Released today in the middle of what seems like unending gray Bay Area winter weather, Sometimes I Think About Dying is the perfect film to watch given our collective dreary mood.
Abrams is back in command, but is that all there is?
Let me say up front that what you are reading will be a completely spoiler-free review of the new, ninth and final Star Wars movie, The Rise of Skywalker. So read on without fear. I want to be careful about revealing any of the film’s surprises, since, if you’re a fan of the franchise — especially a Gen X’er one like me — you’ve waited a long time for this finale, and you deserve to watch it fresh. Instead, I’m going to talk about feeling, because feeling is big in this film.
“Every once in awhile I have what I think of as an out-of-the-body experience at a movie,” wrote a rapturous Roger Ebert in the summer of 1977 of Star Wars. Later that year a more skeptical Pauline Kael, writing about the same film, said, “the loudness, the smash-and-grab editing, the relentless pacing drive every idea from your head.” Never could the duality of responses to the Star Wars series of films be better predicted. They are either the greatest experiences in a movie theater since L’Arrivée d’un train en gare de La Ciotat, or the biggest waste of time since Birdemic: Shock and Terror.Continue reading “Film Review: Star Wars: The Last Jedi“
The 39th Mill Valley Film Festival, showcasing over 200 films from more than 50 countries, opened last Thursday evening, and runs until this Sunday, October 16th. The Festival is screening some titles already garnering Oscar buzz: Damien Chazelle’s La La Land, which opened the Festival (and will open widely this fall), the stunning Manchester by the Sea (which already received deserved acclaim back in January at its Sundance premiere), and Loving, the Jeff Nichols historical drama that closes the Fest.