Movie Reviews

One-line review: A film about the time when royal drama meant bloodshed with swords.  Director Mani Ratnam must surely have wrestled with how to make this film. Should he cater to the Tamil audiences familiar with the beloved book on the Chola dynasty, on which the film is based? Or should he make the film […]

One-line review: This anonymous “boy’s” coming-of-age story is universal. This is Taika Waititi’s second film, based on his Oscar-nominated short “Two cars one night, ” Although Waititi wrote Boy’s script before his first film, Eagle and the Shark, he decided to hold on to it after workshopping it at the Sundance Institute. It was a

One-line review: Well-aged wine in a charming new bottle, paired with some good cheese. I discovered this film only recently because of Taika Waititi’s rapidly rising star and the resulting interest in his previous work. This movie was a top grosser in New Zealand on its release, topping Taika’s previous film, Boy, and also screened

One-line review: A National Geographic edition on the Wild West’s Coenesque inhabitants.   The Ballad is an anthology of six short films in the Western tradition that the Coens wrote separately over the years. In fact, Tim Blake Nelson (Buster Scruggs) got the script in the early 2000s. But he didn’t know when and whether the

One-line review: A migrant worker also helps an English farmer find love. God’s own country is a love story between two men working on a Yorkshire farm, and therefore comparisons with Brokeback Mountain are inevitable. But unlike Brokeback Mountain, neither homosexuality nor homophobia is God’s own country’s focus: love is. This is director Francis Lee’s

One-line review: A talented folk singer’s losing hustle to make it, thanks to mostly him getting in his way. Let us be clear that there would be no Inside Llewyn Davis without Oscar Isaac. Even the Coens admit that they thought the film’s lead was uncastable after a slew of auditions.  It was impossible to

One-line review: Four middle-aged friends use alcohol to get back their high for living. Another Round’s original title in Danish is Druk, or binge drinking, which has no English equivalent. But the English title allows multiple interpretations of the term another round: it could be for a drink, love, and life. The film is director

One-line review: A superlative comedy that gets its laughs by being a sincere ode to the originals. Young Frankenstein is the touchstone of movie comedies, all muscle and no fat, like a tight five-minute stand-up comedy set. And that is no accident. Director Mel Brooks started a trend by showing the film’s rushes to the

One-line review: Harry Dean Stanton plays mostly himself in his befitting last hurrah. I discovered Lucky after a recent rewatch of Fargo and John Carroll Lynch’s brief but unforgettable turn as Marge’s adoring husband in it. As I explored his other works, I stumbled upon his solo directorial venture: Lucky. The film was written for

One-line review: A drunk in love, Adam Sandler, packs a mean punch. Punch Drunk Love was PTA’s escape after the long and heavy Magnolia. He wanted to make a short romantic comedy (inspired by Jacques Tati). But we know a PTA film can never be that simplistic, so we have a crazy love story aided