I was apprehensive about Redbelt–mostly due to the awkward trailers–but it was totally unfounded. The film’s story, Mamet’s narrative, resists being abbreviated or advertised. It’s all very gradual, very quiet, which each scene building on the one previous. It’s probably Mamet’s finest film as a director, his widescreen composition is wonderful–there’s this one shot where […]
Entries Tagged as 'Chiwetel Eliofor'
Redbelt (2008, David Mamet)
May 12th, 2008 · No Comments
Tagged: Chiwetel Eliofor· David Mamet· Joe Mantegna· Sony Pictures Classics· ★★★★
Love Actually (2003, Richard Curtis)
February 8th, 2008 · No Comments
Richard Curtis–I think–said he wrote Love Actually from all his unused ideas. Just threw them into the oven and baked them together. To some degree, it shows. Unlike the usual big cast films, with lots of incidental meetings and relationships (as P.T. Anderson wrote, these things “happen all the time”), Love Actually is very loose. […]
Tagged: Alan Rickman· Bill Nighy· Chiwetel Eliofor· Hugh Grant· Laura Linney· Richard Curtis· Universal Pictures· ★★★
Inside Man (2006, Spike Lee)
October 29th, 2007 · No Comments
Inside Man has got to be the cleverest remake of The Taking of Pelham One Two Three made to date, starring Denzel Washington as Walter Matthau and Clive Owen as Robert Shaw and Jodie Foster as Martin Balsam. Okay, just kidding. Kind of. Inside Man, rather pointedly, follows in the Dog Day Afternoon tradition of […]
Tagged: Chiwetel Eliofor· Christopher Plummer· Denzel Washington· Jodie Foster· Russell Gewirtz· Spike Lee· Universal Pictures· Willem Dafoe· ★★★
Dirty Pretty Things (2002, Stephen Frears)
June 20th, 2007 · No Comments
At some point during Dirty Pretty Things, maybe the half-way point, I didn’t check, I realized the film’s non-traditional approach was holding it back. It’s ironic (or maybe not, I’m sure I’m using the word wrong) since the third act is the most predictable thing I’ve seen in recent memory. I sat and waited for […]
Tagged: BBC Films· Chiwetel Eliofor· Miramax Films· Stephen Frears· Steven Knight· ★★½
Melinda and Melinda (2004, Woody Allen)
May 15th, 2005 · No Comments
Woody Allen has written around thirty films, probably thirty-four. Ten of these films are some of the finest in the last thirty years, give or take. But he tries something new in Melinda and Melinda and it doesn’t work.
Of his recent work, his post-Miramax period, Melinda is the second strongest–Curse of the Jade Scorpion holding […]
Tagged: Amanda Peet· Chiwetel Eliofor· Chloë Sevigny· Fox Searchlight Pictures· Jonny Lee Miller· Radha Mitchell· Will Ferrell· Woody Allen· ★★★
