The Big Sick makes me feel good about romantic comedy

Emily V. Gordon and Kumail Nanjiani really lived The Big Sick. And the writer and stand-up comic/actor had enough smarts – and guts – to take their how’d-we-meet story to paper together and allow producer Judd Apatow and director Michael Showalter put the touches on it for the big screen. Lucky us. This is an…

Who’s the real outcast in Table 19, you’ll wonder

Oh, Eloise seems so put together as she makes her entrance way back there to sit with the other (very) strangers sitting around table in the way back in the reception of her best friend, whose brother is the best man. And also is the guy who dumped her two months ago. By text. Which…

Oh, baby, Bridget Jones delivers some laughs and affection for the franchise

Oh, that Bridget Jones. She falls for smooth-talking sports agent who had her from hello … Wait a minute. That was Renée Zellweger’s character in Jerry Maguire. That one was from the Way Wayback Machine, in 1996, when she played a sweet and innocent woman who entangles herself with Tom Cruise’s Jerry despite herself, but…

Mike and Dave find the dates they deserve

Zac Efron has not been on what you’d call a winning streak with me. I hated Neighbors. If humanly possible, I despised Dirty Grandpa even more. Too despicable. Too deplorable. Too demeaning. D-minus. And yet I checked out Mike and Dave Need Wedding Dates from my place of work having seen the trailer and doing…

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…