‘Arts’ Archives
“Rebel in the Rye”
“Rebel in the Rye”(2017) *** out of five Black Label Media, Biography/Drama What is more joyful for a writer than to have his or her essay or novel published? Probably the reward of making a living at it or, at least, attaining some award for the efforts. In the world of J.D. Salinger (like many famous writers) success will not come easy, only great persistence pushes forward to that goal of being published. As for the young J.D. Salinger (Nicholas Hoult, “ About a Boy” , “A Single Man” , “X-Man: Days of Future Past” , “X-Man: Apocalypse” ) he almost sinks his own ambitions as a writer after being did-missed from NYU (New York University) and a few other universities before being accepted at Columbia. At Columbia, he has an extroverted professor Whit Burnett (Kevin Spacey) who sees a terrific talent below the young man”'s stubbornness. Burnett becomes Salinger”'s mentor and promoter as the latter is faced [...]
A Tribute to Robert Mitchum (1917-1997)
Robert Mitchum was born on August 6, 1917, in Bridgeport, Connecticut. (I was also born on August 6th, but not until 1948.) He was an actor with great talent and vastly underrated. At an early age he rebuffed authority by being charged with vagrancy and was sentenced to a Georgia chain gang, but found a way to escape. Mr. Mitchum”'s big break in Hollywood was a role as Lt. Walker in “Story of G.I. Joe”(1945) and received an Oscar nomination as Best Supporting Actor. But in all his years of acting -- 1945 to 1997--- he never won an Oscar. He had a deliberate style of acting, charming, convincing that made him popular with audiences. As a bad boy he was up with the best of them such as Victor Mature, Humphrey Bogart, James Cagney, Lawrence Tierney, and other actors. He was arrested for marijuana use spending time in prison in 1949. Mitchum didn”'t give up the weed though. Some of his movies: «The Night of the Hunter» (1957), “Cape [...]
“Kidnap” & “Detroit”
Kidnap “Kidnap”(2017) * out of 5 starts Thriller, Di Bonaventure Pictures It is true a child goes missing every 40 seconds in the United States. However, it is also true “ Kidnap” is a bad movie. (It had been sitting on the shelf since 2014: usually a bad sign.) Even though I sympathize with Halle Berry”'s character Karla Dyson who has her young son Frankie (Sage Correa) snatched from her in an amusement park just slightly out of eyeshot. What ensues is a hyper- octane car chase after the kidnappers Terry (Lewis Temple) and Margo (Chris McGinn) Vicky up and down Louisiana highways causing numerous car wrecks (you wouldn”'t want to be on any of these freeways), including a police officer on a motorcycle demanding her to pull over upended. “Kidnap” is one huge mess: clumsy script, lousy monologues and a painfully predictable atrocity. She”'s driving a 1980s Mustang and her antagonists are driving a Chrysler minivan. The two [...]
