Dir. David Yates. Starring Daniel Radcliffe, Emma Watson, Michael Gambon Chris Columbus’ versions of Harry Potter were loving if long-winded, Alfonso Cuaron’s…I hate using this word, but it really was disruptive…and remarkable, and Mike Newell’s clean and effective. If those are all true, then David Yates’ versions are by and large ham-fisted. Yates’ four adaptations… Read More Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix (2007)
Dir. Mike Newell. Starring Daniel Radcliffe, Emma Watson, Rupert Grint The Potter books total over a million words. The movies come to nearly twenty hours. There are any number of scenes that must have been difficult to adapt for myriad reasons, but the absolute most difficult scene to turn from words to images is the… Read More Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire (2005)
Dir. Alfonso Cuaron. Starring Daniel Radcliffe, Rupert Grint, Emma Watson As a lad, I was so certain that the job of a filmmaker was to be as faithful as possible to the material s/he adapted. I have been wised up significantly since then, but I have to confess that because of that particular foible, I… Read More Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban (2004)
Dir. Chris Columbus. Starring Daniel Radcliffe, Rupert Grint, Emma Watson The great strength of Sorcerer’s Stone is that it leaned all the way into making us awestruck at the Wizarding World. The great failure of Chamber of Secrets is that it leaves aside that sense of discovery which came with its predecessor. For example, a… Read More Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets (2002)
Dir. Chris Columbus. Starring Daniel Radcliffe, Rupert Grint, Emma Watson The Harry Potter books are meant for young people—I was in elementary school when my dad all but pressed a copy of Sorcerer’s Stone on me during a Barnes and Noble trip, and in high school when I inhaled Deathly Hallows—but unless you’re one of… Read More Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone (2001)
Dir. Herbert Ross. Starring Sally Field, Julia Roberts, Dolly Parton Whaddaya like? You like coming home to a kiss? Somebody with a smile at the door? Whaddaya like? You like indescribable bliss? Then whaddaya wanna get married for? Just as Company makes sense in the New York City of the late ’60s, Steel Magnolias makes sense in… Read More Steel Magnolias (1989)
Dir. Grigori Chukhrai. Starring Vladimir Ivashov, Zhanna Prokhorenko, Aleksandr Kuznetsov This is a short movie, less than ninety minutes from tip to tail, and what’s incredible about is that for, I dunno, eighty-two of those minutes I never would have dreamed that this was a movie about cruelty. Alyosha (Ivashov) is on his way back… Read More Ballad of a Soldier (1959)
Dir. Bob Persichetti, Peter Ramsey, Rodney Rothman. Starring Shameik Moore, Jake Johnson, Liev Schreiber This is the kind of superhero movie I imagined when I was a preteen: witty, action-packed, heartfelt, and most of all absolutely overflowing with possibility. Multiverses are cheating, fine, but here’s an example. The first superheroes I ever got into were… Read More Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse (2018)
Dir. Rob Reiner. Starring Cary Elwes, Robin Wright, Mandy Patinkin William Goldman could not have chosen a more difficult kind of story to write than this bifocals fairy tale. Looking at it through the top half of the lens, this is a once upon a time story about adventure and magic and a princess in… Read More The Princess Bride (1987)
Dir. Kenneth Branagh. Starring Lily James, Richard Madden, Cate Blanchett Pretend I sound like your mother when I say: This is just a nice movie. The story of Cinderella (James) is one that banks on the obvious cruelty that the stepmother (Blanchett) and stepsisters (Holliday Grainger and Sophie McShera) throw at our innocent heroine. Some… Read More Cinderella (2015)
Seeing Things Secondhand 