Director Joe Swanberg (Nights and Weekends) goes beyond the mumblecore movement with this revealing drama about marriage. For Alexander the Last, Swanberg reigns over an experienced cast of actors — including Jane Adams, Jess Weixler, and Josh Hamilton — but still incorporates his usual improvisational techniques. Margot at the Wedding director Noah Baumbach serves as one of the film’s producers. —IFC FilmsRead More »
Synopsis:
A Palestinian bomber has killed an Israeli diplomat and his family and the Israeli plot to neutralise him becomes convoluted as they select an American Actress (Charlie) to impersonate the Bomber’s brother’s girlfriend after the Israeli’s capture and kill the brother. Charlie is placed into a world where she begins being an actress, then becomes a spy, then is trained by the Palestinians as a guerrilla and finally is sent to deliver a bomb. She is chronically confused by how far she is really supposed to go in her impersonations and how much of herself she must give up.Read More »
Ex-Green Beret hapkido expert saves wild horses from being slaughtered for dog food and helps protect a desert “freedom school” for runaway.Read More »
A lawyer defends a yacht captain accused of killing his boss and raping his mistress.Read More »
At first glance, you might dismiss Journey Through the Past as just another sci-fi quickie. Please DON’T do that. This 75-minute, R-rated musical documentary is a probing portrait of rock star Neil Young. The film begins in 1966, when Young was still with Buffalo Springfield, and concludes in “the present”-1972, that is. Also appearing are Neil Young’s faithful companions Stephen Stills, Richie Furay, Dewey Martin, David Crosby and Graham Nash. Songs include “Only Love Can Break Your Heart” and “Heart of Gold.” The direction of Journey Through the Past is credited to one “Bernard Shakey”-who also goes by the name of Neil Young ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie GuideRead More »
Even when he’s not working with his own material, Alan Rudolph remains one of our sharpest film stylists. In this 1991 featurea somber thriller involving wife abuse and murder in New Jersey, written by William Reilly and Claude Kervenhe does such a good job with the storytelling and the actors that the broadness of the film’s depiction of a working-class milieu doesn’t seem unduly jarring, anchored as it is in an effectively distancing New Age score by Mark Isham. Demi Moore, who also coproduced, stars as the best friend and coworker of a hairdresser (Glenne Headly) married to an abusive layabout (Bruce Willis). If in the past Rudolph has tended to romanticize the sordidness of working-class life (as in Remember My Name and Choose Me), here he seems to be trying to overcompensate with a vengeance, but the fleetness of his camera moves and editing and the strength of his lead actors (who also include Harvey Keitel and Billie Neal as police detectives) keep one riveted to the screen.
Jonathan RosenbaumRead More »
Plot
Ellen Beldon is due to be hanged in Texas for the murder of her husband but Jud Farrow, ranch foreman for her uncle, breaks her out of jail and escorts her to the safety of her uncle’s New Mexico ranch. Mace Beldon, her father-in-law, offers professional gunman Gil McCord five-thousand dollars to bring her back to Texas so she can be hung. He is able to get her away and, during the trip back, she tells him the story of her trial. She claims her brother-in-law, Kell Beldon, shot his step-brother (her husband)so that he would be his father’s sole heir, and that drunken fur-trapper Elby Kirby was the only witness. Gill decides to see Kirby and force a confession from him. Meanwhile, Kell gets Ellen back by chance and turns her over to the law. Gill gets an order from the district judge to stop the execution, and Kell, seeing his story falling apart tries to out-shoot Gill.Read More »
Cult director Bert I. Gordon was at the helm for this terrifying story of supernatural passion. Set on an island in a tight-knit community, Tom Stewart (Richard Carlson) is preparing to marry the woman he loves. All is well until Tom’s old girlfriend, Vi, confronts him at the top of the island’s lighthouse, claiming he can only be hers! A freak accident throws the scorned woman to her death. At first relieved, Tom’s tune changes when her vengeful spirit begins to follow him wherever he goes. He’s soon tormented, body and soul, by an unforgiving she-ghost! What lengths will Tom go to in order to protect his secret? Will the vengeful Vi finally reveal herself to the others at hand? Find out in this harrowing tale of love between the living and the dead!Read More »
Relatives of an eccentric millionaire gather in his spooky mansion on the 20th anniversary of his death for the reading of his will.Read More »