by Steve Murray | Sep 2, 2010
The best thing about “Mesrine: Killer Instinct,” which opened in Atlanta last week, is also the best thing about the follow-up film, “Mesrine: Public Enemy #1.” Playing the titular French gangster, the dynamic Vincent Cassel is almost charismatic enough to make you forget that director Jean-François Richet’s movie doesn’t deepen or expand on its predecessor. "Killer Instinct" was generally accorded modern classic status when it came out. But by the end, the two films spend four hours showing Jacques Mesrine kidnap, rob and kill his way across several nations without ever really getting inside the man’s head.
Maybe there was never really ...
by Steve Murray | Aug 26, 2010
Jacques Mesrine may have been French, but according to a two-feature overview of his life, he would have liked to be named an honorary American -- or, rather, a dishonorable one. A gangster who saw himself as a sort of film star, he comes across as a Gallic Clyde, robbing, killing and kidnapping his way across several countries with a succession of Bonnies at his side.
Based in part on Mesrine’s own memoir, the first film of director Jean-François Richet’s diptych is called “Mesrine: Killer Instinct.” It introduces us to the anti-hero (played by French film’s charismatic madman, Vincent Cassel, top ...
by Steve Murray | Aug 13, 2010
The sweet if slightly bland Swedish gay-adoption dramedy “Patrik, Age 1.5” is distributed in the States by the LGBT cable network known as "here!" (lowercase and with an exclamation point). That feels about right. This movie would work just fine on the small screen.
It opens with young doctor Göran (Gustaf Skarsgård) meeting his new neighbors at a garden party next door. Where’s the wife? people ask. There isn’t one, but there’s a husband, Sven (Torkel Petersson), who has an ex-wife himself, a teenage Goth daughter, and a bunch of monkeys on his back (smoking, drinking, screwing around). And he and ...
by Steve Murray | Aug 4, 2010
First-time filmmaker Angela Ismailos likes the way she looks. That’s the clearest message that comes through in her documentary, “Great Directors.” The movie offers a decent handful of clips and quotes for film lovers. But in cramming interviews with 10 noted directors into a scant 86 minutes, Ismailos wastes precious time by including moody shots of herself, swanning solemnly through Paris, Rome and London.
Oh, yes, she is striking and well-dressed, in the way of women born into the moneyed world of Greek shipping, which is her background. Her film, if not exactly bursting with insight, is harmless enough. But what ...
by Steve Murray | Jul 23, 2010
Good news: “Inception” isn’t the only movie that wants to make you think this summer. But, other than that shared goal, the Leo DiCaprio action flick couldn’t be further from “Agora,” a toga-and-sandals film that is more about introspection than spectacle. Though it unfolds in Alexandria of the fourth century A.D., the movie consciously holds up a mirror to our own time, depicting a civilization wracked by religious dogma, intolerance and terrorism.
The latest from Spanish writer-director Alejandro Amenábar (“The Others,” “The Sea Inside”), “Agora” focuses on the real historical figure Hypatia (played by Rachel Weisz). A Greek scholar at the Library ...
by Steve Murray | Jul 22, 2010
Like its title, “Best Worst Movie” contains some oppositions. It’s funny and sobering, sweet and bitter, inspirational and cautionary. And it’s an eye-opening look at the ways people delude themselves as a side effect of that unstoppable global disease: the desire for fame.
Here’s the story. Many of the aspiring actors unlucky enough to appear in the 1990 straight-to-video “Troll 2” chose not to list that gig on their résumés. That was an option, at least, for the actors who even got another audition after the witless, low-budget “horror” film about an American family under attack from vegetarian (!) goblins.
Michael Stephenson, ...
