Author:   Ken Hanke

Showing 946-966 of 5225 results
Starring: Philip Seymour Hoffman, Rachel McAdams, Willem Dafoe, Grigoriy Dobrygin, Nina Hoss, Robin Wright

A Most Wanted Man

Reviewed by Ken Hanke on
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The Story: Complex espionage tale involving a refugee, an inheritance and warring factions of counter-terrorist agencies. The Lowdown: More cerebral than exciting, A Man Most Wanted presents an unromantic and penetrating look into the world of modern espionage. It wants to be more than it is, but it's still good and contains a strong performance…
Starring: Anne Wiazemsky, Walter Green, Francois Lafarge, Jean-Claude Guilbert, Philippe Asselin

Au Hasard Balthazar

Reviewed by Ken Hanke on
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In Brief: Robert Bresson's symbolic drama Au Hasard Balthazar — the story of the mostly sad life of a donkey named Balthazar — makes a welcome return appearance at World Cinema. Do not think that this is any kind of cute movie with some humanized animal. It is anything but. It may not be quite the…
Starring: John Wayne, Jeffrey Hunter, Vera Miles, Ward Bond, Natalie Wood, John Qualen

The Searchers

Reviewed by Ken Hanke on
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In Brief: The Hendersonville Film Society ran John Ford's The Searchers (1956) about seven years ago, so it's certainly high time the movie showed back up on local screens. While I've never been convinced it's quite the masterpiece it's been hailed as — in part because of its influence on George Lucas and Star Wars…
Starring: (Voices of) Dane Cook, Ed Harris, Julie Bowen, Curtis Armstrong, Hal Holbrook

Planes: Fire & Rescue

Reviewed by Ken Hanke on
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The Story: A racing champion crop duster goes to fire and rescue school. The Lowdown: Even by the none-too-exacting standards of kiddie fare these days, this is just dire. It isn't funny. It isn't exciting. It ought to have gone straight-to-DVD — assuming it had to go anywhere.
Starring: Barbara Sayer, Tatsuo Ichikawa, Bernie Segal Larry Adams

The Mystery of George Masa

Reviewed by Ken Hanke on
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In Brief: Paul Bonesteel's 2002 documentary The Mystery of George Masa — originally shown on PBS in 2003 — tells the story of the enigmatic Japanese conservationist and photographer Masahar Iizuka (locally known as George Masa). Using a mix of interviews, tasteful dramatic recreations, archival photos and a ton of reasearch, Bonesteel paints as complete a…
Starring: Peter Millis, Tracey Johnston-Crum, Art Booth, Russ Wilson, Sam Jillian, Sonia D'Andrea, Joseph Barcia

The Quitters

Reviewed by Ken Hanke on
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In Brief: When local musician Hank Bones couldn't get a stage production of his musical The Quitters, he decided to make a film of it. Cheerfully admitting that he had no experience with film, he dived straight into the project — on a $9,000 budget — and with the help of friends and local actors…
Starring: Emmanuelle Seigner, Mathieu Amalric

Venus in Fur

Reviewed by Ken Hanke on
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The Story: A seemingly completely inappropriate actress goes out of her way to convince a writer-director that she should star in his new play. The Lowdown: Brilliant, bold filmmaking from a great filmmaker, who proves that at 80, he can still be at the top of his game. It's funny and perceptive and maybe a…
Starring: Keira Knightley, Mark Ruffalo, Hailee Steinfeld, Adam Levine, Catherine Keener, James Corden

Begin Again

Reviewed by Ken Hanke on
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The Story:  A jilted singer-songwriter and a washed-up record producer team up to produce an album on their own. The Lowdown: A mostly pleasant but deeply flawed little film that gets by on its stars and a sense of generosity.
Starring: Robert Mitchum, Gene Barry, Jacques Aubuchon, Jim Mitchum, Keely Smith, Sandra Knight

Thunder Road

Reviewed by Ken Hanke on
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In Brief: Wedge Brewery holds their annual showing of Asheville's own Thunder Road, the 1958 moonshine-running and fast-cars classic — well, a classic of this kind of backwoods-action melodrama. Wedge Brewery will show Thunder Road on Saturday, July 19. Films start 15 minutes after sundown.
Starring: Katsuhiko Sasaki, Tomoko Ai, Akihiko, Katsumasa, Goro Mutsumi

