Hollywood

The “Horror” genre is pungently, throbbingly alive!   “Le Manoir du Diable”, (“The House of the Devil”) mid-1890”s by Georges Milies, credited as the first horror film; now, in the 21st century one cannot escape its domination of multiplex theatres; not bothersome, and has held my movie appetite for spine-tingling titillation, since first exposed long ago. Never apologizing for its attraction, I …

Western movies have never been my favored genre but have experienced and relished the best: “True Grit”, “Shane”, “Butch Cassidy & The Sundance Kid”, “Blazing Saddles”, “Stagecoach”, “High Noon”, “The Magnificent Seven” and the 1991 Oscar winning “Dances with Wolves”, director Kevin Costner took home an Oscar for best director and the film won the best picture of the year. It was outstanding and secured Costner’s …

Living in an urban environment saturated with a legitimate economy, hospitals, all levels of education, schooling those from pre-stage through PH.D’s; thriving residences populated by tax- paying individuals, everything for every need, EXCEPT the constant, plaguing of cacophonous, traumatic, worthless motorcyclists whose sole purpose is to disturb the peace; detestable, disenfranchised, aliens “Bikeriders”; a culture totally incomprehensible (although there are …

For those metaphorical souls and those who are not “Tuesday” is a sublime crash course, a treatise on dying and death; it is not sad or morbid it is just wise, realistic and beautiful. Out of the outrageous, stellar, fecund, fantastical mind of Croatian writer/director Daina Oniunas-Pusic comes a film reverberating with the solvency and depth of poets John Donne, …

After close to a two-month hiatus from imbibing in the transformative realm of film I sat forlornly with one other individual watching a documentary of such magnitude and wonder that I wanted to scream in frustration at the lack of attendance; here is an atrocious, catastrophic, historical truth of the past that screechingly resonates today: antisemitism is vibrantly alive, pervasive, …

Peneflix will be on a six-week hiatus. Look forward to posting again on our return!

Dev Patel has accomplished the pristine blending of east and west films aka Bollywood and Hollywood, remarkable on a myriad of levels. The Bollywood genre has fast-tracked in mimicry, imitation of Hollywood’s 6 pack ab heroes, following the trope of: Arnold Schwarzenegger, Sylvester Stallone, Tom Cruise vs. Akshay Kumar, Hrithik Roshan, Shah Rukh Khan. Patel with keen ingenuity follows the …

Over the weekend I binged watched a trio of Ripley movies  (skipping “Ripley’s Game” and “Ripley Under the Ground”) that novelist Patricia Highsmith (1921-1995) wrote and lionized “Tom Ripley” a pernicious psychotic with a pleasant façade and amoral core. Commencing with Netflix’s “Ripley” starring Andrew Scott (“All of Us Strangers”), an eight- episode, compelling study of a man who looks …

Of all the times I have visited these star-crossed lovers, this Metropolitan Opera version distances every performance I have ever seen; maybe a lifetime must disappear before perfection is granted, achieved. Sitting in the theatre, knowing the outcome, I found myself fervently praying that timing would fortuitously bless this couple, so worthy of togetherness, charmed liveliness, granted the grace to …

The Talmud (Sanhedrin 37a): “Whoever saves a single life is considered by scripture to have saved the world.” Director James Hawes introduces audiences to Sir Nicholas Winton (1909-2015), played with inimitable force by Anthony Hopkins, a man who saved 699 children from the incendiary clutches of the Holocaust. Johnny Flynn with iconic dignity depicts “Nicky” as a young stockbroker who …