Netflix and Beyond

Listening to Ricky Gervais, who for the most part behaved himself, and the myriad of acceptances from winners and honorees, one comment resonated long after the glamorous conclusion; Patricia Arquette (winner of Supporting Actress in a miniseries) stated that this night will not be remembered; the profundity of these few words struck a realistic, valid cord: Australia, burning; women empowerment, …

During this ponderous hiatus, waiting for the winners of the Golden Globes and Academy Awards, I periodically step out of my comfort zone, imbibing in genres I know little about and have minimal interest in; martial arts falls into this category; even though a neophyte, I found “Ip Man 4: The Finale” dimensionless, pejorative, sophomorically written but plausibly entertaining in …

The narrowing of boundaries between theatre and home viewing is a positive controversy; nothing beats the darkened, enclosed enchantment of the theatre, but television affords exposure and participation by those whose time, lives might be stymied by uncontrolled situations; choice breeds inclusiveness; entertainment touching vast numbers in universal spheres. Here are, not just films, but a streaming series, available to …

Since 1977, “filmites” have been invested in a “galaxy, far, far away” and have experienced a franchise that has grown exponentially through the decades; director J.J. Abrams complication of past scenarios is “out of this world” to view, tweaked historical references infused with present digitalization enhancement, lend freshness to an inflated, fantastical tale; protagonists and antagonists have died, their progeny …

Salman Khan wrote and stars for the third time as “Detective Chulbul Robinhood Pandy”; an excessive three hour egregious homage to himself; self aggrandizement rarely, if ever, seen on the screen; Khan’s a clone of Narcissus, a mythological figure who fell in love with himself; narcissism at its zenith; inflated physique and ego strutting excessive silliness, stale dance sequences, and …

Valium inducing, emotionally pulverizing, “Uncut Gems” sears to the soul one man’s addiction to living on the edge, a gambler, constantly questing the ultimate high, pushing to lethal limits his megalomania; Adam Sandler, like Sacha Baron Cohen in “The Spy”, switches oeuvres, and stuns as “Howard Ratner”, a jeweler, in possession of a stone of such magnitude, he is willing …

Writer/director Sam Mendes’s visual, fictionalized account  of a WW1 incident told to him by his grandfather, Alfred Mendes; “1917” differs from traditional “war” films in its intimacy; two British corporals sent on a death-defying mission, through still volatile, vacated enemy lines, to cauterize an attack by an ally battalion, an attack, orchestrated by the Germans, risking the lives of 1,600 …

This spirited fourth major film adaptation of Louisa May Alcott’s (1832-1888) seminal “Little Women” (1868) is a refreshing, feisty, revamping of a tale that has everlasting appeal; its timelessness touching imaginations, one generation after another; director Greta Gerwig’s contemporary interpretation resonates with the pungency of twenty-first-century resolve adorned in the accoutrements of the nineteenth century; Concord, Massachusetts; severity of the …

“Cats” debuted in London,1981; based upon T. S. Eliot’s 1939  “Old Possum’s Book of Practical Cats” composer Andrew Lloyd Webber, with Merlin magic, stupefied audiences with his innovative, anthropomorphic felines; it was a sensation that captured the imaginations of theater goers throughout the world and continues to do so, even today, with this uneven production by Academy Award winning director …

Writer/auteur Terrence Malick, has superlatively, with fecund imagination, blessed audiences with a masterpiece simmering in sacredness; a marriage of such profundity, depth, it transcends description; an aesthete, Franz Jaggerstatter (August Diehl) marries Fani (Valerie Pachner), a woman whose every fiber is matched dreamily with her husband; peasant farmers, in the Elysian, pastoral fields of Austria; twentieth- century madness of WWII …