Author: FOCUS Newspaper

Director Martin Brest’s 1979 film Going in Style was remarkable in that he wasn’t even thirty when he made the film and yet it so sharply captured the trials and tribulations of growing old. The film’s plot involves three bored...

It’s old news by now that Hollywood studios are not renowned for taking chances. If something works they tend to bludgeon an idea to death until it dies from overexposure or, worse, audience indifference. With the runaway...

The struggles of African Americans in a country that prides itself in being the land of the free forms the basis of director Raoul Peck’s incendiary documentary, I Am Not Your Negro. Based on a proposed book project by the...

By Jocelyn Noveck, AP National Writer One can imagine the pitch meeting: It’s American Idol, but animated, and everyone’s an animal. We’ll star a cuddly koala. We’ll get McConaughey, Witherspoon, some other A-listers. We’ll...

Denzel Washington’s passion project Fences, an adaptation of the celebrated play by the late August Wilson, is a film filled with many moments of winning truth and insight. Washington not only stars in the film but he also...

I just can’t help but wonder what a visiting race of extraterrestrials might make of the way that human grief is depicted in the new Will Smith drama Collateral Beauty. Since this film and the way it depicts grief is about as...

I loved director Damien Chazelle’s second film, Whiplash, from two years ago. In fact, it was my favorite film of its year. It’s no surprise, I suppose, that I would respond so strongly to his bittersweet and wistful musical...

Celebrated designer turned filmmaker Tom Ford stumbles a bit with his second cinematic foray, the much anticipated Nocturnal Animals. This is a film that pulses with Ford’s stylish directorial flourishes but ultimately does not...

Actor Bryan Cranston has, in numerous interviews, repeatedly made mention of the fact that he’s careful about the projects in which he chooses to participate. He’s an actor I generally respect and hold in high esteem and I’ve...

Veteran director Robert Zemeckis’ latest film, Allied, is many things. It is alternately a solid WWII yarn, a love story, a mystery and a meditation on the moments that make up the lives we choose to lead. The good news is that...

Playwright and occasional filmmaker Kenneth Lonergan’s Manchester By the Sea is only his second film in fifteen years but it successfully builds on themes established in Lonergan’s superbly crafted earlier films (Margaret, You...

Poor Octavia Spencer. Having the knowledge that it was only a handful of years ago since she was awarded a best supporting actress Oscar for her work in The Help, it’s saddening to see her returning as a prostitute in the...

Disney’s latest family oriented opus, Moana, is further proof of the company’s systematic rubber-stamping of the majority of its animated film output. It’s pleasant enough and features some occasionally memorable songs, although...

Rules Don’t Apply, Warren Beatty’s much heralded return as a filmmaking force after an eighteen-year layoff, is a major disappointment considering the pedigree of both the subject matter and the creative talent behind the film....

From a cinematic storytelling standpoint, some subjects are just hard to make compelling. To cite one example, a film about decoding symbols would be one of the last things I would have on my short list of go-to film subjects....