Posted on May 27, 2008 at 6:00 am
Same “stick it to the man” story. Same stoic, emotionally damaged but still a fighting machine (mean, yes; lean, not so much) who can take on a hundred guys with guns because he is so well trained and so pure of heart.
Also because he wrote and directed it.
Yes, Rambo is back. We first met him in 1982’s
First Blood
Posted on April 22, 2008 at 6:00 pm
It is not easy to take a wealthy socialite, a powerful Congressman, and a CIA agent, have them played by three Oscar-winners, two who are genuine box office gold, and make them look like the underdogs, but in this “extraordinary story of how the wildest man in Congress and a rogue CIA agent changed the history of our times” (as put in the unusually accurate book subtitle), that is what they are.
Posted on March 28, 2008 at 8:01 am
A-| Lowest Recommended Age: | High School |
| MPAA Rating: | Unrated |
| Profanity: | Very strong language |
| Alcohol/ Drugs: | Drinking, smoking |
| Violence/ Scariness: | Graphic and intense battle violence, characters injured and killed |
| Diversity Issues: | A theme of the movie |
| Date Released to Theaters: | March 28, 2008 |
‘Beaufort,” the first Israeli movie nominated for the best foreign film Oscar in 24 years, is a meditation on the tragic ironies that soldiers face while ending an 18-year occupation of a medieval fortress in Lebanon. Despite their valor, the soldiers’ mission increasingly seems like an exercise in futility. They might as well be waiting for Godot.
Even though the Israelis are leaving, Hezbollah forces are becoming more aggressive and trying to make the evacuation look like a retreat. Meanwhile, far away, generals and politicians issue orders that seem clueless or callous or both, when they even remember Beaufort at all.
Built during the Crusades of the 12th century, Beaufort (“Beautiful Fort”) has been fought over off and on ever since. We are told in opening text that raising the Israeli flag over Beaufort in 1982 had enormous political and cultural symbolism. But 18 years later, as the movie begins, it is not at all clear what leaving the fortress will symbolize. Are the Israelis leaving in triumph, having accomplished their goals? Or is it surrender? The soldiers are trying simultaneously to protect themselves, fight the enemy and leave with dignity, with some sense that the time they spent and the lives they lost meant something and made a difference.
Posted on January 22, 2008 at 8:00 am
Crazy times require crazy tactics. And so just because the UN can’t seem to find Bosnia’s most notorious war criminal does not mean that a gonzo journalist shouldn’t track him down for an interview.
Based on a 2002 Esquire Magazine story called What I Did on My Summer Vacation by Scott Anderson, the movie starts off with a snarky advisory: “Only the most ridiculous parts of this story are true.” The snark deepens to anger and outrage but performances of great sensitivity and heart keep it from getting shrill.
Simon Hunt (Richard Gere) is a television war correspondent equally strung out from the madness of war and from the lack of interest in the stories he sends back home. He has spent his entire career living on adrenaline and alcohol, chasing stories all over the world about people trying to wipe each other out. One night during a live broadcast on network television he had a meltdown, and since then he has been relegated to scrambling for freelance piecework for any global television service he can get to pay him enough to cover his bar tab. But the market for his stories is getting smaller and the bar tab is getting larger.
The network anchorman arrives (James Brolin, sleek and satisfied as a Siamese cat), accompanied by his cameraman (Terrence Howard as Duck), formerly Simon’s closest colleague, and Benjamin (“The Squid and the Whale’s” Jesse Eisenberg), a young kid just out of school whose father is a network executive.
Posted on October 21, 2007 at 10:28 pm
C| Lowest Recommended Age: | Mature High Schooler |
| MPAA Rating: | Rated R for some war scenes |
| Profanity: | None |
| Alcohol/ Drugs: | Drinking, smoking |
| Violence/ Scariness: | Battle violence including war atrocities, references to Holocaust, many characters injured and killed |
| Diversity Issues: | A theme of the movie, very strong women characters |
| Date Released to Theaters: | October 17, 2007 |
Good intentions often make bad movies.
