Journalist, Author & Syndicated Columnist
Equal parts documentary, children’s story, and narrative drama, Cave of the Yellow Dog is a beautifully filmed adventure that the entire family will enjoy. It’s unique on many levels, the most notable being that the charismatic family portrayed in the film are an actual family, and none of them are professional actors. The eldest daughter (played by adorable Nansal Batchuluun) appears to be about 6 or 7 years old.
Fans of “Laguna Beach” will love the first season of The Hills, which follows Laguna’s Lauren Conrad as she attends fashion school in Los Angeles and works as an intern at Teen Vogue magazine. OK, so that’s the premise for this quasi-reality MTV series. But in reality, the show is an excuse to watch pretty young people make out, break up, get back together, and break up some more.
During her recent three-week trip to Vietnam, actress Jordana Spiro made do with just one backpack. “Really, there’s almost nothing you can’t buy there if you need it,” she says. “It’s a completely amazing place and I’d go back in a second.”
In “Must Love Dogs,” Jordana Spiro played a ditzy fashionista who loved luxury and liked John Cusack. In her TBS sitcom “My Boys,” the actress stars as a down-to-earth Chicago Sun-Times sports reporter covering the Cubs. But when she has a week or two off from work, Spiro relishes getting away from it all by traveling to exotic destinations. While others in her position might book themselves into five-star accommodations, she prefers to spend less on hotels and more on experiencing the country’s culture. During her recent three-week trip to Vietnam, she made do with just one backpack.
“Sparkle” tells the rags-to-riches (and rags again, for some of the characters) tale of three sisters with gorgeous voices. There’s Sister (Lonette McKee), Sparkle (Irene Cara, Fame), and Delores (Dwan Smith), who team up with a couple of players (including a very young Philip Michael Thomas, pre-Miami Vice) to form a singing group.
Equal parts Romeo and Juliet and Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, Shinobi offers breathtaking cinematography, appealing actors, and ninjas. What more could a movie fan ask for?
In Because I Said So, Diane Keaton outdoes any pushy parent trying to marry off their children. On the eve of her 60th birthday, Daphne (Keaton) decides that she will find a suitable suitor for her youngest daughter Milly (Mandy Moore). Never mind that Moore was barely into her 20’s when she shot the film and easily could pass as a high-school senior. The film asks us to believe that an otherwise smart, loving mother would push marriage on a young woman who obviously wasn’t ready for that kind of commitment.
By Jae-Ha Kim Amazon.com Utilizing aerial shots and a soundtrack that includes folktunes as well as classical masterpieces by Beethoven, Wagner, and Strauss, Visions of Germany is a feast for the eyes and ears. Broken […]
One of the few spin-offs that actually equals the original in terms of quality, Law & Order: Special Victims Unit has another stellar season in its third year. Detectives Olivia Benson (Emmy winner Mariska Hargitay) and Elliot Stabler (Christopher Meloni) continue to investigate sexually-based crimes with compassion and vigor.
A reality series in the loosest sense of the genre, “Jamie Kennedy’s Blowin’ Up” delves into the world of hip-hop by way of comedy. It’s not a bad effort either. The MTV series is equal parts ad-libbed and scripted, but the actors on the show are so good that you’d swear they were just a couple of clueless knuckleheads trying to become rap stars.
Slamdance Film Festival co-founder and president Peter Baxter knows all too well what goes into making a movie and trying to find an audience for it. Baxter currently is working with James Zalcman on “Wild in the Streets,” a documentary about a rough English sport that was the precursor to soccer.
Flavor of Love goes through the motions of being a real reality show, but it doesn’t try that hard. It’s obvious Flav is taking advantage of his popularity while he can and that the women are hoping their participation will help launch their modeling/acting/singing careers. But no one in their right mind actually believes that Flav will marry any of these unusual women.
At its core, “Stomp the Yard” is a romantic drama disguised as a dance film. Or is it the other way around? DJ (Columbus Short) is a troubled teen from Los Angeles who gets a chance for a better life when he is admitted into Atlanta’s privileged Truth University. Just when he thought he had escaped a life of gangs, DJ finds himself in the middle of a “war” between two upper-crust fraternities where stepping (a popular dance form) is their weapon of choice.
By focusing on controversial congresswoman Cynthia McKinney–who has been a vocal opponent of President George W. Bush and his administration–and a few others, Inaba doesn’t lose the viewer with too many subjects.
It is with trepidation I walk back to my room after dinner. I am used to strolling back to hotels in foreign countries, but I am not accustomed to looking overboard into a pitch black ocean while doing so. But when you are on a cruise ship, that’s what you do. You lay in the sun. You eat plenty of food. You relax. And if you’re a land lover like me, you think about what it takes to keep a liner like the M/S Paul Gauguin afloat.
A complicated movie about the Central Intelligence Agency and its agents, “The Good Shepherd” isn’t your typical spy movie. Though it stars Matt Damon and Angelina Jolie–actors with considerable experience in the action-espionage genre–“The Good Shepherd” requires that they play more subdued and (much less interesting) characters here.
When “liberators” don’t understand the country they’re trying to help, the end result can be well meaning, but diluted. In the documentary The Beauty Academy of Kabul, filmmaker Liz Mermin focuses on a group of American hair stylists who travel to post-Taliban Afghanistan to teach local women how to beautify themselves and their customers.
Based on the true-life story of Chris Gardner, a San Francisco salesman forced at times to shelter his young son (played by Smith’s adorable look-alike offspring Jaden Smith) in a men’s room, there is little suspense to “The Pursuit of Happyness” in terms of Chris’ outcome. (His story and eventual accomplishment as a successful and wealthy Chicago businessman was well-publicized on the newsmagazine show 20/20.)
A comedy aimed at the inner kid in all of us, “Unaccompanied Minors” provides a few laughs and some good acting by its young thespian stars. But the hyuck fest doesn’t offer enough substance, or even some so-bad-it’s-good vignettes, to hold the viewer’s interest for long.
A crop of outstanding documentaries bravely examines some of the modern world’s most pressing issues — from global warming to free speech.