Author:   Ken Hanke

Showing 1387-1407 of 5225 results
Starring: Bette Davis, Olivia de Havilland, Joseph Cotten, Agnes Moorehead, Cecil Kellaway, Mary Astor

Hush … Hush, Sweet Charlotte

Reviewed by Ken Hanke on
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In Brief: Robert Aldrich's follow-up to What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? (1962) started as just another vehicle for Bette Davis and Joan Crawford, but it wasn't long before Crawford had to be replaced by Olivia de Havilland — a change that probably benefitted Hush...Hush, Sweet Charlotte (1964) to no end. There's little doubt that…
Starring: Levon Helm, Amy Helm, Larry Campbell, Billy Bob Thornton, Libby Titus Fagen

Ain’t in It for My Health

Reviewed by Ken Hanke on
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In Brief: Admirably tight documentary about drummer, singer, songwriter and rock legend Levon Helm. Shot in 2008, the film is more content to concentrate on the present than to load itself down with clips from the past. As a film for the faithful, it tends to assume, probably correctly, that the viewer needs only the…
Starring: Joseph Fiennes, Gwyneth Paltrow, Geoffrey Rush, Judi Dench

Shakespeare in Love

Reviewed by Ken Hanke on
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In Brief: As a rule, few things age less gracefully than an old Oscar winner, but this historical romp has held up as a truly pleasant diversion. It's kind of a bittersweet romantic comedy in historical drag. The film puts forth the story of how Shakespeare's proposed play Romeo and Ethel, the Pirate's Daughter became…
Starring: Pierce Brosnan, Trine Dyrholm, Molly Blixt Egelind, Sebastian Jessen, Kim Bodnia

Love Is All You Need

Reviewed by Ken Hanke on
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The Story: Middle-aged romance — and some youthful heartache — at a wedding in picturesque Italy. The Lowdown: Beautiful to look at and charming to watch, Love Is All You Need is a keeper. The romance is effective, the comedy is funny, the locales are gorgeous and there's a deep humanity to it all.
Starring: Fabrice Luchini, Ernst Umhauer, Kristin Scott Thomas, Emmanuelle Seigner, Bastien Ughetto

In the House

Reviewed by Ken Hanke on
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The Story: A high school literature teacher becomes obsessed with the writings of one of his students. The Lowdown: One of the best films you'll see all year, In the House is a brilliant and entirely new kind of thriller that is both amusing and tragic. Compelling entertainment every inch of the way, it is…
Starring: Nicole Kidman, Fionnula Flanagan, Christopher Eccleston, Alakina Mann, James Bentley

The Others

Reviewed by Ken Hanke on
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In Brief: Alejandro Amenábar's virtually perfect The Others (2001) remains one of the handful of truly great ghost stories to make its way to the screen. Everything about this supremely stylish and utterly creepy film beautifully contributes to an atmosphere as thick as the fog surrounding the old house. Everything works together to make the…
Starring: Alain Delon, Monica Vitti, Francisco Rabal, Lilla Brignone

L’eclisse

Reviewed by Ken Hanke on
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In Brief: The final film in Michelangelo Antonioni's "alienation trilogy," L'eclisse (1962) is one of those art-house warhorses that everyone is supposed to know and revere. It's also not a lot of fun and its opacity can come perilously close to feeling like an art-film parody. There's little story — merely two people meeting and…
Starring: Brit Marling, Alexander Skarsgård, Ellen Page, Toby Kebbell, Shiloh Fernandez, Patricia Clarkson

The East

Reviewed by Ken Hanke on
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The Story: An operative for a high-priced security firm infiltrates an ecoterrorist cult and finds herself drawn in. The Lowdown: An interesting premise is ultimately not enough to keep this indie afloat. Some scenes, however, have a great deal of power. A mixed bag, but not without interest.
Starring: Burt Reynolds, Cybill Shepherd, Madeline Kahn, Duilio Del Prete, Eileen Brennan, John Hillerman

At Long Last Love

Reviewed by Ken Hanke on
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In Brief: While it may fall short of being an overlooked classic, Peter Bogdanovich's extremely ambitious 1975 musical comedy is far from being the train wreck that is casually assumed (usually by people who haven't seen it). Bogdanovich's idea was to craft something like an Ernst Lubitsch musical — but one packed with Cole Porter…
Starring: Cary Grant, Eva Marie Saint, James Mason, Jessie Royce Landis, Leo G. Carroll, Martin Landau

