Last year, New York’s wonderful non-profit, three-screen movie theater — Film Forum — held a two-week tribute to Robert Ryan. Although he never attained the full-fledged stardom of peers such as Burt Lancaster, Ryan worked steadily from the late 1940s up until his death in 1973. The actor went out on a high, playing the ex-anarchist Read More
Robert Ryan: the man who lived against type
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The good old/bad old days of Cold War paranoia films
The 1970s are often cited as the heyday of the paranoid thriller — thanks to “The Parallax View” (1974) and “Three Days of the Condor” (1975) and a few other key titles — but the genre really started a decade earlier. The ’70s films were the result of Watergate and all of the revelations about Read More
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‘The Hateful Eight’ nostalgia trip
The glorious experiment by Quentin Tarantino and The Weinstein Company that resulted in bringing back the roadshow and Ultra Panavision 70 wide-screen format will end tomorrow night at 100 theaters around the country. “The Hateful Eight” was the first movie to be shot and projected in the super-wide format since “Khartoum” 50 years ago, and
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‘Cassavetes/Rowlands’ series opens in NYC
Downtown Manhattan’s elegant new arthouse – The Metrograph – is launching a terrific nine day series devoted to the films of writer-director-actor John Cassavetes and the work he did with his great actress wife Gena Rowlands. “Cassavetes/Rowlands” starts tonight, appropriately enough, with the 1977 film “Opening Night” in which Rowlands stars as an actress returning
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Deluxe DVD treatment for ‘The Swimmer’
The Frank and Eleanor Perry film version of the John Cheever story “The Swimmer” was a resounding flop in 1968, but over the years it has acquired a cult following. The movie has always been of particular interest in Connecticut because the Perrys and star Burt Lancaster spent the summer of 1966 filming in and
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Out of the vault: ‘Adrian Messenger’
No one would rank the 1963 John Huston film “The List of Adrian Messenger” among the best pictures by the director of “The Treasure of the Sierra Madre” and “Prizzi’s Honor,” but it’s an entertaining mystery that deserves to be better known. Just as the Warner video division has been releasing no-frills versions of its
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‘La Pelle’: Italian WWII drama resurfaces
The Cohen Media Group has been making waves as a relatively new player in the DVD distribution of European films. The company, headed by New York City real estate man Charles Cohen, also bought the venerable Quad Cinema in downtown Manhattan as a new showcase for art films. The renovations are expected to be finished
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‘She Made Me Laugh’: what is a ‘friend’?
Readers and critics have been arguing about Richard Cohen’s Nora Ephron memoir/biography since it was first published last year. “She Made Me Laugh: My Friend Nora Ephron” (Simon and Schuster) has been attacked as an exploitation of a “best friend” when she is no longer around to respond; a name-dropping orgy filled with Hollywood celebrity
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‘Sweet Smell of Success’ tonight in Bethel
It will be my pleasure tonight to host a Hearst screening of “Sweet Smell of Success” at the Bethel Cinema. It’s one of my all-time favorite movies, perhaps because it deals with three of my favorite things – the world of newspapers, show business and New York City. The ultra-dark look at the underbelly of
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Is this Glenn Close’s year to win an Oscar?
Quick! Name the movie that won Julianne Moore her best actress Oscar. If you think it’s “Magnolia” or “The Hours” or “Far from Heaven” you’re wrong. But I can’t blame you for not remembering the picture that finally won Moore an Oscar three years ago – “Still Alice” – because it’s an indie production that
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