by Quendrith Johnson, Los Angeles Correspondent SANTA BARBARA,CA (1/22/2020): It was the kind of Dream Weekend most actors will never experience; after SAG Awards on Friday night, by Tuesday, Laura Dern was picking up a glitzy tribute prize in Santa Barbara for life achievement.  And there’s something so very ‘Laura Dern’ in the way Laura Dern parses her acceptance speech sentences, as distinctive as her onscreen persona. This master-stroke in delivering lines was...

Cold Pursuit, Review: Too much cold, too many pursuits Stylised rendition and slick editing almost save this drug cartels and trail of corpses tale, but only almost. By the time you have attended the countless funerals and shoveled tons of snow, you come out of the cinema as cold as the weather. As the numbness wears out, you realise you have watched just another revenge drama, albeit with a refreshing new take. Nels Coxman's quiet life as a snow-plow driver (clearing roads after snowfal...

Downsizing, review: Mini We Once in a while, a movie comes along that renews our faith in creative writing and the ability of cinema to rise above its own decadence. Maybe it took a dozen ‘shrink’, ‘little’ and ‘antman’ films, from 1957 to 2015, to inspire the writers of Downsizing, the title itself a pun, but the resulting effort has a fresh new feel about it. After setting up a very interesting premise and some smooth as silk spellbinding VFX, the film th...

Star Wars-The Last Jedi, Review: The Lost Jedi George Lucas maintains that his Star Wars films were for kids. Back in the late 70s, when the trade-mark skewed angle intro rolling text greeted us as the film began, I was not a kid. Maybe the sensibilities of an Indian film-goer at 25 were akin to the school-kids in the West, but I loved what I saw. Since, I have seen most, if not all, the core movies and the spin-offs/anthologies, most of them likeable, but the 40th anniversary release saw me ...

Siraj Syed reviews The Founder: Hey Mac, watch out for that Burger! Your McDonald’s burger is not going to be same again. Neither are the fries, or the softees. This is a biopic (read ‘Based on a true story') about the Kroc behind the arches, an American salesman known to the world as Raymond A. Kroc, who consolidated and expanded the two-store enterprise to, nearly, what it is today. Not the founder of the pioneering and iconic fast-food chain, he was more or less solely res...

Wild, Review: On your hike to happiness, leave everything behind Personal to the point of being alien, Wild is a well-intentioned film that picks incidents from a true story, brings the occasional tear to the eye, yet remains foggy and distant. Haunted by memories of her mother Bobbi who succumbed to cancer at a relatively young age, Cheryl gets into reckless behavior, a heroin addiction, several casual sexual relations and a divorce. Then, in what seems a hurried and unconsidered decision, ...

SPOTLIGHT MEDIA PRODUCTIONS   87TH OSCARS® NOMINATIONS ANNOUNCED   By Adrienne Papp   Directors Alfonso Cuarón and J.J. Abrams, actor Chris Pine and Academy President Cheryl Boone Isaacs announced the nominations for the 87th Academy Awards® today (January 15).  For the first time, nominees in all 24 categories were announced live. Cuarón and Abrams announced the nominees in 11 categories at 5:30 a.m. ...

by Quendrith Johnson, Los Angeles Correspondent There are many reasons to wonder silently about the HFPA and their Golden Globe Awards, uhm, maybe the NSA knows more than some of us. (But not likely.) Last year Theo Kingma took the helm, and most of us hoped for the best after the sale to Peter Guber and friends.  What if the HFPA, founded in 1947, came back to its core directive as a charitable institution and gathering place for international journalists in Hollywood? Once w...

We are pleased to announce that "The Monday Before Thanksgiving" written and directed by Courtney Cox will be programmed at the Lady FIlmmakers Film Festival! The film stars Laura Dern, Rosemary Harris, and Courtney Cox.The festival boasts two other films with famous names and faces. The films "This Life" directed by Sarah Spillane starring Danny Glover and "Slap" directed by Grant Barbeito stars Clancy Brown and Mel Rodriguez.Tickets are available on www.ladyfilmma...