Jersey Boys Pros: Superb music performances. Cons: Overly familiar and emotionally inert Jersey Boys is a movie one wants to like better than they actually do. The 2014 cinematic adaptation of the long running Broadway play offers up a look at the career of the Four Seasons. The play was a musical complete with singing […]
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In the House (2012) Pros: strong script, strong performances Cons: the ending is less arresting than the buildup to it Adapted by prolific French auteur François Ozon from a play by Juan Mayorga, “In the House” (Dans la maison, 2012) is a Pirnadellian dark comedy about writing, invasion of privacy, expropriation and manipulation of the […]
Die Again Tomorrow by Kira Peikoff Pros: decent premise and story Cons: missed an opportunity for some real discussion Die Again Tomorrow by Kira Peikoff explores a couple different, yet related, death-inspired themes. The first revolves around so-called Viatical Settlements – where someone (presumably with a terminal illness) sells their life insurance policy at a […]
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Festive In Death – J.D. Robb Pros: some fun holiday-themed stuff Cons: lame investigation Festive In Death is the 39th book in J.D. Robb’s In Death series. Like the rest of the series, it takes place in the year 2060, and features New York Police Lieutenant Eve Dallas as she solves homicides. In […]
Director Steven Spielberg’s Bridge of Spies has been at the very top of “movies I want to check out IP in the theatre” well ….just a small notch down from Star Wars. Trust me, this is almost always a very short list for mrroland, but I’m very glad I checked this one out on the […]
The Weather Man (2005) “Who wants to be foretold the weather? It is bad enough when it comes, without our having the misery of knowing about it beforehand.” —Jerome K. Jerome, Three Men in a Boat [Rating: 3.4/5] Pros: Phedon Papamichael ‘s cinematography Cons: piling on frustrations I found it very hard to get […]
3 Women (1977) Pros: Shelly Duvall, Gerald Busby soundtrack Cons: too long and slow and wince-inducing I find Robert Altman’s 1977 “3 Women” excruciating watching—excruciatingly slow and wince-inducing for all three of the women. The hearty, gauche vision in yellow, Millie Lamoreaux (big-eyed, buckteethed and otherwise gawky Shelly Duvall) does not seem to me to […]
“The Woodlanders” (1997 Pros: Rufus Sewell, Emily Woof Cons: predictable Although I have never read a novel by Thomas Hardy (1840-1928), from having watched the screen adaptations of his novels Far from the Madding Crowd and Tess of the Tuberville, I was pretty much able to anticipate the plot of “The Woodlanders” (1997) from very […]
Slaughter by John Lutz Pros: Decent premise Cons: that goes bad Scattered. Dis-jointed. Horribly grotesque. I’m talking about John Lutz’s Slaughter. A serial-killer novel that just didn’t work for me. This book is part of Lutz’s Frank Quinn series. As it’s the first such book I’ve read, I can’t speak to whether this book is […]
The Enemy by Lee Child Pros: Decent story and satisfying ending Cons: Had to wade through too much to get there Lee Child’s The Enemy contains some very good stuff. Too bad you have to wade through so much dull stuff to find the gems. The Enemy is the eighth book in the Jack Reacher […]