Burying a city dog
A tender meditation on barrio streets, pets and mortality….
Carbonated love
MOT’s Donizetti potion both sparkles & fades.
Happy Together
The fact that writer-producer-director Wong Kar-Wai’s Happy Together employs a familiar narrative — a tale of two tempestuously crossed partners in love — only highlights the auteur’s unique set of strengths. Innovator Wong expands the vision behind his classics Chungking Express and As Tears Go By with rare vitality. In this case, the lovers are…
Character
While at first glance, its title may suggest a postmodern exercise (akin to calling a movie Plot), Character is actually concerned with very different meanings of the word. Does the essential character of an individual stem from a distinctive quality, nature or attribute? Can character be built by rigid self-discipline and fortitude? Should character derive…
Chinese Box
Among the revelers at a Hong Kong New Year’s Eve bash is John (Jeremy Irons), a British journalist who covers the financial and political aspects of this city without ever really understanding what makes it tick. While the countdown to 1997 merrily progresses (they’re following the Western calendar, not the Chinese), another approaching date clouds…
The Kingdom II
This is the second imported chunk of the miniseries that director Lars von Trier devised for Danish TV in 1994, four more episodes spread over five hours, depicting the hugely comical interactions of the denizens of a large, and largely mismanaged, hospital known as the Kingdom — which also happens to be haunted. The Kingdom…
Woo
At last, heartthrob Jada Pinkett Smith gets her star turn with top billing in a major feature, and she’s not robbing banks, either. Initially, Woo seems every bit the fun dating film that’s guaranteed to give urban 20-somethings their six bucks of fulfillment. Unsurprisingly, it’s no more than that, although at times its tenuous jokes…
