THE EAST Fox Searchlight Pictures Director: Zal Batmanglij Screenwriter: Zal Batmanglij, Brit Marling Cast: Brit Marling, Alexander Skarsgard, Ellen Page, Toby Kebbell, Shiloh Fernandez, Julia Osmond, Patricia Clarkson Screened at: Fox, NYC, 5/14/13 Opens: May 31, 2013 The Department of Homeland Security lists the Animal Liberation Front as a domestic terror organization. This group would go further than the more moderate animal rights organizations like PETA and the Humane Society by breaking into laboratories and freeing monkeys and other animals are kept for experimentation. The ALF is an example of a well-meaning group driven to extreme measures under the belief that anything more moderate will not work. In the film  [ Read More ]

Title: Shadow Dancer Directed by: James Marsh Starring: Clive Owen, Andrea Riseborough, Gillian Anderson, Aidan Gillen, Domhall Gleeson, Brid Breenan, David Wilmot, Martin McCann Running time: 104 Minutes, Rated R, Available on VOD 05/20 & in theaters 05/31 Set in the early 1990′s a single mother is given the choice to go to prison or be an MI5 informant against her family after an aborted IRA bomb plot in London. The film starts out with a young girl being asked to run to the store to get her father cigarettes. She convinces her younger brother to go since “she went last time” and moments later her little brother is carried  [ Read More ]

Title: Sexy Evil Genius Directed by: Shawn Piller Starring: Seth Green, Michelle Trachtenberg, Katee Sackhoff, Harold Perrineau, William Baldwin and Anthony Michael Hall Running time: 91 minutes, Rated R, Available on Blu-ray Special Features: Award winning documentary “Jujitsu-ing Reality”; Commentary with Director Shawn Piller, Seth Green and Harold Periineau A group of strangers are invited to a bar by a mutual ex-lover named Nikki (Katee Sackhoff) whom has recently been released from a mental institution after murdering an abusive ex boyfriend.  They all tell their increasingly sad and strange tales of their relationships and breakups with Nikki.  Zachary (Seth Green) is Nikki’s first boyfriend and first love, Miranda (Michelle Trachtenberg)  [ Read More ]

Title: Erased Directed by: Philipp Stölzl Starring: Aaron Eckhart, Liana Liberato, Olga Kurylenko,Yassine Fadel Running time: 100 minutes, Rated R An ex-CIA agent working at a corporation as a securities expert in Antwerp is now raising his estranged teenage daughter after his wife dies.  After taking his daughter to the hospital when she suffers effects of a peanut allergy, he stops by his office only to find it has been cleared out and his identity has been erased – emails, bank account, any documentation showing reason why he moved to Belgium.  He thwarts several assassins attempt to murder both him and his daughter, and then he discovers he is part  [ Read More ]

Title: The Great Gatsby Director: Baz Luhrmann Starring: Leonardo DiCaprio, Carey Mulligan, Joel Edgerton, Tobey Maguire, Isla Fisher, Amitabh Bachchan, Elisabeth Debicki. Fitzgerald’s novel, offers an amorous ideal hopelessly bound to cynicism, fostered by rapid changes taking place in American society (Prohibition, the conversion of industry for war to industry for consumer goods, the explosion of the entertainment industry as a vast, inspiring and influential force), channelled by the epitome of the American Dream. Baz Luhrmann has had an osmotic approach in metabolising every single word of Francis Scott Fitzgerald and transforming it into a majestic piece of entertainment. ‘The Great Gatsby’ can be seen as a social satire commenting  [ Read More ]

Title: Star Trek Into Darkness Directed By: J.J. Abrams Starring: Chris Pine, Zachary Quinto, Zoe Saldana, Karl Urban, John Cho, Bruce Greenwood, Simon Pegg, Anton Yelchin, Benedict Cumberbatch, Alice Eve, Peter Weller “Star Trek Into Darkness” isn’t as effective as the first film overall, but there are so many exceptional set pieces within the whole that it packs more than enough momentum to pull through and deliver a riveting experience. The film begins mid-mission with the crew of the Enterprise trying to keep a volcano from exploding, destroying an alien planet, and killing its inhabitants. When things go awry, Kirk (Chris Pine) makes some brash decisions and even though he  [ Read More ]

Title: Black Rock Directed by Katie Aselton (‘The Freebie’) Starring: Kate Bosworth, Katie Aselton, Lake Bell (‘No Strings Attached,’ TV’s ‘The League’), Will Bouvier, Jay Paulson (TV’s ‘Mad Men’) and Anslem Richardson (‘NCIS: Los Angeles’) Childhood friends who have known each other for years often have a tendency to drift apart as they enter adulthood, and begin to develop their own ideas what their lives should be like and what would truly make them happy. But there’s often is one person who becomes stuck in the middle of their friends’ continued fighting, who takes it upon themselves to take whatever means necessary to bring the group back together, no matter  [ Read More ]

Title: Frankie Go Boom Directed by: Jordan Roberts Starring: Charlie Hunnam, Chris O’Dowd, Chris Noth, Lizzy Caplan, Whitney Cummings, Nora Dunn, Sam Anderson and Ron Perlman Running time: 89 min, Not Rated, Available on DVD Special Features: Behind the Scenes, Deleted & Alterate Scenes with Director introduction, Pig in the Pool, Trailer Frank has constantly been humiliated by his selfish, insensitive brother Bruce their entire lives, and Bruce has managed to get each embarrassing incident caught on video and shown to the public. Frank has chosen to distance himself from his family for the sake of his feelings and to finish a novel out in Death Valley until he gets  [ Read More ]

