Larry Crowne (2011), directed and co-written by and starring Tom Hanks, just wants to be liked. Hanks plays a department store salesman who gets downsized in the economic climate and enrolls in community college to get a degree and a new start and he’s as sweet and unassuming and genuine a fellow as you’ll see […]
After helping turn Miami Vice into the defining neon crime show of its era, Michael Mann turned back the clock and put his stamp on Crime Story: Complete Series (1986-1988). Created by former Chicago cop Chuck Adamson with Gustave Reininger, the Mann-produced sixties-era gangster series made for a fabulous mix of genres (old-time gangster thriller, […]
Money Monster (2016) makes a show of channeling anger at Wall Street, which seems to emerge with a profit even when everyone else loses their retirement savings, and the frustration for the failure of the media circus that passes for journalism to hold it accountable into a modern plugged-in thriller. It has George Clooney playing […]
Mystic Pizza (1988), a summer buddy movie of romance and friendship among three best friends in the resort community of Mystic, Connecticut, launched the careers of Lili Taylor, Julia Roberts, and Annabeth Gish. Roger Ebert gave it his thumbs up when it was released in 1988: “The characters are allowed to be smart, to react […]
