Leonard Maltin's Movie Crazy

THE BEST NEW HOLIDAY DVDS, BLU-RAYS AND 4KS

Blu-Ray/DVD Contributors November 25, 2023

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The following article was written by my friend and colleague Alonso Duralde. You can learn more about him HERE. Whether you’re stuffing the stocking of a physical-media fan or just building up your own holiday home-video library, there’s an eclectic selection of media guaranteed to spice up your Christmas. Holiday Horrors and Thrillers The 4K release of 2022’s sleeper hit Violent Night (Universal Pictures Home Entertainment) – starring David Harbour as an exhausted Santa who has to face off with a team of criminals headed by John Leguizamo – is one of several new releases that color way outside the lines of what has traditionally been considered holiday entertainment. Also getting 4K reissues are two classics set at the holidays but not always considered “Christmas…

NAPOLEON MEETS HIS WATERLOO

In Theaters Leonard Maltin Movie Reviews November 25, 2023

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It’s a shame that this ambitious movie is a muddle, for director Ridley Scott has staged some of the most astonishing battle scenes ever put on film. Gigantic in scale and scope, they make the viewer feel like a participant, taking that overused word “immersive” to another level of meaning cinematically. However, some of the dialogue is ludicrous and prompted (presumably) unintended laughter at the showing I attended and others I have heard about. Most of this has to do with his wooing of Josephine and dogged determination that she produce a male heir. We never understand the mutual attraction between Bonaparte and the alluring woman who is destined to become his wife. That is just one of this vast movie’s failings. Any schoolchild could…

MAESTRO IS MAGNIFICENT

In Theaters Leonard Maltin Movie Reviews November 20, 2023

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I don’t know where or how Bradley Cooper got the ambition to make this powerfully challenging film, or the fortitude to both direct and co-script it while playing the leading character, but it is clearly a labor of love. Many passion projects lose something on the way to the screen, but Maestro is an exception: a deeply felt, magisterial film that provides its leading man with a formidable showcase and a captivating role for his costar, Carey Mulligan. Like many other baby boomers, I grew up watching Leonard Bernstein’s Young People’s Concerts on television and retain a vivid memory of the charismatic conductor. My admiration for him grew as I became aware of his many accomplishments outside the world of conducting: writing the score for On the Town, Wonderful Town, Candide, and West Side Story, not to mention On the Waterfront. Watching this account of his life and times, I…

MAY DECEMBER

In Theaters Leonard Maltin Movie Reviews November 20, 2023

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Todd Haynes would seem an ideal choice to direct a story inspired by the real-life case of schoolteacher Mary Kay LeTourneau, who made headlines in the 1990s when she raped a 12-year-old student, then married him and raised a family. It’s still an eye-opener after all this time, and certainly ripe for adaptation as a movie. A sharp observer of women’s roles in society and suburban life, as evidenced in such films as Safe, Carol, the Douglas Sirk-inspired Far From Heaven and the miniseries Mildred Pierce, Haynes is right at home in this fictionalized narrative written by Samy Burch and Alex Mechanik. Natalie Portman plays a television star who arrives on the scene to spend time with Julianne Moore, whom she is about to portray in a movie. Most of…

FALLEN LEAVES: A QUIET GEM

In Theaters Leonard Maltin Movie Reviews November 20, 2023

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I’m a relative latecomer to the charms of Aki Kaurismäki’s work, but I’ve become a proselytizer to make up for lost time. The Finnish writer-director who brought us Le Havre and The Other Side of Hope is backwith a thoroughly entertaining, completely unpredictable love story called Fallen Leaves. Kaurismäki’s sense of humor is infectious and unmistakably his own. Some people would call this kind of comedy “dry,” and I suppose that’s as good an adjective as any. Yet it made me laugh out loud. Alma Pöysti and Jussi Vatanen perfectly portray two lonely, working-class people who carry on a fitful courtship. Their relationship, which gets off to an especially rocky start, isn’t pretty. They are completely believable; the director has guided them through his world with nary a misstep. The…

THE KILLER

In Theaters Leonard Maltin Movie Reviews November 15, 2023

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David Fincher’s films are often cold-blooded and I was wary of him adapting the graphic novel The Killer. Sure enough, this cheerless bit of 21st century pop existentialism is schematically laid out, following an assassin as he performs one hit after another. Fincher is also a master craftsman, and the film is meticulously well-made, drawing on the talents of cinematographer Erik Messerschmidt, production designer Donald Graham Burt, and composers Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross, among others. Andrew Kevin Walker’s screenplay is broken into chapters, a conceit which seldom works to any film’s advantage. Here, each one is named for the victim of the hired assassin, played by an emotionless Michael Fassbender, and the location of the kill (Paris, New Orleans, wherever). There is a sameness to the…

PRISCILLA: A MINIMALIST BIOPIC

In Theaters Leonard Maltin Movie Reviews November 8, 2023

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I think I’ve just seen the first minimalist biopic ever made. Most movies about famous people’s lives come from the opposite direction, embellishing their feats, triumphs and failures. This one simply observes, almost without comment, the—uh—unusual relationship between Priscilla and Elvis Presley, from the time she was 14 years old to the day she walked out on the singing star. Writer-director Sofia Coppola has done her most crucial job well, casting Cailee Spaeny as Priscilla and Jacob Elordi as Elvis. Elordi adopts a good-enough impression of Elvis to enable us to accept him in the role, and relative newcomer Spaeny is credible as the subdued schoolgirl who tickles his fancy (for reasons we never really understand), to the point that he wins her parents’ approval…