Title: Dead Mine Directed by: Steven Sheil Starring: Ario Bayu, Sam Hazeldine, Mike Lewis, Les Loveday, Miki Mizuno, Carmen Soo, James Taenaka, Joe Taslim, Bang Tigor Available on VOD 05/02/13 & DVD 05/28/2013 The legend of Yamashita’s Gold drives a rich treasure hunter, his “golddigger” girlfriend, a researcher, engineer and some armed mercenaries as protection to the middle of the jungle in Indonesia. They are shot at by some unknown gunmen and are forced into a mine which caves in on them after a convenient grenade blast.  The team venture downward where they discover the mine was converted into an underground bunker by the Japanese during WWII.  Deep into the  [ Read More ]

Title: Frances Ha IFC Films Director: Noah Baumbach Screenwriter: Noah Baumbach, Greta Gerwig Cast: Greta Gerwig, Mickey Sumner, Charlotte d’Amboise, Adam Driver, Hannah Dunne, Michael Esper, Grace Gummer, Patrick Heusinger, Josh Hamilton, Cindy Katz, Maya Kazan, Justine Lupe, Britta Phillips, Juliet Rylance, Dean Wareham Screened at: Dolby88, NYC, 5/6/13 Opens: May 17, 2013 Among the self-help books that flood the marketplace annually are a number that concentrate on happiness; not necessarily how to achieve this state of contentment or bliss, but an analysis of people of different ages. Surprisingly the ones I’ve read note that folks in their twenties are the least happy while those in the seventies are flourishing.  [ Read More ]

Title: The English Teacher Cinedigm Director: Craig Zisk Screenwriter: Dan Chariton, Stacy Chariton Cast: Julianne Moore, Michael Angarano, Greg Kinnear, Lily Collins, Nathan Lane Screened at: Review 1, NYC, 5/1/13 Opens: May 17, 2013 They say that the best way to learn a subject is to teach it, and, as a former high school chalk-pusher I heartily agree. In Craig Zisk’s “The English Teacher,” the title character teaches the likes of “A Tale of Two Cities” while some of the greats taped to the walls like Mark Twain overlook the classroom. The teacher represents learning a lot about Charles Dickens by searching out good questions for classroom discussion. But what  [ Read More ]

Title: Child’s Pose Director: Calin Peter Netzer Starring: Vlad Ivanov, Florin Zamfirescu, Luminita Gheorghiu, Bogdan Dumitrache. The Romanian drama directed by Calin Peter Netzer premiered in competition at the 63rd Berlin International Film Festival where it well-deservedly won the Golden Bear. ‘Child’s pose’ isn’t just a powerful tale of corruption and guilt in modern Romania. It’s an in-depth analysis of a pathological relationship between a 32 year-old son, Barbu, and his domineering mother, Cornelia Kerenes. The Yiddish-like-mater sees a chance to regain control over her adult son, by using her connections to try and stop Barbu from going to jail, when he faces manslaughter charges for reckless driving. The movie  [ Read More ]

Title: Call Me Kuchu Cinedigm Director: Katherine Fairfax Wright, Malika Zouhali-Worrall Screenwriter: Katherine Fairfax Wright, Malika Zouhali-Worrall Cast: David Kato, Naome Ruzindana, Stosh Mugisha Screened at: Review, NYC, 5/9/13 Opens: June 14, 2013 in NY and June 21, 2013 in L.A. Who needs Idi Amin when fascism is alive and well in Uganda? OK, not fascism on a government level, yet. But we here in the West, where fifteen countries and several American states have already approved gay marriage, may not realize that in other parts, particularly in Third World nations, not only is gay marriage prohibited. Homosexuality itself is illegal! In Katherine Fairfax Wright and Malika Zouhali-Worrall’s incisive documentary,  [ Read More ]

Title: Amaro Amore (Bitter Love) Director: Francesco Henderson Pepe Starring: Aylin, Prandi, Malik Zidi, Francesco Casisa, Yorgo Voyagis, Ángela Molina, Lavinia Longhi. Did you know that the French word for dustbin is poubelle? Well if the 50s and 60s were the times of the ‘New Wave,’ the Nouvelle Vague, it seems like Francesco Henderson Pepe’s first feature film ‘Amaro Amore’ will begin the era of the “Poubelle Vague,” i.e. Franco-Italian trash-films! The enticing Eolian location becomes the perfect stage for the existential drama. Two French siblings André and Camille go to the Sicilian islands in search for their identities, where they will meet Santino, a local guy from Salina and  [ Read More ]

Title: 20 Ans d’écart (It Boy) Director: David Moreau Starring: Virginie Efira, Pierre Niney, Gilles Cohen, Charles Berling. In a time when women who date younger men are the new cool, David Moreau’s cougar comedy is extremely timely. Alice Lantins (Virginie Efira) is 38 years old. She is beautiful, ambitious, and impeccably professional: she has everything to become the next editor-in-chief of Rebelle magazine. Everything except for her bourgeois uptight image. But when the young and charming Balthazar (Pierre Niney), barely 20 years old, crosses Alice’s path, her colleagues’ attitude inexplicably changes. Realising that the she holds the key to her promotion, Alice stages the comedy of an improbable idyll  [ Read More ]