Author:   Ken Hanke

Showing 421-441 of 5225 results
Starring: Deborah Kerr, Megs Jenkins, Peter Wyngarde, Martin Stephens, Pamela Franklin, Michael Redgrave

The Innocents

Reviewed by Ken Hanke on

In Brief: Though highly regarded in some quarters, I have always found Jack Clayton's The Innocents (1961) a well-produced bore with literary pretensions of the stupefyingly trapped-in-amber kind. But I thought it was time to give it another try when this screening popped up. I wish I could say another viewing of this film version…
Starring: Bill Murray, Kate Hudson, Leem Lubany, Fahim Fazli, Arian Moayed, Bruce Willis

Rock the Kasbah

Reviewed by Ken Hanke on

The Story: A meandering series of events that ultimately becomes the tale of a low-rent talent agent getting a young Afghan girl on the show "Afghan Star." The Lowdown: The first half of this Bill Murray vehicle is just not good, but it gives way in its second half to a movie that's very worth seeing to a degree that…
Starring: Bob Hope, Paulette Goddard, Willie Best, Paul Lukas, Richard Carlson, Anthony Quinn

The Ghost Breakers

Reviewed by Ken Hanke on

In Brief: For their Halloween movie, the Asheville Film Society revisits the Bob Hope horror-comedy The Ghost Breakers, which they showed four years ago. After spending nearly a year trying to figure out what to do with Hope, Paramount had struck gold by putting him in a film version of an “old dark house” stage play with The…
Starring: Jack Black, Dylan Minnette, Odeya Rush, Ryan Lee, Amy Ryan, Jillian Bell

Goosebumps

Reviewed by Ken Hanke on

The Story: The assorted monsters from R.L. Stine's Goosebumps books get loose, causing kid-friendly mayhem. The Lowdown: It's better than you probably think, and children should love it. It looks good, is pleasant enough, but anything more than that — probably not.
Starring: Mia Wasikowska, Tom Hiddleston, Jessica Chastain, Charlie Hunnam, Jim Beaver

Crimson Peak

Reviewed by Ken Hanke on

The Story: A young woman marries a strange man and discovers that life with him and his sister in the family mansion isn't what she'd hoped for. The Lowdown: Guillermo del Toro's gothic horror, haunted house shocker — perhaps the most visually striking film of the year — is in a class by itself. A…
Starring: Susanne Wuest, Lukas Schwarz, Elias Schwartz, Hans Escher, Elfriede Schatz, Karl Purker

Goodnight Mommy

Reviewed by Ken Hanke on

The Story: Two children become convinced that their mother — wrapped in bandages following cosmetic surgery — isn't their mother. The Lowdown: Highly regarded on the festival circuit it may be, but this is a slow, unpleasant thriller with the most transparent "twist" of all time.
Starring: Tom Hanks, Mark Rylance, Scott Shepherd, Amy Ryan, Alan Alda, Sebastian Koch

Bridge of Spies

Reviewed by Ken Hanke on

The Story: Fact-based story of Cold War politics and espionage. The Lowdown: Solid old-fashioned moviemaking with everything that implies. Sure, it's well-made and it does what it sets out to do, but there's an inescapable sense of ossification.
Starring: Akira Takarada, Momoko Kôchi, Akihiko Hirata, Takashi Shimura, Fuyuki Murakami

Gojira (Godzilla)

Reviewed by Ken Hanke on

In Brief: Perhaps no series in the history of movies ever went to hell as fast as the seemingly endless spawn of Gojira — or Godzilla as it came to be known in the West. Oh, sure, the immediate cheapjack sequel Godzilla Raids Again (1955) — which made it to the U.S. in 1959 as Gigantis the Fire Monster — was at…
Starring: Ellen Burstyn, Linda Blair, Max von Sydow, Jason Miller, Lee J. Cobb

The Exorcist

Reviewed by Ken Hanke on

In Brief: For the Halloween season, the Asheville Film Society has booked — from a new DCP rendering of the movie — William Friedkin's horror classic The Exorcist (1973). Friedkin’s film treatment of William Peter Blatty’s best-selling novel about a young girl possessed by a demon originally seemed more an “event” than a great movie. Its…
Starring: Hugh Jackman, Levi Miller, Garrett Hedlund, Rooney Mara, Adeel Akhtar, Amanda Seyfried

Pan

Reviewed by Ken Hanke on

The Story: An attempt at creating an origins story for Peter Pan. The Lowdown: A deeply disappointing film from an incredibly talented filmmaker. It sometimes works. More often, it doesn't. It's mostly watchable, but it's a lot of fuss over not much. Think of it as Peter Pan: The YA Years.
Starring: Oliver Reed, Samantha Eggar, Art Hindle, Henry Beckman, Nuala Fitzgerald, Cindy Hinds