Terror of Mechagodzilla

Reviewed by Ken Hanke on
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In Brief: This is the last of the original series of Godzilla movies — starting with Gojira (Godzilla) in 1954 and ending in 1975 with this — and it's one that does much to right the mistakes of the 1970s entries. Bringing back the director who started it all, Ishiro Honda, and composer Akira Ifukube…
Starring: Eddie Constantine, Anna Karina, Akim Tamiroff, Howard Vernon

Alphaville

Reviewed by Ken Hanke on
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In Brief: Jean-Luc Godard's Alphaville (1965) is simply one of the damndest things you're ever likely to see. Godard took a popular noir-ish, pulp fiction  detective, Lemmy Caution (Eddie Constantine) and plopped him into a nightmarish sci-fi movie that seems to be part serious, part satire — or possibly one huge practical joke. Is Godard serious or not? Good…
Starring: Robert Redford, Helen Mirren, Willem Dafoe, Alessandro Nivola, Matt Craven

The Clearing

Reviewed by Ken Hanke on
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In Brief: The Clearing was partly shot in Asheville, giving it a certain local interest — though I fear that Asheville watchers may be disappointed that there’s nothing very specifically Ashevillian about it. Not that that’s so surprising, since the movie is supposed to be taking place in Pennsylvania, and most of the North Carolina…
Starring: Roger Ebert, Chaz Ebert, Martin Scorsese, Werner Herzog, Ramin Bahrani, Marlene Siskel

Life Itself

Reviewed by Ken Hanke on
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The Story:  Documentary on movie critic Roger Ebert. The Lowdown: Something of a mixed bag — and one that dodges the hard questions and comes across more like a celebration of its subject than an actual portrait. It nonetheless does a good job of capturing much of the essence of a man who loved the…
Starring: Liam Neeson, Maria Bello, Mila Kunis, Adrien Brody, Olivia Wilde, Moran Atias, James Franco, Kim Basinger

Third Person

Reviewed by Ken Hanke on
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The Story:  Three stories set in three different countries are intercut with each other. The Lowdown: A fascinating, flawed and occasionally maddening film with a terrific cast giving solid performances. It's wildly ambitious — probably too much so — overstuffed, overlong and yet compelling in ways that better films often aren't.
Starring: Saeed Jaffrey, Roshan Seth, Daniel Day-Lewis, Gordon Warnecke, Derrick Branche, Shirley Anne Field

My Beautiful Laundrette

Reviewed by Ken Hanke on
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In Brief: Since Stephen Frears had a movie up for a Best Picture Oscar — Philomena — last year, it's apt  that his first big hit, My Beautiful Laundrette, should be getting another look. This multicultural, multisexuality comedy-drama-romance kicked off Daniel Day-Lewis' career and made the first mark for a production company called Working Title. It was also…
Starring: The Four Marx Brothers, Margaret Dumont, Lillian Roth, Louis Sorin, Hal Thompson

Animal Crackers

Reviewed by Ken Hanke on
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In Brief: No one and nothing is quite safe at Mrs. Rittenhouse's (Margaret Dumont) swanky Long Island house party when the Marx Brothers show up. Worse, one of them, Captain Jeffrey T. Spaulding (Groucho), is her guest of honor. Zeppo is his secretary and, as usual, mostly fades into the background, while Signor Emmanuel Ravelli…
Starring: Andrew Lawrence, Gary Busey, C. Thomas Howell, Jillian Rose Reed, Andrew Caldwell

Confessions of a Womanizer

Reviewed by Ken Hanke on
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In Brief: This year's feature winner at the Twin Rivers Media Festival is an extremely likable — mostly due to its energetic cast — sex comedy that benefits to some degree by name performers, Gary Busey and C. Thomas Howell, in key supporting roles. The fact that it's mostly gorgeous looking in bright, pop art…
Starring: Aaron Paul, Juliette Lewis, Josh Wiggins, Deke Garner, Dalton Sutton, Camron Owens, Dylan Cole

Hellion

Reviewed by Ken Hanke on
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The Story: Story of a dysfunctional, motherless family in Texas, focused on the older, delinquent son. The Lowdown: An indie-basic tale of disaffected youth and their alcoholic dad in rural Texas. Some aspects are pleasing, but you've seen it all before.