North by Northwest

Reviewed by Ken Hanke on
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In Brief: Alfred Hitchcock's final film of the 1950s marked his last collaboration with star Cary Grant. It's also the director's ultimate movie about an innocent man on the run for a crime he didn't commit — and is by far the most elaborate variation on that concept. Whether or not North by Northwest is…
Starring: Clark Gable, Carole Lombard, Dorothy Mackaill, Grant Mitchell, Elizabeth Patterson

No Man of Her Own

Reviewed by Ken Hanke on
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In Brief: Clark Gable plays a gambler hiding out from the law in some upstate New York podunk town where he meets Carole Lombard, a bored, romance-starved librarian. She's interested but wary. He's determined — so determined that he agrees to marry her on a bet. Complications ensue in this pleasant comedy made several years…
Starring: Alain Delon, François Périer, Nathalie Delon, Cathy Rosier, Jacques Leroy

Le Samouraï

Reviewed by Ken Hanke on
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In Brief: Jean-Pierre Melville's elegantly stylish, yet icy neo-noir thriller, Le Samouraï, holds up pretty nicely after 46 years, but it probably hasn't the same impact today that it originally did. Though it helped to set the standard for future neo-noirs, the film is curiously distinctive in many instances — especially in the casting of…
Starring: Catherine Hessling, Charlotte Clasis, Pierre Champagne, Maurice Touzé

Whirlpool of Fate

Reviewed by Ken Hanke on
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In Brief: Jean Renoir's debut film seems first and foremost intended to show off the charms and beauty of Renoir's star (and then-wife) Catherine Hessling. It's less a story than just a series of melodramatic events in which to drop Mrs. Renoir, and as such it's a pretty patchy affair. However, there's enough of the…
Starring: Michael Caine, Angie Dickinson, Nancy Allen, Keith Gordon, Dennis Franz

Dressed to Kill

Reviewed by Ken Hanke on
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In Brief: After the somewhat tepid response to The Fury, Brian De Palma went out of his way to court controversy with this splattery — and more than a little sleazy — 1980 thriller. And however you feel about it, the flick certainly worked to draw audiences with its sex, nudity and over-the-top violence. Designed…
Starring: Henry Cavill, Amy Adams, Michael Shannon, Russell Crowe, Kevin Costner, Laurence Fishburne

Man of Steel

Reviewed by Ken Hanke on
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The Story: A reworking of the Superman origin story. The Lowdown: A mixed bag of a movie that holds its own for about 90 minutes before turning into 45 minutes of noisy, repetitive action. It is not, however, without merit.
Starring: Katie Chang, Israel Broussard, Emma Watson, Claire Julien, Taissa Farmiga, Leslie Mann

The Bling Ring

Reviewed by Ken Hanke on
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The Story: Fact-based story about a group of well-to-do teenagers who stole more than $3 million in clothes, jewelry and drugs from the homes of rich celebrities. The Lowdown: Slick and sometimes witty takedown of the subject, but I'm not sure if the film is any deeper than the characters — and celebrities — it…
Starring: Amy Acker, Alexis Denisof, Nathan Fillion, Clark Gregg, Reed Diamond, Fran Kranz, Jillian Morgese

Much Ado About Nothing

Reviewed by Ken Hanke on
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The Story: Shakespeare's comedy of battling lovers, dastardly plots and bungling policemen gets a modern treatment — in everything but language. The Lowdown: A mostly delightful film from Joss Whedon that not only captures Shakespeare's play, but perhaps shines some new light on it. In the teeth of the blockbuster summer, it's almost a little…
Starring: Ethan Hawke, Julie Delpy, Seamus Davey-Fitzpatrick, Jennifer Prior, Charlotte Prior, Walter Lassally

Before Midnight

Reviewed by Ken Hanke on
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The Story: A look in on a day in the lives of the characters from Before Sunrise and Before Sunset nine years after we last saw them. The Lowdown: A beautiful — almost sublime — film about a relationship we've been following since 1995. Moving, authentic and a must-see.