The Brood

Reviewed by Ken Hanke on

In Brief: The Brood (1979) may reasonably be considered the first of David Cronenberg’s mature films. It’s undeniably the first that afforded him the presence of two actual stars — Oliver Reed and Samantha Eggar. It’s also the first that is clearly about more than it seems, which only serves to make its excursions into Cronenbergian…
Starring: Woody Allen, Alan Alda, Martin Landau, Mia Farrow, Anjelica Huston

Crimes and Misdemeanors

Reviewed by Ken Hanke on

In Brief: If Crimes and Misdemeanors isn’t Woody Allen’s best blending of drama and comedy, it’s most certainly in the running (and beats the pants off his 2005 white-bread, wholly dramatic reworking of similar material, Match Point). It may also be the filmmaker’s most intensely Jewish work. Jewishness, of course, is rarely far removed from any Allen film,…
Starring: Rudolph Valentino, Nita Naldi, Casson Ferguson, Gertrude Olmstead

Cobra

Reviewed by Ken Hanke on

In Brief: Rudolph Valentino's penultimate film, Cobra (1925), is something of an oddity. Cobra (no, the title doesn't refer to Valentino) is essentially a drawing room romantic drama done in the typical Hollywood style of the era. The camera is nailed down (the one shot where it moves is startling just because it feels out…
Starring: W.C. Fields, Peggy Hopkins Joyce, George Burns, Gracie Allen, Bela Lugosi, Stuart Erwin, Cab Calloway

International House

Reviewed by Ken Hanke on

In Brief: With International House, the Asheville Film Society celebrates not its star, its strangeness, nor its Pre-Code freedom, but rather the birthday (the 133rd) of horror icon Bela Lugosi, who here (despite his billing) had probably his best non-horror role. A friend of mine once summed up A. Edward Sutherland’s International House (1933) by running down the cast list and…
Starring: Andrew Garfield, Michael Shannon, Laura Dern, Clancy Brown, Tim Guinee, Noah Lomax

99 Homes

Reviewed by Ken Hanke on

The Story: A man who loses his home in the housing bust goes to work for the crooked realtor who evicted him. The Lowdown: It's powerful, and it's still timely, but 99 Homes is also obvious and increasingly less compelling as it goes on.
Starring: Idris Elba, Abraham Attah, Emmanuel Nii Adorn Quaye, Ama K. Abebrese, Richard Pepple, Opeyemi Fagbohungbe

Beasts of No Nation

Reviewed by Ken Hanke on

The Story: Uncompromising account of a child soldier in an African war.  The Lowdown: Stark, powerful, finely crafted, but inclined to redundancy in its excessive length. Still, its unflinching portrait of the unthinkable is unforgettable.

Cranky Hanke’s Weekly Reeler September 30-October 6: Sleeping with the Sicario Martian

Posted on by Ken Hanke

In Theaters.  OK, here it is — the first week of the real fall movie season and we have one mainstream release, one expanding to mainstream art title and one little art title of some note which is likely to be crushed under the combined weight of those two. That’s assuming it isn’t already going […]

Starring: Jason Robards, Britt Eckland, Norman Wisdom, Forrest Tucker, Harry Andrews, Joseph Wiseman

The Night They Raided Minsky’s

Reviewed by Ken Hanke on

In Brief: The Night They Raided Minsky’s (1968) is a surprisingly pleasant early William Friedkin film that (like any number of movies editor Ralph Rosenblum tried to take credit for “saving”) works far better than so many films trying to depict the 1920s. Oh, the music isn’t exactly period, and the sleaze factor of burlesque is…
Starring: John Wood, Shannon Whisnant, Marian Lytle, Tom Lytle, Peg Wood, Lisa Whisnant

Finders Keepers

Reviewed by Ken Hanke on

The Story: The thoroughly preposterous — but true — story of the battle over possession of an amputated foot. The Lowdown: Every bit as strange as it sounds, the film is at once very funny, yet strangely moving and even tragic.
Starring: Barbara Kent, Glenn Tryon, Fay Holderness, Gusztav Partos, Eddie Phillips, Andy Devine

Lonesome

Reviewed by Ken Hanke on

In Brief: I first read about Paul Fejos’ Lonesome (1928) when I was in high school — a rather long time ago. I don’t remember the book, but I do remember that the film sounded like something I wanted to see, just from the story. I’ve always been drawn to movies with simple stories that are built on…