Reviews

I am a fan of biopics, especially of creative people, such as artists, writers and musicians. In my opinion a fatal flaw of some biopics is the actual inclusion of the subject talking about herself. Seeing that the cast consists of only Frida herself and the fact that I am not a fan of recent films I was fully prepared to give this a rating of 5, but Frida Kahlo is an interesting person and so I felt I had to watch it even if I hated it. But the fact that Frida has been dead for about 70 years and had nothing to do with the production of the film allowed this to be not just good but a fantastic film. A large amount of the material comes from her diaries and paintings, many of them self portraits, and in these Frida was very honest about herself. One feature is that many of her paintings are partially animated. Again, this could have been bad but it was tastefully done so enhanced, rather than spoiled, the film. Fortunately these animations were done before the current AI which would just make her art works into cartoons.

This international film addresses the question often asked in film "is it possible to have a platonic friendship between an unmarried and woman? ". In this case the man is a handsome rich playboy, Erast (Gabriel Olds), and the woman, Liza, (Barbora Bobulova), is the beautiful but naive daughter of a hard working peasant farmer recently deceased. Liza's mother is sickly but refuses to die until she has assured Liza's future by marriage. Unfortunately Liza has been discovered by Erast who cannot marry Liza because of class differences, but he supports the mother and daughter by buying their farm produce. As a playboy he is not wanting for sexual release so is very careful that while he spends his free time with Liza their relationship is not sexual. Until it is. Then the relationship and his life go downhill, he loses his money gambling and must marry the rich countess who has been courting him. Needless to say, there is not a happy ending.

Ben Gazzara is the main character as narrator and does a nice job. This is a small film but I found the production quality to be good even though it seemed filmed mostly in a studio with green screen. This film is worth the 95 minutes running time.

If you want to know what was going on in Los Alamos during the Manhattan project this is the film you should watch, not "Oppenheimer". This film is based on the autobiography of Stan Ulam who was actually there during and after the war ended. Ulam worked in the relatively unknown fusion bomb group headed by Edward Teller. This was a failure during the war so is not mentioned in most histories. This film accurately gives credit to Johnny (as he was known) von Neumann who was the person who was able to make the connection between theory and actual design of the successful bombs. Oppenheimer's main contribution was recognizing von Neuman's ability.

There are several errors even here. One while the stated rationale for making the bomb was to prevent Hitler from making it first. But the German physicists were way ahead of the Americans so knew that an atomic bomb was a very expensive longshot, especially for Germany who was fighting on many fronts. So they never tried. Thus this rationale was mostly hype on our part. But the scientists said nothing because this was a wonderful adventure in physics.

Another was that Tellers main rationale for his fusion bomb was that it was thought to be no radioactive and there would be fewer civilian collateral causalities. As it turned out the eventual hydrogen bomb built after the war was a hybrid, made mostly of uranium and plutonium, which gave the original bombs their lethal radioactivity, with only a small fusion reaction, again mostly for hype.

One error in the visuals is that von Neuman was shown before the Trinity test standing in front of his computer which had presumably made the calculations. Actually von Neuman had only recently come up with the design for the computer and was upset at being recalled to Los Alamos for the Trinity test because he wanted to start building his computer in Princeton. In fact he had at that time only one 20 year old physicist's wife with little formal math or physics background to help him with the calculations. Reportedly he told her that" he was inventing the computer to replace her because she was so bad at arithmetic." Actually it took 15 years before electronic computers were allowed to replace the "lady" computers, see the great film "Hidden Figures" for a good exposition of that.

Sadly this film was had a lower advertising budget so few have seen it, unlike "Oppenheimer". Accuracy is boring so it hard to recommend this film to non science geeks. But as biopics go, this one wasn't bad.

I have never read Joyce Carol Oats because I am not fond of her subjects. But I had just seen the good bio-pic "Blonde" based on her book. So while looking for my next film to watch I came across this film and thought if she could write a good biography of Marilyn Monroe maybe this might be OK. It wasn't.

I have seen many bio-pics, many quite good. As a writer myself, non-fiction, many have been about writers, artists or musicians. Creative people. But my first rule of a good bio-pic is that the subject should not be actually in the film. Preferably dead. There is nothing like interviews of the subject to make a bio-pic boring. There should be a story, perhaps accurate, maybe not so accurate as was "Blonde". We want to get a feel for the person. Maybe some of her writing, or her books, films, art, music etc. Especially popular music, here is where extended performances are much better than 15 second clips. There was some of this here, the most effective were written rather than spoken. But mostly for those of us who maybe did not know much about her. There can be some film clips of events pertaining to her life, but again don't overdo it.

But most of all, professional actors, often several, should play parts of the subject's life. The writer of the bio-pic can more efficiently portray an idea than a random clip of the subject herself. Fiction is usually better than real life.

