The Astounding She-Monster (1957)

 

THE ASTOUNDING SHE-MONSTER  (1957)  ¢ ¢

    D: Ronald V. Ashcroft

    Robert Clarke, Kenne Duncan, Marilyn Harvey,

    Jeanne Tatum, Shirley Kilpatrick, Ewing Brown

A meteor from a distant planet crashes to earth, carrying a passenger: a woman who looks all blurry because she's supposed to be naked, but she's really wearing a shimmering, radioactive bodysuit. Anyway, she's astounding. Drive-ins would not have existed without movies like this. And vice versa.

Trick or Treat

Hangmen Also Die! (1943)

 

HANGMEN ALSO DIE!  (1943)  ¢ ¢

    D: Fritz Lang

    Brian Donlevy, Walter Brennan, Anna Lee,

    Gene Lockhart, Dennis O'Keefe, Margaret Wycherly,

    Alexander Granach, Tonio Selwart, Lionel Stander

A World War Two propaganda piece in which heroic Czechs stand up to evil Nazis in the aftermath of the assassination attempt on despised German commander Reinhard Heydrich. There's some epic scenery-chewing in this. If the actors playing the Nazis had handlebar moustaches to twirl, they'd be twirling them. Walter Brennan sheds most of his backwoods persona to play a resistance leader. Brian Donevy plays the assassin. Bertolt Brecht worked on the script. 

I Really Hate My Job (2007)

 

I REALLY HATE MY JOB  (2007)  ¢ ¢ ¢ 1/2

    D: Oliver Parker

    Neve Campbell, Shirley Henderson, Danny Huston,

    Alexandra Maria Lara, Anna Maxwell Martin 

Five women, all with unrealized hopes and ambitions, try to make it through a hectic shift at work in a London restaurant. A funny, fast-paced comedy with some distinct parallels to Stanley Tucci's "Big Night". Neve Campbell as a burned-out waitress (and aspiring actress) gets a brief nude scene, but it's Shirley Henderson as the overworked cook (and would-be writer) who stands out in the ensemble.

Marie Antoinette (2006)

 

MARIE ANTOINETTE  (2006)  ¢ ¢ 1/2

    D: Sofia Coppola

    Kirsten Dunst, Jason Schwartzman, Rip Torn,

    Steve Coogan, Judy Davis, Asia Argento,

    Shirley Henderson, Molly Shannon, Marianne Faithfull,

    Danny Huston, Rose Byrne, Aurore Clément

In 1770, a 14-year-old Austrian countess named Maria Antonia Josefa Johana is sent off to fulfill her dynastic destiny in an arranged marriage to the future king of France. Once there, she'll become much better known as Marie Antoinette. We all know how that turned out, but before it does, there are masked balls and splendid feasts and elegance and opulence and decadence in magnificent surroundings. (The movie was actually filmed at Versailles.) Sofia Coppola's script tries to make the case that Marie Antoinette was a victim of history, which you might buy into if you can get beyond the fact that she seems unwilling, unable, or just too oblivious to look outside the privileged bubble she was born into. But you don't have to be a socialist to see the yawning divide between the pampered nobles and the miserable masses, or to conclude that if any place ever was in the market for a revolution, it was 18th-century France. In fact, you don't see much of the revolution, but you do see a lot of powdered wigs, and as sumptuous as everything looks, it's all just kind of boring. (Remember "Barry Lyndon"? Same thing.) On the other hand, most movies set in the 18th century don't feature tunes by The Cure, Adam and the Ants, Siouxsie and the Banshees and Bow Wow Wow. "I Want Candy"? Sure, why not?

Last Call: Tom Skerritt

 

"M*A*S*H"

"Alien"

"Contact"

"Steel Magnolias"

"A River Runs Through It"

"East of the Mountains"

"The Turning Point"

"Smoke Signals"

"Top Gun"

"Thieves Like Us"

(1933-2026)

Naza (2026)

 

NAZA  (2026)  ¢ ¢ ¢ ¢

    D: Yuvak Abraham, Rachel Szor

The movie - or one of the movies - Benjamin Netanyahu would like you not to see, a sobering documentary in which 24 members of Israel's intelligence service speak matter-of-factly about the methodical extermination of Palestinians in the Gaza Strip. You could start with the Hamas attack on October 7 - a horrific atrocity - and throw in the way its operatives mix with the general population, and still be appalled at the speed with which Israel's response morphed from a quest for justice to a campaign of retribution to a calculated exercise in mass murder. The witnesses, assigned to plan, execute and even photograph Israeli strikes on civilian targets, call themselves technicians who are told to "trust the system" and not think too much about the moral implications and consequences. They describe the exhilaration that comes with a mission accomplished, and compare their remote-controlled assaults to a video game. They talk candidly about leveling whole neighborhoods, with casualty counts in the hundreds and even thousands. They kill hungry people running to get food. They kill children. Some express remorse and some don't. In the end, you're left with an unsettling question, briefly brought up in the film: What's the difference between what the Nazis did during World War Two  and what Bibi and the IDF are doing in Gaza? The answer seems to be, not much. 

Major League II (1994)

 

MAJOR LEAGUE II  (1994)  ¢ ¢

    D: David S. Ward

    Tom Berenger, Charlie Sheen, Corbin Bernsen,

    Dennis Haysbert, James Gammon, Omar Epps,

    Eric Bruskotter, Takashi Ishibashi, Bob Uecker,

    Michelle Burke, Margaret Whitton, David Keith

The outcasts and misfits who made a surprise run to the playoffs in the first "Major League" movie are back to try again in this tired, recycled sequel. Everybody goes through the motions, but nobody comes up with anything original. Maybe they needed more batting practice. 

