Hildegard Bingen lived behind cloistered walls in the 12th century. But Hildegard Bingen’s music is still being played, music she composed more than 800 years ago. That fact alone should be enough to warrant a film about an extraordinary woman. But Hildegard is a saint in the Roman Catholic Church,…
feature film
Five Things I Never Realized about Papillon
So I saw the new flick Papillon, and liked it so much I decided to reread the book, which I had read years before as a teenager. That didn’t disappoint either. So this is blog post about both the book and the recent film. An earlier edition of the film…
Madame Bovary: It’s Not Like the Book
In this case, the book is better than the movie. I’m talking about Madame Bovary, the 2015 rendition of Gustave Flaubert’s estimable novel, about the sixth since the “talkies” began. Other reviewers discuss how difficult it is to capture the essence of the book on film, and, again in this…
To Live: About Life and Death
To Live, a Chinese Mandarin language film now available on Netflix DVD, is still powerful 24 years after it was first produced. Starring Gong Li and directed by Zhang Yimou, To Live was banned in China when it was first released, and the Chinese government punished the director by preventing…
Paul, Apostle of Christ Film Tops Expectations
Paul, Apostle of Christ, is a religious movie even an atheist can love. It’s the story of the apostle who came after Christ, who started his career chasing and torturing those who came to be known as Christians, until he was struck down on the road by Damascus by a…
Jon Hamm Can’t Carry Beirut
Jon Hamm may have been great in Mad Men, but he’s not that great starring in a major movie like Beirut. There are other problems with the film, notably the script, but I just didn’t buy Hamm playing a labor negotiator cum spy in Beirut. He’s playing true to form,…
Chappaquiddick Hits Home
Anyone old enough to remember the Chappaquiddick incident, and even many of those who are too young to remember it, probably think there is little new to learn about what happened there almost 50 years ago. The new film doesn’t reveal much new, but handles the story from a perspective…