Not Easily Broken
Directed by Bill Duke and based on a T.D. Jakes novel, Not Easily Broken features Muscular heartthrob Morris Chestnut, who plays Dave Johnson, a former high school athlete who works construction and can’t please his wife, Clarice (Taraji P. Henson, so good in Benjamin Button). Their marriage is strained by Clarice’s materialistic ambitions and Dave’s…
The Unborn
In The Unborn, writer/director David S. Goyer delivers something like the Jewish version of The Exorcist. He isn’t above stealing random scenes from just about every other horror movie he can think of, either. The basic plot concerns college student Casey Beldon (Odette Yustman), who discovers that a nasty spirit called a Dybuk is trying…
Bride Wars
Emma (Anne Hathaway) and Liv (Kate Hudson) are best friends who’ve dreamed of getting married at New York’s Plaza Hotel ever since they were kids. So when the time finally comes and their respective weddings accidentally get booked on the same day, neither is willing to give up the date. Things get nasty as the…
Gran Torino
In Gran Torino, the 78-year-old Clint Eastwood plays Walt Kowalski, a retired Detroit autoworker mourning his recently deceased wife. Walt’s hatreds are many: He grumbles at his teenage granddaughter’s belly ring, the doting attention of his son and daughter-in-law (Brian Haley and Geraldine Hughes), the Asian family next door (“Damn barbarians!”), and at Father Janovich…
Revolutionary Road
Leonardo DiCaprio and Kate Winslet’s first pairing since Titanic made them stars in 1997 is a totally different kind of love story. Totally different. In fact, most of the time Revolutionary Road is a hate story about a 1950s suburban couple that can barely stand each other. DiCaprio and Winslet play Frank and April Wheeler,…
Kenny (Australia, 2006)
Mockumentary-style comedy from Australia that was a sleeper hit Down Under and insinuates some nice blue-collar insights using the same sort of comic techniques employed in The Office. The title character is an unpretentious, hardworking, divorced bloke who services and maintains toilets, usually portable ones. Kenny is treated like scum by his brother, his customers…
I.O.U.S.A. (U.S., 2008)
This documentary, which commences with footage of presidents from the past several decades talking about impending economic crises, takes a long, hard look at the current state of turmoil. Former Controller General David Walker likens the growing 8.7 trillion dollar national debt (as of February 2007) to “fiscal cancer,” and the film systematically shows just…
A Thousand Years of Good Prayer (U.S., 2007)
Adapted from a Yiyun Li short story, this Wayne Wang (Joy Luck Club) film is a modest affair that explores issues of assimilation as Mr. Shi (Henry O), a widower from Beijing, travels to the States to stay with his recently divorced daughter (Yu Feihong). While Mr. Shi maintains he’ll never meet another woman after…