Go Brewers!

Hour of the Gun (1967)

 

HOUR OF THE GUN  (1967)  ¢ ¢ ¢ 1/2

    D: John Sturges

    James Garner, Jason Robards, Robert Ryan,

    Albert Salmi, Steve Ihnat, William Windom,

    William Schallert, Michael Tolan, Frank Converse

Most movies about Wyatt Earp end with the gunfight at the OK Corral. This one starts there and proceeds to tell a somewhat fictionalized account of what happened to Wyatt, Doc Holliday and Ike Clanton after the gunfight was over. Wyatt's played by a no-nonsense James Garner. Doc's played by Jason Robards, and as usual, it's Doc who has the most fun and gets the best lines. Ike's played by Robert Ryan, at about the midpoint between his roles in "The Professionals" and "The Wild Bunch". Director John Sturges lets the story play out in its own time. (The opening gunfight lasts less than a minute, about what the actual gunfight did.) Coincidentally, Sturges also made "Gunfight At the OK Corral" in 1956, and Garner would play Wyatt Earp again in Blake Edwards' "Sunset" in 1988. 

Go, Johnny, Go (1959)

 

GO, JOHNNY, GO  (1959)  ¢ ¢ 1/2

    D: Paul Landres

    Jimmy Clanton, Chuck Berry, Alan Freed,

    Sandy Stewart, Richie Valens, Eddie Cochran,

    The Cadillacs, The Flamingos, Jackie Wilson

Vintage '50s musical acts punctuate a perfunctory story about a kid named Johnny who's determined to make it big in the world of rock & roll. All of the songs are lip-synched. None of the guitars are plugged in. Chuck Berry plays a couple if tunes, but never really gets to cut loose. Richie Valens went to rock-&-roll heaven four months before the movie's release.

Jane By Charlotte (2021)

 

JANE BY CHARLOTTE  (2021)  ¢ ¢ ¢

    D: Charlotte Gainsbourg

A home movie done as a series of conversations between singer/actress Charlotte Gainsbourg and her mother, singer/actress Jane Birkin. The locations range from Paris to Tokyo, New York City to the South of France, and their exchanges cover everything from dogs and children to loss and regret to aging, pain and death. They know they're being filmed - they're doing the filming - but they're both so comfortable in front of the camera that it doesn't matter very much, and the act of making the movie becomes a part of the process that draws them closer together. Neither wears much makeup, and Birkin, in her 70s, actually seems to grow older as the film goes on. You get a real sense watching it that both women know their time together is limited, and that Charlotte's determined to capture as much of her mother as she can before it's too late. It was Birkin's final screen appearance. 

Hoosiers (1986)

 

HOOSIERS  (1986)  ¢ ¢ ¢ 1/2

    D: David Anspaugh

    Gene Hackman, Barbara Hershey, Dennis Hopper, 

    Sheb Wooley, Fern Persons, Chelcie Ross

Gene Hackman plays a hard-nosed basketball coach who's been banned from college ball for hitting a player. After ten years in the Navy - he's still wearing his peacoat - he lands at a high school in a small Indiana town where he's not warmly received by the locals, or (at first) by his scrappy, short-handed team. Will he and the boys win the town over? Will the coach and the bad-ass vice principal played by Barbara Hershey hit it off? Will the team of underdogs start to win? Put it this way: Have you ever seen a Hollywood sports movie? Unabashed, feel-good Americana with real-looking Midwest locations and effective supporting work from Hershey and a visibly rehabbing Dennis Hopper.

Girl Gang (1954)

 

GIRL GANG  (1954)  ¢

    D: Robert C. Dertano

    Joanne Arnold, Timothy Farrell, Harry Keaton,

    Mary Lou O'Connor, Mildred Kalke, Lou Monson

Here are some things you should know, if you don't know them already. Don't steal cars. Don't take the payment you get for them in joints. Don't smoke pot because it'll make you want to shoot heroin right away. Don't shoot heroin. Don't get your drugs from a pusher named Joe, even if everybody tells you he's a "regular guy." Don't loan money to a junkie who says she'll pay you back, because she won't. Don't keep fighting that other heroin addict on the floor in the hallway when the cops are coming up the stairs to arrest you both. Don't leave the safe open after you open it to get the money to pay a junkie for sex. Don't pay a junkie for sex. Don't get shot robbing a gas stati0n to get money for dope, and don't die on the kitchen table while the quack doctor is digging the bullet out of your gut. Don't do any of that stuff. And definitely don't do it in a movie called "Girl Gang". Just don't. That's all.

Frankenstein (2025)

 

FRANKENSTEIN  (2025)  ¢ ¢ ¢ 1/2

    D: Guillermo del Toro

    Oscar Isaac, Jacob Elordi, Christoph Waltz, 

    Mia Goth, Felix Kammerer, Charles Dance,

    David Bradley, Lars Mikkelsen, Christian Convery

Financed by his brother's prospective father-in-law, Victor Frankenstein goes to work in a vast steampunk laboratory, hoping to create life from death. To his infinite horror, he succeeds. Oscar Isaac goes for the throat playing Victor. If he'd scaled it back even a little, his performance might be more effective. But "Frankenstein" always belongs to the Monster, and Jacob Elordi's deformed giant is both horrifying and pathetic: a self-loathing abomination who didn't ask to exist (and doesn't want to), but finds himself cursed with immortality. Del Toro takes on more of the book than the James Whale/Boris Karloff version did , and the production is more elaborate. (Keep an eye out for the color red.) But I wouldn't necessarily take one version over the other. It's good to have both.