The real-life tale that brought Film Stars Don’t Die in Liverpool displays deep love

Unless you’re a bonafide film buff whose expertise and passions go back to the black-and-white days, you might now be familiar with the work of actress Gloria Grahame. Even though her credits on IMDb.com run 64 projects long and includes the 1953 Oscar for Best Supporting Actress for her performance in The Bad and the…

The Seagull unleashes a new batch of stars to brandish their vanity

Stop, in the name of love! Oh, but try as they might, the characters in The Seagull can’t turn off their misdirected ardor. This latest version of Anton Chekhov’s classic play is, yes, staged in the 19th century Russian countryside, somewhere outside of Moscow. Directed and written by Michael Mayer, this lush adaptation turns loose…

What would one teen boy take from 3 diverse 20th Century Women?

If you lived through 1979, parts big and small of Mike Mills’ Women of a Certain Age will smack you upside the head. The writer and director fashioned this sometimes searing and sometimes sleepy 118-minute period piece after his relationship with his mother, and filled it with the way the people and place in their…

The elusive Warren Beatty applies his rules to recluse Howard Hughes

No doubt he’s an odd duck, but wildly intelligent. That much I was certain of even before my dear wife Karen and I took in the Black Friday 6:50 p.m. showing of Rules Don’t Apply in the Regal Cinemas’ theater at Syracuse mega shopping, dining and entertainment complex Destiny USA. When I left after the…

Pacino packs a subtle punch in ‘Danny Collins’

Sometimes our great actors can seem to be merely playing themselves. My, that can become tiring. Jack Nicholson as Jack Nicholson, anyone? Arch that eyebrow. Unleash that expression of disgust. Sorry, Jack. Al Pacino has done that to me at times. Not in “Danny Collins.” He’s not a cop or a crime figure or anywhere…