> TIFF’s Midnight Madness program is exactly what you think it is:  10 flat-out, unapologetic genre movies that premiere each night at midnight in front of a raucous crowd at the 1200-seat Ryerson Theatre.  In any given year, the Madness may include unexpected gems like last year’s Insidious and 2006’s Borat, interestingly weird pictures such […]

> Worth A Ticket; A tasty croissant from Woody Allen. Woody Allen interrupts the opening credits of his new comedy MIDNIGHT IN PARIS to insert a montage of lovely Paris locations.  I mention this because after more than 40 years and as many films, the rules of Woody-land seem as fixed and immutable as the […]

  LUCE (Neon):  Julius Onah’s film was one of the most gripping and provocative of the festival, combining a tale about social and racial tensions with the suspense of a psychological thriller.  Based by director Julius Onah and JC Lee on the latter’s play (as adapted, the drama isn’t in any way stagebound), it centers […]

  LITTLE DEATH (no distrib):  Jack Begert’s first feature (co-written with Dani Goffstein) is a diptych about Los Angeles, put together in sharply contrasting ways.  The first half is about sitcom writer Martin (David Schwimmer) as he hustles to get his first film as writer/director greenlit, while coping with his splintering marriage to Jessica (Jena […]

  ENDER’S GAME:  Watch It At Home – Breaks The Rules, But Doesn’t Win the Game You don’t often see a $110M (plus marketing) YA adventure, intended to kick off a new movie franchise, as resolutely off-putting as ENDER’S GAME, and that’s worthy of some respect.  Its protagonist, Ender Wiggin (Asa Butterfield), isn’t cool like a […]

  THE LONE RANGER:  Not Even For Free – The Silver Bullet Is Self-Inflicted Disney’s reluctance to produce THE LONE RANGER is well-documented; the studio even shut down the production shortly before shooting was to begin in order to force producer Jerry Bruckheimer, producer/director Gore Verbinski and producer/star Johnny Depp to slim down the production […]

  LATE NIGHT (Amazon):  It’s legitimate to note that the thoroughly mainstream and commercial Late Night belonged at Sundance just about as much as The Devil Wears Prada would have, since to a large extent it transposes Prada from fashion to the world of late-night talk shows.  The festival’s decision to host Late Night (which paid […]

  WORTH (no distrib):  A dry but fascinating angle on the story of 9/11, Worth centers on the real-life Ken Feinberg (Michael Keaton), an attorney with a very specific expertise:  he and his firm calculated and negotiated compensation payouts to victims and survivors of disasters, in order to settle suits brought for their losses.  In […]