23 May 2025. MISSION IMPOSSIBLE – THE FINAL RECKONING **1/2 Tom Cruise has been a Hollywood fixture since his huge hit in 1983 at age 21 in the rollicking “Risky Business”. Today, at 62, he has been consistently at the top of his profession for more than 40 years. That is the mettle of the […]
FILM: This week’s dud films
16 May 2025. This mediocre week has a horror film, FINAL DESTINATION BLOODLINES, which I refused to see; a weak documentary with a big name, LES IMMORTELS; and a Nepalese film at the Grütli about a kidnapping and a female detective. Have not seen it. FINAL DESTINATION BLOODLINES So if you’re itching for a good […]
FILM: Eileen Gray and the House by the Sea ***1/2
9 May 2025. EILEEN GRAY ET LA MAISON EN BORD DE MER ***1/2 (vo English and French) If you’re interested in architecture, this excellent docufiction is for you. And even if you’re not, it’s still an intriguing study of a talented woman ahead of her times. With well-cast actors who play the roles of Gray, […]
FILM: ON SWIFT HORSES **1/2
2 May 2025. ON SWIFT HORSES (LES INDOMPTÉS) **1/2 With her delicate features, English actress Daisy Edgar Jones seems to have been designated as the girl who shines in old-fashioned, novel-based romantic melodramas such as “Albion”, “Voyagers” and “Where the Crawdads Sing”. If those are your type of films, you may like this latest one, […]
FILM: THE ACCOUNTANT 2 ** – heavy duty killings and retaliations
25 April 2025. Sorry – this is not a great week for releases….But some good news – the excellent LA COCINA (reviewed last week) at the GRÜTLI, is also showing at the BIO Cinéma in Carouge! THE ACCOUNTANT (MR. WOLFF 2) ** As the film starts it feels like Ben Affleck is still awfully mad […]
FILM: LA COCINA **** – like a fist in the stomach
LA COCINA **** This work is like a fist in the stomach. Filmed in black and white, almost like a documentary, it features various workers in a busy restaurant – The Grill – around Times Square. They are cooks, busboys, dishwashers, waitresses, all with different backgrounds, languages, hangups. This is the lower echelon of the […]
FILM: THE AMATEUR *** – a taut, intelligent thriller
11 April 2025. THE AMATEUR *** Langley, Virgina, near Washington D.C. – we’re at the CIA headquarters. And we’re following the life of one Charlie Heller, a brilliant decoder, a bit of a shy loner, in this vast, almost anonymous web of spies. Unfortunately there’s a huge spoiler if I go any further, but suffice […]
FILM: READING LOLITA IN TEHRAN
4 April 2025. READING LOLITA IN TEHRAN ***1/2 (vo Farsi) I have to confess that I had a hard time back then getting through Azar Nafisi’s 2003 best-seller of the same name, on which this film is based. The reason was that the group of girls Nafisi included in her private Western literature classes (held […]
FILM: AGENT OF HAPPINESS ***1/2
21 March 2025. AGENT OF HAPPINESS ***1/2 (vo Bhutanese/Dzongkha, Nepali) Bhutan is a small, mountainous country, nestled between Nepal, China and India, with breathtaking natural vistas and a citizenship that has been gently guided by its popular king to believe in its serenity and peaceful harmony. It creates some beautiful cinema, with films such as […]
FILM: PARTHENOPE *** – the destruction beauty causes
14 March 2025. PARTHENOPE *** (vo Italian) You can’t get more Italian than a Paolo Sorrentino film – “Il Divo”, “La Grande Bellezza”, “Youth”. And his films are always present in competition at the Cannes film festival. Sorrentino loves his country and all its foibles, exposing them in films covering famous political figures and the […]
