The feel-good La La Land, director Damien Chazelle's prohibitive awards favorite, is a movie of mystery. Can Emma Stone sing? (She can.) Can Ryan Gosling sing and dance? (As a singer, he makes an OK dancer.) The real and lasting question rising from its smoggy, sunny success, however, is this one: Why don’t they make more musicals? Every week a pigeon flies in from “The Death of ... more >
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They Don’t Make Them Like That Anymore? “La La Land”
The mystery of musicals
Emma Stone and Ryan Gosling
Directed by Damian Chazelle
ONLY CANNES FORGIVES
It's about to get ugly
Ryan Gosling and Kristin Scott Thomas
Directed by Nicolas Winding Refn
Nicolas Winding Refn's intent for his new film, shown in competition this morning, is difficult to discern. Is "Only God Forgives" a send-off to his previous film “Bronson” with a (sustained) nod at David Lynch and liner notes from Eastern philosophies? It would be distasteful to call a film a styling exercise. Filmmakers get our admiration because they invest more into filmmaking than you or I ... more >
A new go at BLUE VALENTINE
Revisiting Cianfrance's debut film
With “The Place Beyond the Pines” arriving in theaters with a bang last month, now may be a good time to remember “Blue Valentine,” Derek Cianfrance’s debut film of 2010 that critics called “astonishing” and audiences confirmed as such. It was and remains so on second viewing, this story of the unraveling of a marriage, for reasons all too familiar yet still unexplainable. What happens to people ... more >
The place beyond the pines
The new epic family drama is here
Ryan Gosling and Eva Mendes
Directed by Derek Cianfrance
Since “Blue Valentine” Derek Cianfrance has paired up with Ryan Gosling again this time with the ambition of achieving "his" epic crime movie. Because who better to delve into this genre with than the hero of "Drive," currently enjoying leading-man status? The idea for “The place beyond the pines” was clever--the film, much less. Stilted by excessive determination Cianfrance delivers an ... more >
Gaspar Noé partnering up with Ryan Gosling?
Bret Easton Ellis tweeting about future plans for a film collaboration
Interesting bit of news out of the tweetosphere today: Bret Easton Ellis, who's probably the second busiest user of Twitter after worldwide revolutionaries, has mentioned Drive actor Ryan Gosling meeting with Irreversible director Gaspar Noé, possibly concerning shooting the screen adaptation of The Golden Suicides, a Vanity Fair article about the double suicide of artist and socialite Theresa ... more >
The ides of March
Things are not what they seem in Washington politics
Paul Giamatti, George Clooney, and Philip Seymour Hoffman
Directed by George Clooney
The Ides of March, as those of you who remember their Roman history--or at least their Shakespeare--know, is the fateful 15th of March when Brutus and his co-conspirators assassinated Julius Caesar. And now it’s yet another well-meaning and nicely put-together film by George Clooney, based on the play “Farragut North” by Beau Willimon. Don’t expect the film to overturn the established wisdom ... more >