Good Omens, a limited series fantasy comedy based on the book by Terry Pratchett and scripted by Neil Gaiman, may be the most anticipated Amazon Prime Original series of the year. Starring Michael Sheen and David Tennant as an angel and demon (respectively) who team up for a quest, it costars Brian Cox, Frances McDormand, […]
The Big Night (1951), the final American film made by Joseph Losey before he fled Hollywood and the blacklist for Europe, has a title just generic enough to suggest anything from a musical extravaganza to a teen sex comedy. But vagueness aside, it’s really quite a provocative youth noir with John Drew Barrymore as an […]
“To know me is to fly with me,” proclaims philosopher-in-flight Ryan Bingham. “This is where I live.” And it’s clear in the opening moments of Up in the Air (2009) as Ryan—as played by George Clooney—walks through the airport, perfectly at home as checks in to the preferred customer counter and eases through security with […]
Farscape (1999-2003), created by Rockne S. O’Bannon (who wrote the cult science fiction film Alien Nation) for the Sci-Fi channel (long before they rebranded themselves SyFy), is like no other SF show on TV. If you missed the trip through the wormhole, here’s the gist of it: Ben Browder is John Crichton, an American astronaut […]
A Quiet Place, the family-centered horror film with Emily Blunt and Krasinski, romantic comedy Book Club with Diane Keaton and Jane Fonda, and Jonah Hill’s directorial debut Mid90s, a coming-of-age film with Lucas Hedges and Katherine Waterston, make their respective streaming debuts in April on Prime Video. On the streaming TV front, season five of […]
“Come with me and you’ll be in a world of pure imagination.” Gene Wilder is the weird, wonderful, slightly sinister candy bar king who invites five children into his factory kingdom in Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory (1971), a musical adaptation of Roald Dahl’s children’s fantasy. It is a rare breed: an imaginative live-action […]
In The Net (Geumul) (South Korea, 2016), a poor, non-political North Korean fisherman (Ryoo Seung-bum) drifts into South Korean waters and the gears of political gamesmanship when his net gets tangled in his motor and he’s picked up and interrogated as a suspected spy. The South Koreans see him as either a brainwashed victim or […]
Originally published by The Film Noir Foundation As any fan of classic movies seeking treasures on streaming services knows, it’s a wasteland out there. There are oases, of course, but at any given time there are fewer options for pre-1970 movies between the three major streaming services—Netflix, Amazon Prime Video, and Hulu—than you could find […]
“Do your parents know you’re Ramones?” If Rock ‘n’ Roll High School (1979) isn’t the greatest rock and rebellion film of all time it is certainly on the short list, a pure, cheerfully juvenile blast of blitzkrieg guitar rock, Looney Tunes sight gags, teenage hormones, and rebellion against authority because it’s there. They aren’t exactly […]
Anton Corbijn’s The American (2010) is a cool, continental thriller starring George Clooney as the titular American, a professional in the assassination game in Europe. I use the term “thriller” in the generic sense, as this plays out more like Jean-Pierre Melville portrait of isolated underworld professionals, freelancers in the international network of criminal enterprise. […]
