Screen Test

       Cate Blanchett and Nina Hoss in Tár.   Focus Features photo via IMDB Besides being fluent in German and awesomely articulate in English, Cate Blanchett also speaks the language of music in “ Tár.” Which parts of her portrayal of pianist-conductor-composer Lydia Tár stem from the actress's prodigious talent, and which parts are thanks to writer-director (and musician) Todd Field, either way Lydia Tár is more superhero than mere mortal, a force of nature, a one-woman energy field. Blanchett reportedly learned to play two instruments, and conduct an orchestra  and  speak German for the role. The intensity of the character – an opinionated, outspoken lesbian, a lioness on the orchestral podium of the Berlin Philharmonic who has no time for frivolity and does not suffer fools gladly – has put Blanchett near the top of best actress predictions this awards season. Deservedly so. You don't watch her performance through the first half of the movie so muc...

  Joel Edgerton (center), Colin Farrell and Viggo Mortensen working to save “Thirteen Lives.”                Amazon Prime photo via IMDB One summer day in 2018, twelve young Thai members of the Wild Boar soccer team ended practice before setting off on their bikes to explore the nearby Tham Luang Nang Non cave complex. An assistant coach accompanied the boys, ages 11 to 16.   They were already underground in the sprawling maze of caverns and tunnels under the Thai-Myanmar border when the rain began. Monsoon season had arrived unseasonably early, adding to the boys' parents' terror when their sons didn't return later that afternoon. The story that unfolded – first of the boys' disappearance; then of their discovery, all still alive but trapped as the water level in the cave kept rising; then of a rescue too outrageous to be believed – held the world spellbound for the next 18 days. It was the kind of adventure you only see at the movies, ...

George Clooney, Maxime Bouttier, Kaitlyn Deever and Julia Robets in “Ticket to Paradise.” Armon Shokri Universal Pictures photo via IMDB Like a kinder, gentler answer to the Emmy-winning “The White Lotus,” “Ticket to Paradise” joins the ranks of comedies about things that can go wrong when beautiful people vacation in beautiful places. It's as pleasant as a tropical breeze, and just as slight. Considering that it buzzes with the high wattage Oscar winners George Clooney and Julia Roberts generate just being in the same frame, you might wish for something more substantial. Then again, it's the only movie in the box office top five that was actually made for grown-ups. It looks like it was fun to make. Pictures of Julia and George could be in the encyclopedia entry titled “Beautiful People.” They get to fly off to Bali (actually played by Queensland, Australia), spend weeks cracking each other up, call it work and get paid gazillions of dollars just for good measure. They play lo...

Tom Hanks and Austin Butler in “Elvis.” Warner Bros. image via IMDB Labor Day didn't just mark the beginning of fall – it also signaled an early start to film awards season. The first DVD screener “for your consideration” just arrived in my mailbox. Which means it's time to dust off the blog and let the games begin. The Emmys will be broadcast Monday on NBC where two of the very few series I've seen and written about here – “Ted Lasso” and “The White Lotus” – have chalked up a whole lot of nominations. Meanwhile, recent coverage from film festivals in Cannes and Venice is already handicapping early picks for this year's Oscar field. Baz Luhrmann's “Elvis,” an exuberant revision of the mythology surrounding rock 'n' roll's first – and still greatest – demigod, premiered at Cannes. It's playing in theaters, but is also available on HBO Max, which is where I saw it. Austin Butler's channeling of the rock icon – nailing his singing voice, his guitar ...

  Ray Liotta in “Something Wild.” ( Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Studios photo via IMDB) . Amber Heard and me at the 2018 Maui Film Festival at Wailea.  (Maui Film Festival photo.) No one had ever heard of Ray Liotta the first time I interviewed him. It was 1986. He and a couple of other young actors early in their careers – Jeff Daniels and Melanie Griffith – were in New Orleans on a press junket for “Something Wild.” The comedy thriller wasn't set in New Orleans but director Jonathan Demme – an aficionado of American culture – had picked the destination as an excuse to spend the weekend enjoying some storied N'awlins' food and music. “Something Wild” was a quirky romp in which straight-laced Daniels gets waylaid by free-spirited Griffith before her loose cannon husband shows up to change the mood entirely. Liotta played the loose cannon. He was such a ticking time bomb on screen, it came as news (with junket journalists frantically checking our press kits to find out who he was) t...

  When Anthony Bourdain came to Hawaii a few years before his death to film an episode of his CNN series “Parts Unknown,” someone threw a big party in his honor. I have friends who were there. It hearkened back to the luaus that greeted Mark Twain on his visit to the islands a century and a half earlier.  Bourdain and Twain were cut from the same cloth – world traveling adventurers whose glib humor and popularity with mass audiences masked the deep compassion and wisdom of their writing. They were working class, men of the people. Guys whose curiosity and love for life stemmed from not placing themselves above it. Memories of the CNN episode are fading now, but I recall that the star of the Emmy- and Peabody- winning series went spear fishing with some bruddahs off Molokai. They snagged an octopus, and Bourdain, as instructed, gamely proved his mettle by chewing on its head to remove its brain as they all bobbed in the channel.  He was into karate at the time, pursuing it...

       poynter.org photo Are we over Will Smith yet? Doesn't look that way. The notorious  Slap  is still sparking a veritable feeding frenzy across the mediaverse. So many columnists, professors and pundits have weighed in, I feel like I got PhD's in sociology, psychology and toxic masculinity in the week since the infamous moment that distracted the Academy Awards from the more hopeful messages of award winners “CODA,” Jessica Chastain, Ariana DeBose and “Drive My Car.” Aside from echoing Denzel Washington's biblical sentiment on the matter – who are any of us to judge? – I don't have much to add. Based on a decades-long career, Will Smith is a veritable monument; most of us are no more than flies buzzing around his edifice. But for all the probing of residual racism or the fragile insecurity of manly men, let me nominate two other candidates for boogyman in the superstar's tragic fall: Fame. And fortune. We didn't know it on Sunday night but now we have ...