The Good Liar tries so hard to be an Alfred Hitchcock thriller to the point in which the film ultimately comes to fail on that particular level. Roy Courtnay (Ian McKellen) is a con man. He meets Betty McLeish (Helen Mirren) by way of an online dating website. If Roy gets his way, he’ll rob Betty of every dollar she’s worth. Betty’s grandson, Stephen (Russell Tovey), has his suspicions of Roy but Betty shrugs it…
"The Good Liar Isn’t At The Level of Hitchcock"Tag: Helen Mirren
Maria Altmann’s remarkable true story of recovering stolen artwork from the Austrian government manages to get justice in Woman in Gold. I found myself watching the film again during Tisha B’Av during a double header with Stanley Kramer’s Judgment in Nuremberg. Despite the fact that the Weinstein name is attached, please do not let that stop you from watching this film. Maria Altmann’s (Helen Mirren) story is but one of many Holocaust stories out there. …
"Woman in Gold: A Story of Justice and Redemption"
National Treasure: Book of Secrets suffers from the same problem that seems to plagues many sequels by offering more of the same. The film does manage to up the stakes and increase the action. This time, the legacy of the Gates family is on the line. But rather than keep it simple, the clues take Benjamin Gates (Nicholas Cage) and company overseas to Paris and London. The film’s prologue puts Thomas Gates on the scene…
"National Treasure: Book of Secrets ups the action"
The obligatory Thanos snap joke about five realms being wiped out aside, The Nutcracker and The Four Realms is the weakest film to come from the Disney umbrella this year. Fourteen-year-old science nerd Clara Stahlbaum (Mackenzie Foy) gets a gift from her late mother as the holidays approach. It’s not just any gift as this gift is supposed to contain everything inside that she needs. There’s just one problem. This is a gift that requires a…
"The Nutcracker and The Four Realms"
The last few years have not been kind to Will Smith and Collateral Beauty proves to be no exception. To be honest, this movie kept putting me to sleep repeatedly while I viewed it last night. If you want to see a movie that deals with loss and grief, please go watch Manchester by the Sea instead. David Frankel directs from a screenplay by Allan Loeb. The star-studded cast includes Smith, Edward Norton, Keira Knightley,…
"Collateral Beauty: It’s a Yawner"
In Eye in the Sky, director Gavin Hood takes us behind the scenes of what really goes on in a war zone. Based on a screenplay by Guy Hibbert, Helen Mirren leads a cast that includes Aaron Paul, Alan Rickman, Barkhad Abdi, Jeremy Northam, Iain Glen and Phoebe Fox. It’s one of the final on-screen performances from the late Rickman and the film was appropriately dedicated to his memory. Mirren stars as Colonel Katherine Powell.…
"Eye in the Sky: What Really Happens Behind-The-Scenes"