Review: "The Prom" on Netflix

by Nathaniel R

I first saw The Prom on Broadway during its sort of sleeper success run (I believe it broke even? but for a Broadway original without stars, that's a success!) and I loved it as much as Principle Hawkins (Keegan Michael-Key) reveals that he loves going to the theater. I relate to Hawkins, okay? And I know what that says about me. Consider if you will, these potentially cringe lyrics about seeking escape through art in  "We Look To You"... 

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In defense of Glenn Close as "Maw-Maw"

by Juan Carlos Ojano

Adapted from J.D. Vance’s controversial memoir about his family in the Appalachians, Hillbilly Elegy opened to harshly negative reviews from critics, but the film is not really out of the awards conversation. What was seemingly a slam dunk Oscar contender given the pedigree of its cast is now caught in the critics/audience divide, something that has become a commonality these past few years (Green Book, Bohemian Rhapsody, Joker, etc). Just look at the critics and audience scores the film got in Rotten Tomatoes and Metacritic.

ROTTENTOMATOES: Tomatometer: 26% / Audience Score: 85%
METACRITIC Metascore: 39 (generally unfavorable) / User Score: 7.9 (generally favorable)

The most significant Oscar push for the film will undoubtedly be seven-time oscar nominee Glenn Close for Best Supporting Actress. She plays Mamaw, J.D.’s grandmother and de facto guardian when his mother Bev (Amy Adams) spirals into heroin addiction. This role comes after a surprising Best Actress loss at the 91st Academy Awards for her performance in The Wife.  Absurdly overdue for a win, Close came to this particular Supporting Actress race as a preordained frontrunner. However, the dismal critical reception of the film immediately cast doubt on her chances. Some now feel she won't be nominated at all. Or, that she doesn't deserve to be which is unfair on Close’s part, in my humble opinion...

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"The Crown" S4: An(other) Acting Showcase

by Cláudio Alves

As a staunch antimonarchist and someone who despises Thatcher and her legacy, watching The Crown's fourth season was an oft-frustrating, sometimes fascinating, exercise. Peter Morgan and his team haven't shied away from looking at the dark side of British history and this latest series is no different. However, time constraints, an episodic structure, and attempts at historical ambivalence often result in a lackluster, superficial, occasionally rushed, experience.

Still, the production values are always immaculate, and the dramatization of the 80s features some of the best costumes the program has ever shown. Nevertheless, what always brings me back to The Crown isn't its analysis of politics, its melodrama, or pretty clothes. The show's greatest strength is its cast, with the actors excelling even when their material is lacking. When faced with some of the royal family's most tumultuous years, the performers upped their game and delivered a masterclass in screen acting…

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Review: Sophia Loren returns with "The Life Ahead"

by Cláudio Alves

The Movie Star and Her Director Son

Even before we see her face in The Life Ahead, it's impossible to draw the eyes away from Sophia Loren. Following in the tradition of European realism, Edoardo Ponti's camera captures an Italian marketplace with shaky energy. However, no matter how shabby the framing might be, the colors depart from the standards of realism. Angus Hudson's cinematography makes everything a bit too bright, the sun shining on the streets like golden flames, every saturated color intensified. It's reality as if painted with crayons by an enthusiastic child. 

In this sunny landscape, a shot of bright blue, bluer than the sky, stands out, crowned by a mess of gunmetal hair. Dressed in azure, Loren may have lost some of the youthful glow of her heyday in the midcentury, but the star power is intact, her magnetism as strong as ever. Furthermore, the director, her son, knows how to pay reverence to the screen legend without making it too obvious or too elegiac…

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The animated couture of "Over the Moon"

by Cláudio Alves

As computer animation evolves, the making of these features becomes ever more complex. A few decades ago, it might have seemed silly to have cinematographers collaborating with cartoon filmmakers, but that's no longer the case. Roger Deakins, for instance, had a crucial part in making the How to Train Your Dragon movies look the way they did. The same goes for costume design.

Once upon a time, what an animated figure wore was, more or less, inseparable from character design and you rarely had a specific costume department in such productions. With films like Disney's Frozen and Laika's gigantic stop-motion projects, there's increasing space for costume designers in the making of animated movies. The latest example is Netflix's Over the Moon…

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