Posted on March 7, 2015 at 8:00 am
“CitizenFour,” the Oscar-winning documentary about Edward Snowden, is free online. Whether you consider him a hero or a traitor, it is well worth watching, and considering the fragile balance between privacy and national security — and who decides.
Posted on March 6, 2015 at 3:32 pm
A couple of weeks ago, “The Best Years of Our Lives” was on TCM and I decided to watch the first few moments to enjoy again scenes I have enjoyed many, many times. I promised myself I would go to bed after half an hour but found myself once again watching all the way to …
Posted on March 6, 2015 at 3:05 pm
We mourn the loss of film visionary Albert Maysles, who with his brother David, showed us a new way to see film and a new way to see the world. They were the first Americans to create intimate, unstructured documentary storytelling without experts talking from behind their desks or extended narration. This is “direct cinema,” …
Continue reading “Tribute: Documentary Pioneer Albert Maysles”
Posted on March 6, 2015 at 8:00 am
Writer Alan Bennett (“The Madness of King George”) was not sure about the right way to respond when a near-homeless woman in a fragile mental state moved her dilapidated van in front of his house. He did not want her there but he could not bring himself to send her away. What began as a …
Continue reading “Trailer: The Lady in the Van with Maggie Smith”
Posted on March 5, 2015 at 5:59 pm
“Unfinished Business” is a story about three renegade renegades from bureaucracy going up against The Man and the importance of the individual in an era of soul-grinding corporatism. But the movie itself is clearly the product of institutional over-management, as though it was put together by a committee and then circulated for sign-off through a …
