Inherent vice movie

In a good movie year — and whatever you may have heard, 2022 was such a year — I find it an agony to compile a Top 10 list . There are just too many good and great films, too many titles that I want to celebrate. Being overwhelmed by a bounty of excellence is a pleasure, one that I often experience at film festivals. And lately, whether I’m at home or at a festival, I have been struck by how much of this abundance is from women onscreen and behind the camera. We are experiencing a sea change with women and movies, a shift in numbers but also in consciousness. Female-driven movies, from women filmmakers and not, open weekly and are greeted as a matter of course rather than as aberrations; some dominate the box office, and a handful are enlivening the awards season. Despite continuing biases and barriers, women are now directing movies with a variety of budgets, topics and casts. It’s made my job as a critic more exciting. It is, I learned long ago, demoralizing and alienating to … [Read more...] about For the First Time Ever, I’m Optimistic About Women in the Movie World

0 Schools See the latest announcement from Dallas College. Press Release Desk , News Partner Posted Reply Press release from Dallas College: January 23, 2023 Dr. Bradford Williams (DALLAS) — Dallas College Chancellor Justin Lonon has selected Dr. Bradford Williams to serve as vice chancellor of operations after a rigorous search to fill a key leadership position. In addition to serving as president of the El Centro Campus since 2021, Williams has spent the last six months as interim chief marketing officer at Dallas College. Dr. Williams begins his new role today. “We’re incredibly proud and fortunate to have Dr. Williams in this role," Chancellor Justin Lonon said. “At El Centro, he successfully led efforts to restore student and employee culture post-pandemic, while expanding our relationships with local businesses and community organizations during an incredibly challenging time. We look forward to him … [Read more...] about Dallas College: Dallas College Names New Vice Chancellor Of Operations

As a general rule, putting Jennifer Lopez in your romantic comedy automatically gets you halfway to a decent movie. The male lead hardly matters: while Lopez has had natural chemistry with George Clooney (“Out of Sight”) and Matthew McConaughey (“The Wedding Planner”), she’s had it just as easily with men of less distinction, like, say, Michael Vartan (“Monster in Law”) or Alex O’Loughlin (“The Back-Up Plan”). In the frothy action rom-com “Shotgun Wedding,” directed by Jason Moore, Lopez stars opposite Josh Duhamel: not exactly Clark Gable, but Lopez makes it work. She always does. As a couple whose destination wedding is interrupted by hostage-taking pirate-terrorists, the two bicker and banter with classic screwball brio, with a love-hate rapport that is both delightful and effortlessly convincing. Much of the dialogue feels canned and phony in the style of a badly written sitcom. But coming out of J. Lo’s mouth, I believed it. “Shotgun Wedding” combines two familiar … [Read more...] about ‘Shotgun Wedding’ Review: ‘Die Hard’ With Refreshments

A romantic comedy starring Diane Keaton, Richard Gere, Susan Sarandon and William H. Macy would kill as a Nancy Meyers movie. Unfortunately, the rom-com “Maybe I Do” was written and directed by the television veteran Michael Jacobs. “Maybe I Do” not only lacks the luscious locations of a Meyers picture, it’s got nothing in the realm of her medium-sharp writing either. For the first section of the movie, three story threads are intercut in a ham-handed, arrhythmical way. The picture begins with its only funny bit, in which Sam (Macy), alone in a movie theater watching a downer art picture and losing his mind, tears up his Twizzlers and mixes them with his popcorn. He’s about to throw in some Peanut M&M’s when he’s interrupted by Grace (Keaton), another lonely senior at the movies. A spark occurs and the two, who are unhappily married to other people, begin to fan the flame. Then, in a luxe hotel room, Howard (Gere) and Monica (Sarandon) grit their teeth through a … [Read more...] about ‘Maybe I Do’ Review: Lukewarm Liaisons

“Cairo Conspiracy” was Sweden’s entry in this year’s Academy Awards race for best international feature, but it does not have a single word of Swedish in it, nor is it set anywhere near the Nordic country. The film (which did not receive an Oscar nomination) is a European coproduction written and directed by Tarik Saleh, a Swedish director whose father is Egyptian. It was shot largely in Turkey. And like Saleh’s 2017 film “ The Nile Hilton Incident ,” it takes aim at corruption in the title city. Adam (Tawfeek Barhom), a young man from a remote Egyptian province, receives the glad news that he’s won a scholarship to Al-Azhar University, an eminent, Islamic institution in Cairo. As Adam gets accustomed to campus life, the movie introduces another character, Colonel Ibrahim (Fares Fares). He’s tasked by a military committee with fixing the election for the university’s new grand imam. The ideal cleric’s interests should, naturally, align with the state’s. Ibrahim is a shaggy … [Read more...] about ‘Cairo Conspiracy’ Review: There Are No Angels

“Forget it, Noredin. It’s Cairo.” Had a similar line not been made famous in another noir, that one might serve as an apt ending for “The Nile Hilton Incident,” a film that owes debts to “Chinatown,” “The Long Goodbye” and other crime mysteries that are marinated in cynicism. Noredin (Fares Fares), a police detective, trolls the city, demanding payoffs from whoever is unlucky enough to cross his path. To call him corrupt is not to say that the rest of the force is clean. Everyone here is on the take, all the time, from cops to clerks to politicians. Noredin gets the case of a murdered woman, a crime that higher-ups are eager to label a suicide. But Salwa ( Mari Malek ), a hotel maid, saw something, and Noredin develops a shred of conscience that leads him to investigate. Perhaps he’s spurred by his father, who looks upon him and his ill-gotten gains with disappointment and says, “You can’t buy dignity, son.” Anger seethes throughout the story, set days before the 2011 … [Read more...] about Review: ‘The Nile Hilton Incident’ Puts the Noir in Cairo