THE EAST IS EAST AND THE WEST IS WEST: Movie Review of Woody Allen’s Café Society by Howard Casner
Posted: August 6, 2016 | Author: Donald | Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: Café Society, Corey Stoller, Jeannie Berlin, Jessie Eisenberg, Ken Stott, Kristen Stewart, Parker Posey, Paul Schneider, Stephen Kunken, Steve Carrell, Still Alice, The Clouds of Sils Maria, Woody Allen | 1,003 Comments »First, a word from our sponsors: I wanted to say thank you to everyone who contributed to our Indiegogo campaign for 15 Conversations in 10 Minutes. We did very well due to you folks. For those who weren’t able to give, keep us in your thoughts. And if you are able to contribute in the future, contact me and I’ll tell you how. I will even honor the perks on the original campaign.
I am now offering a new consultation service: so much emphasis has been given lately to the importance of the opening of your screenplay, I now offer coverage for the first twenty pages at the cost of $20.00. For those who don’t want to have full coverage on their screenplay at this time, but want to know how well their script is working with the opening pages, this is perfect for you. I’ll help you not lose the reader on page one.
Ever wonder what a reader for a contest or agency thinks when he reads your screenplay? Check out my new e-book published on Amazon: Rantings and Ravings of a Screenplay Reader, including my series of essays, What I Learned Reading for Contests This Year, and my film reviews of 2013. Only $2.99. http://ow.ly/xN31r
and check out my Script Consultation Services: http://ow.ly/HPxKE
Warning: SPOILERS
In Woody Allen’s most recent attempt at making himself forget that he will have to die one day, or as it’s called in the state of the art, his latest film, Café Society, about a young man, Bobby (Allen stand in Jessie Eisenberg), who goes out to the West Coast to see if he wants to make a future there, the camera often glides around a scene with all the grace of Sonja Henri, even at times so smoothly it left me a little dizzy. I can’t remember the last time I saw Allen’s camera flow as much as it does here. Often of late, his camera feels as if it were following the old saying, what you see is what you get.
Its appearance was so refreshing at the beginning of the film, it had me hoping for something more than a typical 21st Century Woody Allen movie. But alas, though not a terrible night at the cinema, Café Society is only intermittently successful.
A TALE OF TWO JESSES: American Ultra and The End of the Tour
Posted: August 30, 2015 | Author: Donald | Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: American Ultra, Bill Pulman, Clouds of Sils Maria, Connie Britton, David Foster Wallace, David Lipsky, Donald Margulies, Infinite Jest, James Ponsoldt, Jason Segel, Jesse Eisenberg, Joan Cusack, John Leguizamo, Kristen Stewart, Lavell Crawford, Max Landis, Nima Nourizadah, Rolling Stone, Sam Malone, Still Alice, Stuart Greer, The End of the Tour, Tony Hale, Topher Grace, Walter Goggins | 7 Comments »First, a word from our sponsors: I am now offering a new service: so much emphasis has been given lately to the importance of the opening of your screenplay, I now offer coverage for the first twenty pages at the cost of $20.00. For those who don’t want to have full coverage on their screenplay at this time, but want to know how well their script is working with the opening pages, this is perfect for you. I’ll help you not lose the reader on page one.
Ever wonder what a reader for a contest or agency thinks when he reads your screenplay? Check out my new e-book published on Amazon: Rantings and Ravings of a Screenplay Reader, including my series of essays, What I Learned Reading for Contests This Year, and my film reviews of 2013. Only $2.99. http://ow.ly/xN31r
and check out my Script Consultation Services: http://ow.ly/HPxKE
Warning: SPOILERS
I’ve always had mixed feelings about the actor Jesse Eisenberg. His stuttering performances, his “gee gosh” can’t look you in the face acting technique, his off beat visage, have actually, if I must be honest, and I guess I must, I must, put me off at the beginning and often quite annoyed me.
And, as I also said to my friends: Aren’t Jessie Eisenberg, Michael Cera and Paul Dano actually the same person? I mean, have you ever seen them in a room together?
As time has gone on, as time is want to do, as we know from Casablanca, and as Eisenberg has made more and more interesting choices in film roles (from The Squid and the Whale to The Social Network to Night Moves to The Double), he’s sort of won me over and I even look forward to his next endeavor.
Well, his next endeavor, nay, endeavors, we now have, and they come in the form of two new films: American Ultra and End of the Tour.
American Ultra is about a slacker, stoner Peter Pan, called Mike, who works at a convenience store in a small town that he can’t seem to leave because he has an agoraphobic reaction whenever he tries. He lives with a long suffering girlfriend Phoebe who he has decided to ask to marry him. But something happens that causes his best laid plans to go awry. Read the rest of this entry »
THE MOORE THE MERRIER: Movie reviews of Still Alice and Maps to the Stars and why Julianne Moore will win the Oscar this year by Howard Casner
Posted: December 14, 2014 | Author: Donald | Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: Alec Baldwin, Bruce Wagner, David Cronenberg, Evan Bird, Hunter Parrish, John Cusack, Julienne Moore, Kristen Stewart, Maps to the Stars, Mia Wasikowski, Richard Glatzer, Robin Pattinson, Still Alice, Wash Westmoreland | 1,395 Comments »First, a word from our sponsors. Ever wonder what a reader for a contest or agency thinks when he reads your screenplay? Check out my new e-book published on Amazon: Rantings and Ravings of a Screenplay Reader, including my series of essays, What I Learned Reading for Contests This Year, and my film reviews of 2013. Only $2.99. http://ow.ly/xN31r
Warning: SPOILERS
Julianne Moore is destined to win the Best Actress award at the 2014 Academy Awards. It’s written in the stars (pun intended) as much as any plot in a drama by Aeschylus or Shakespeare. Far and wide it has been announced that it is Ms. Moore’s year. And who am I to argue with the stars, metaphorical or not?
Now, the question that remains is, “why”? What confluence of events, both within and without anyone’s control, has lead Moore to this momentous precipice?
I’m glad you asked. I shall try and enumerate the reasons.
REAL Short Box Subscribe!
