On Monday, on Fox’s hot new drama “The Following,” starring Kevin Bacon, a note written by cult follower Amanda Porter (Marin Ireland) described herself as, among other things, a Pisces. This reference didn’t have quite the impact of the Piscean mention in the decade-old Bend It like Beckham, in which an older relative says, “Lesbian? […]
Astrology: Film: ‘Blancanieves’ (2013)
March 25, 2013 by
Blancanieves is Spanish screenwriter and director Pablo Berger’s nod to the Brothers Grimm fairy tale, “Snow White.” Berger revisions the story as a black and white silent movie with sparse use of intertitles, setting it Seville in the 1920’s and making the ceremony, ritual, beauty and gore of bullfighting a torrid vibrant character in its […]
Astrology: Film: ‘Admission’ (2013)
March 22, 2013 by
Being an admissions officer at Princeton University suggests a fascination with noble Jupiterian concerns such as higher mind and an eagerness to expand the noggins of incoming freshmen. Unfortunately, Portia Nathan (Tina Fey), Admission’s unlikely heroine, is so bogged down by Saturnine rules, metrics and weeding out the chaff that her tightly coiled self – […]
Astrology: Film: ‘The Sapphires’ (2013)
March 22, 2013 by
The Sapphires is ostensibly about a talented four-member Aboriginal girl group in Australia whose members, with the help of a washed up Irish entertainer-turned-manager, wind up expanding their lives personally and geographically. Below the surface, though, the movie – directed by Wayne Blair and inspired by a true story that transpires in the late ’60s […]
Astrology: Film: ‘My Brother the Devil’ (2013)
March 21, 2013 by
Siblings are notorious for checking out who got the biggest piece of cake. In My Brother the Devil, directed by Sally El Hosaini, there’s more than dessert at stake between two young adult Egyptian brothers who live with their aging parents in London’s Hackney, an edgy ethnic and cultural hodgepodge. Rashid (James Floyd), the handsome […]
Astrology: Film: ‘The Impossible’ (2012)
December 20, 2012 by
The element water is associated with the Moon’s nurturing, emotion and caring. But in “The Impossible,” directed by Juan Antonio Bayona, wetness – in the form of the tsunami that hits Thailand at Christmastime in 2004 – becomes an annihilator of families. The wave announces its rapid encroachment with a rumble. It drags Maria under […]
Astrology: Film: ‘Not Fade Away’ (2012)
December 20, 2012 by
“Not Fade Away,” directed by Sopranos’ creator David Chase in his feature film debut, is about the power that music wields on a group of male teens growing up in the New Jersey suburbs in the ‘60s. The participation of Steven Van Zandt, the movie’s music supervisor and one of its executive producers, ensures that […]
Film: ‘This Is 40’ (2012)
December 19, 2012 by
Director Judd Apatow’s “This Is 40” puts his “Knocked Up” couple Pete and Debbie under the microscope in this bright sort-of sequel. Debbie (Leslie Mann, Apatow’s real-life wife) is celebrating – or rather, not celebrating – turning 40. But as significant as that chronological milestone is for most people, Apatow bathes his movie in non-significance. […]
Film: ‘Zero Dark Thirty’ (2012)
December 19, 2012 by
“Zero Dark Thirty,” which recounts the decade-long search for and killing of Osama bin Laden, opens with a black screen and the sound of panicked 9-11 voices desperately making a final verbal connection with the outside world. The set-up is pure Mercurial activity: thought, speech, communication and transportation between the real world and hell. Directed […]
Film: ‘The Guilt Trip’ (2012)
December 18, 2012 by
“The Guilt Trip” seems like an unassuming road-trip movie. On the surface, it’s about two travelers – a son whose lack of professional success is eating away at his self-esteem, and his mother whose love for her son fuels her eating. But the movie’s a lot more clever than that. Directed by Anne Fletcher, “The […]
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