Frankly I was not very engaged by this film and didn't come away with an appreciation of her as a person or writer. I may run out and read her book "Blonde" to see how it compared to the film but I am quite sure I will not read many other of her books. They should have Oat's book which knows how to do it right before attempting this film.

There are two Thomas Wolfe's in American literature. The first is known best as the author of "You Can't Go Home Again", in my view the Great American novel. But this film is about the other Wolfe, known as Tom. The two were not related, that they had the same name was a coincidence. While Thomas wrote serious literary prose, Tom's prose was less inhibited, partly because of his friendship with Hunter Thompson. On the other hand, Thomas' life was an alcoholic mess while Tom was very buttoned down in his famous white suits. They both came from the south and had Ivy league educations and were influenced by James Joyce.

It is sad, to me, that this film did do justice to Tom or his writing. The writers of this film wanted to make Tom into a conservative writer such as William F Buckley, Jr. It is true that Tom was no liberal, but he was more of an impartial observer, and while he poked fun of liberals it was not malicious like many on the right. For instance when he wrote about drug culture in "The Electric Kool Aid AcidTest" he tried out LSD himself to understand it. Unlike this biography, he had a good sense of humor.

This biography had lots of interviews of people who knew Tom or his work and lots of film clips of Tom himself. But it had no life. Tom had a life and he deserved better.

It is very difficult to make a film about science and technology for lay people, and while some attempts have drawn crowds and high ratings, most make terrible films. This one is no exception. While the film does get some facts and incidents correctly, as a whole it does not give an accurate portrayal of what actually happened.

From a scientific perspective the science was already done in 1938 by German Otto Strassmann and British Lise Mietner and their collaborators. There was nothing secret about their work. Thus the Manhattan Project, named because that's where the project started, was simply an engineering project comprising tens of locations and thousands of employees. Something like building the Panama canal or sending men to the moon. The big difference is that it worked the first try. Like other large government projects, it finished behind schedule and over budget. The war with Germany was over. If any single individual deserves credit it was General Leslie Groves, not Robert Oppenheimer. Oppenheimer's contribution was to get John Von Neumann involved and push his suggestions. Somehow von Neumann, the most important scientist, was left out of the film.

The scientists were around only to do calculations for the engineers and spent much of their time debating the ethics of the project as the film does show. Many felt their stay in Los Alamos was a waste of their time. Von Neumann used his spare time to invent the computer.

The main secret was whether the project was in fact happening and how it was going. The very existence of Los Alamos was denied by the government. But with all the people involved, many from Europe, it was hard to keep the secret. The Germans to the contrary had no people or locations working on their project and so it was easy to keep their secret. Further our people had reason to promote the idea that Germany was working on it to keep our project alive. The Germans were already so spread out with their war that they knew they didn't have the resources to compete and did nothing with their head start in nuclear theory. We have consistently underestimated Russian science but if they had not found out before we dropped the bomb they certainly did then and would have caught up. So the whole secrecy thing was mostly a red herring.

So basically, this film was a bunch of one liners and some irrelevant noises and graphics mixed in together in sort of a random order. This is not all realistic about how scientists actually talk and act. The producers no doubt hoped that their big budget would carry the film. Financially it worked.

If you want to see a good film about what people in technology do, see the film Sneakers (1992) with Robert Redford and Sidney Poitier. I actually gave extra credit to my students who reported on the real lecture given by the River Phoenix character.

Others have adequately described this film and its acting so I will not go into that but tell you about my own reaction. Earlier this year I complained in several reviews that many of the new films made for streaming could easily have been written by AI. This was before Chat GPT became a thing, now I am sure AI could have written those films. This, however, is not one of them. This did have sex and guns but with a very ambiguous plot and incongruence between the lifestyle of the British in Kenya and WWII going on in Britain was much too subtle for AI. In particular, the wonderful ending could never be written for modern made for streaming films.

A romantic Netflix film based on a book by Antonio Skármeta. It tells the story of Mario, a young postman who delivers mail to the famous local Chilean poet, Pablo Neruda, and falls in love with a waitress named Clarita. They are separated by her mother, who disapproves of their relationship, but they keep writing poems to each other. Mario is surprised to find out that Clarita is also knowledgeable about Neruda and catches him plagiarizing some of his verses. But they eventually make up and get married. The film has nice scenery of the Chilean coast, but it is somewhat simplistic and predictable.

Witi Ihimaera is a New Zealand novelist most famous to film fans as the author of the novel behind the film "Whale Rider". He is of mixed Maori and Anglo-Saxon descent often writing about the relationship between the native Maori and the white settlers. This book and film is a work of fiction and maybe not totally believable but that is what makes it great cinema. The poignant story is developed slowly with an ending that is not telegraphed. Whirimako Black gives a fantastic performance as a Maori medicine woman who is asked to perform a late term abortion on a rich woman and at first refuses. But when she finds out the the nuns in the local hospital not only failed to save a Maori woman having a miscarriage, but destroyed the placenta, which by Maori lore must be buried. However she changes her mind motivated by obtaining a placenta to bury. The bulk of the film is about this attempted abortion which takes several days and is assisted by the Maori servant of the woman. We find out gradually who the woman is, why she wanted to risk her life having this abortion and what happens when her husband returns.

