a persistent feeling that many of the major players involved weren’t giving the” read more

Gone to Earth

“I was deeply surprised to discover this little gem of a movie. It was released after the crowning achievements of The Red Shoes and Black Narcissus, and while Gone to Earth is not their equal, it is a minor glory that deserves a reappraisal and discovery. Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger also g” read more

Madame Bovary

“On a surface level there’s not particular wrong with Madame Bovary, but there’s a persistent feeling that something is missing from it. Or that it’s several small somethings that are missing or slightly off which distorts the final product into something that’s decent enough. But decent enou” read more

We Were Strangers

“A confused movie that alternately wants to be about politics in Cuba, insurgents threatening to topple an oppressive regime, and a love story, We Were Strangers is a muddy viewing experience. There’s plenty of talent lined up, but writer/director John Huston was clearly distracted while making thi” read more

Portrait of Jennie

“After his back-to-back Best Picture victories, super-producer David O. Selznick spent the remainder of his career chasing after those two lightning in a bottle films. Several of them garnered box office results, critical acclaim, and went on to vaulted status in cinema history, and several of them i” read more