Movie Reviews: An Affair to Remember (1957)

Posted on November 28, 2012 by Brian Wright

Inimitable, retro romantic comic-drama ___ 8/10
Review by Brian Wright

Terry McKay: Winter must be cold for those with no warm memories. And we’ve already missed the spring.

The famous quotation. But what is the context? Trying to reconstruct: it does take place in a dialog sequence between Terry McKay (Deborah Kerr) and Nick Ferrante (Cary Grant) aboard ship (a transoceanic cruise destined for New York)… and moves the plot along. By this time—following a significant side trip to an island where they visit Nick’s grandmother (Cathleen Nesbitt)—they have fallen in love. I’m pretty sure Terry is expressing her melancholy that, in the words of the song, “it’s sad to belong to someone else when the right one comes along.” Continue reading →

Movie Review: (500) Days of Summer (2009)

Posted on November 21, 2012 by Brian Wright

Smart, young romantic comedy __ 8/10
Reviewed by Brian Wright

Partygoer: So Tom, what is it that you do?
Tom: I uh, I write greeting cards.
Summer: Tom could be a really great architect if he wanted to be.
Partygoer: That’s unusual, I mean, what made you go from one to the other?
Tom: I guess I just figured, why make something disposable like a building when you can make something that lasts forever, like a greeting card. Continue reading →

Movie Review: Weeds (Showtime Series: 2005-2010)

Posted on November 14, 2012 by Brian Wright

Showtime series irreverently wastes the WOD __ 9/10
Reviewed by Brian Wright (originally April 2010)

Nancy Botwin: I’m not a dealer, I’m a mother who happens to distribute illegal products through a sham bakery set up by my ethically questionable CPA and his crooked lawyer friend.

One day a few months ago, I happened to be reading Playboy—yes, it’s largely only for the articles, these days, dammit—and the video-of-the-month section featured Weeds: Season 5, showing a very sexy picture of Mary Louise Parker in a “trapped pleasure” pose per a green spider web motif. Now that’s hot. Continue reading →

Guest Column: Reason vs. Faith

Posted on November 12, 2012 by Brian Wright

No compromise
by Ron Burcham

This one came my way via an email exchange Mr. Burcham had been part of. And I thought his concise and absolute statement was one of the more heroic expressions of loyalty to the human world of reason and science I had read. Right arm! How many times are we accosted by the purveyors of supernatural Jesus to buy into their Byzantine fantasies or face dire, eternal consequences? Remember Jesse Ventura’s comment in a 1999 Playboy interview: “Organized religion is a sham and a crutch for weak-minded people…”[1] (That’s a big reason I put Jesse on my short list of national leaders who can unite the country under the Constitution and solve real problems in the real world.) — bw, editor Continue reading →

Movie Review: Crazy Heart (2009)

Posted on November 7, 2012 by Brian Wright

Fab musical story, great acting by Bridges __ 9/10
Review by Brian Wright

Bad Blake (to Jane Craddock): I wanna talk about how bad you make this room look. I never knew what a dump it was until you came in here.

When you go by IMDb for your raw material for movie reviews, usually you get the best quotes. Only with Crazy Heart, only being out for a couple of weeks now, whoever actually sits down and transcribes those quotes hasn’t done too many. And the ones he or she has written down are on the lame side. Which is really too bad, because Mr. Bad Blake (Jeff Bridges) as he’s called is one walkin’, talkin’ quote machine… and brings out pithy words from most of the regular folks he gets together with, too. Continue reading →

Movie Review: Shawshank Redemption (1994)

Posted on October 31, 2012 by Brian Wright

Shawshank Redemption
Second best movie of 1994? ___ 10/10

Red: [narrating] I have no idea to this day what those two Italian ladies were singing about. [Le nozze di Figaro Sull’aria] Truth is, I don’t want to know. Some things are best left unsaid. I’d like to think they were singing about something so beautiful, it can’t be expressed in words, and makes your heart ache because of it. I tell you, those voices soared higher and farther than anybody in a gray place dares to dream. It was like some beautiful bird flapped into our drab little cage and made those walls dissolve away, and for the briefest of moments, every last man in Shawshank felt free. Continue reading →

Movie Review: Hearts and Minds (1974)

Posted on October 17, 2012 by Brian Wright

Vietnam documentary: all about denial _ 10/10
Review by Brian Wright

Hearts and Minds stands out as a seminal documentary work, regardless of subject. Michael Moore cites Hearts and Minds as the one movie that inspired him to become a film maker, calling it “not only the best documentary I have ever seen, it may be the best movie ever.”

Even though I mention in a note on Kevin’s page that his incarceration was the straw that broke the camel’s back, viewing such a powerful a movie as Hearts and Minds causes a mind of conscience to cut off all support for tyrannical government. Continue reading →