Take me to the River: New Orleans is a movie that celebrates the rich and diverse musical heritage of N. O. It showcases the fusion of African, Native American, and other influences such as Cuban and Brazillian music, blues, funk, soul, rap, and hip hop. The movie includes legendary artists like Louis Armstrong, Dr. John, Irma Thomas, the Neville Brothers and many more, as well as newcomers who are keeping the tradition alive. The movie is not a conventional documentary, but a musical journey that invites the viewer to join a long jam session with clips of earlier musicians interspersed throughout. It is a joyous and uplifting tribute to the power and beauty of New Orleans music.

This is a rendition of Catherine Cookson's novel by the same name, which this reviewer has not read. It has been compared to Charlotte Bronte's novel Jane Eyre. Both are about class and Status in the mid 19th century. The comparison is not so much Bronte's Jane with Cookson's Riah but more with Jane and Riah's daughter Biddy. In both cases a lower class girl who has somehow been educated is able rise in status by marrying a man in her employer's status. These are both considered feminist novels with strong women characters and this film certainly takes this viewpoint, especially in the last scene.

This is a film adaptation of Anton Chekhov's play Ivanov written in the 1880's. While film allows the director to leave the confines of a theater this adaptation still feels very much as a play. The language spoken is Russian with poor quality captions so it is hard for this reviewer to determine exactly how close it is to the original but it seems very much so. The film is almost 3 hours long with much dialog and little action but many characters and cluttered. It will probably appeal to very few American viewers other than myself and I only consider the film mediocre.

The attempt in this play, according to some literature professors, is to present Nikolai Ivanov, a Russian from the upper strata, as a Russian Hamlet severely afflicted by inner conflicts. He funds his estate from his present wife's dowery and loans from her parents but is virtually broke. His present wife is Anna a quietly suffering woman who converted from Judaism to Orthodox in order to marry Ivanov. A young doctor Eugene Lvov personifies Ivanov's superego but in a practical sense has diagnosed Anna as having tuberculosis and needing rest in Crimea. Ivanov feels very bad about not having the money to take her there but also needs her to die so he can marry Sasha and get his hands on her dowery. There are many other characters but if you watch this film these are the only important ones.

It is interesting to compare this film with the film Vanity Fair (2004) which also depicts 19th-century life, here told by William Makepeace Thackeray. Both films begin and end with a puppet show in lieu of a narrator and have the similar large cast, clutter and long runtime. The difference is that in Vanity fair the protagonist is a woman (appropriately played by Reese Witherspoon) who lives off her husbands, plural, money.

Virginia Woolf is often considered to be one of the most important English writers between the two World Wars in the first half of the 20th century. She was mainly known for her interest in gender including homosexuality and transgender issues long before these became controversial issues in our popular culture. But in drama and film her name is more known for one small passage in her novel "To the Lighthouse" where the main characters Mr. And Mrs. Ramsay were remembered as having long drawn out fights where each doubted the others motives but which ends with the couple sort of making up. The playwright Edward Albee made this passage into a play with title "Who's afraid of Virginia Woolf" which received rave reviews. Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton starred in the movie version which was taken quite literally from the play. An middle-age couple, he a college professor and she the daughter of the college president have a verbal fight which lasts until the wee hours of the night and again ends with the couple somewhat making up.

This film is different, but similar. Here it is a young black couple with Malcolm a film writer and director who has just come from a premier of his first film which is supposedly based upon Marie. She is angered that in the after party he thanks the producers and actors but fails to thank Marie for her contribution. Here again the verbal argument lasts until wee hours of the night. This film also brings in black issues which is somewhat strange as the writer-director Sam Levinson is white. However the director and the two actors John David Washington and Zendaya do make this film work.

After a devastating typhoon in the Philippines Visayas islands, Lineth sneaks on a boat to Manila with a baby and no money. Her ultimate goal is Segovia a four hour bus ride north of Manilla. She depends on the kindness of strangers to make her journey, but the strangers are not always kind and her reward to them is not always gratitude. There is a great deal of sex in this film so viewers who are queasy about such things should not watch this. The purpose of the sex scenes may be simply to distract the viewer. She tells strangers her sad story, only it seems to change with each telling. Things are not what they seem and the actual story may be very different from what you think it will be.

I am a 70ish white US male, perhaps not the target audience for this film. I do have some familiarity with Quebec, the most relevant experience was a train ride from Shawinigan to Riviere-a-Pierre. I normally do not like films with young people, under 40 with their noses stuck to their cell-phones. What was special about this is that they were on an Innu reservation and I do have some background in anthropology. So I managed to get through the film, without particularly enjoying it. However later, this film stuck with me and I realized a very well written and worthwhile film. I particularly liked the ending.