Pictureland

Wayfarers across the centuries, English novelist Thomas Hardy and Danish filmmaker Thomas Vinterberg meet in the fictional country within a country of Wessex, which the novelist described in his preface to Far From The Madding Crowd as "a merely realistic dream country."  It is in the partly-real, partly-imagined Wessex and Hardy's 1874 novel that the writer and filmmaker quite amicably meet and combine their talents.  Of course, such bonhomie does not necessarily guarantee excitement, the kind of friction that often produces artistic brilliance. This latest  (and fourth) film version of Far From The Madding Crowd demonstrates a shared feeling for landscape and a somewhat reluctant romanticism on the part of Hardy and Vinterberg.   Brought newly to the screen, Hardy's beloved novel is above all a handsome piece of work in which the visual appeal of its actors, its wardrobe and landscape are happily allowed to trump the novelist's typical fatalism and te...

  "I'll soon take off my funny disguise....And once you see what's underneath...you're going to wish you were dead!"  And hello to you, too!  The rather dire warning comes from "Mr. Babadook" through the agency of a very persistent children's book that bears name of the monster.  Thus, The Babadook, writer and director Jennifer Kent's creepy and assured feature film debut.  Is the Babadook real? Merely a projection, a top-hatted fiend from a children's book that sets off a couple of already febrile minds?  Or perhaps...we have seen the monster and it is us?    Ms. Kent demonstrates a very sure hand and supple knowledge of film history, the latter manifesting itself in  the action of The Babadook, the film's set design and a particular channel to which the television of Amelia Vannick (Essie Davis) seems permanently tuned, showing everything from the fantastical early cinema of George Melies to the more colorful exploits of Ital...

Poor kids.  Whatever admonishment they might have received about  VD in their time- indeterminate heath or sex ed. classes couldn't have prepared them for this.  The "It" which trails the unfortunate young people in It Follows might find its eventual victims through the congress of young fluid and flesh, but it's far more nasty and persistent than a case of the clap.  Ironically, the only hope - and this is one of many things about It Follows which is less than clear - of ridding oneself of the ghost of hookups past is to have sex with someone else and pass "It" on.  Thus, the walk of shame becomes the sprint, the desperate bike ride, the speeding car ride of terror.  And yet..."It" does inexorably follow.  Pick those partners carefully young lovers. With its placid suburban point of origin and sonic pressure gauge of blaring synthesizers, It Follows pays a good bit of homage to John Carpenter.  As with Carpenter's Halloween, only the ...

Abandon all thought, ye who enter here.  And squeamishness as well.  If you share any such distaste for bloodshed with the film's villain Richmond Valentine (Samuel L. Jackson), best to check that at the door.  The body count is steep in Kingsman:  The Secret Service , although the violence is increasingly cartoonish as the film proceeds giddily through its 129 minutes of mayhem.  At the helm with a steady hand, an iron stomach and no qualms apparent is Englishman Matthew Vaughn. Surprisingly, "Kingsman" is loosely based on a comic book.  Not on a Chekhov short story, as one might assume.  The comic series in question is The Secret Service, by Dave Gibbons and Mark Millar.  Early in the graphic proceedings, an environmental scientist, Mark Hamill (yes, the same) is kidnapped.  The real Hamill, looking a bit like Eddie Izzard's ill-used older brother, is present in "Kingsman" too, as climate scientist James Arnold, held in Argentina by V...

The camelhair coat worn by Abel Morales (Oscar Isaac) shines as brilliantly as anything seen in J.C. Chador's A Most Violent Year.  The coat is merely the golden tan of most such garments.  The New York of A Most Violent Year - interior and exterior - pales by comparison.  It's 1981, and a most violent year indeed in and around the great metropolis.  Almost none of  filth of Abel's world - the fuel oil of his business, the frowning elements, dirt kicked up by a vehicle chase - seem to adhere to the impeccable coat.  But as he tries to make a major expansion of his business while attempting to fend off the grip and violence of gangsterism one one side and encroaching law enforcment on the other, the poised, well dressed man is sorely pressed to keep himself clean in the most profound of respects. A Most Violent Year is a sprawling American story told revealing small.  The canvas is certainly large, even if spread with muted color.  Much...

More a matter of motion sickness, I'm afraid.  Miles Teller thrashes his drum kit till he's a sweaty, bloody mess.  J.K.  Simmons gesticulates, glowers and spews vitriol in a near scat.  All the while, writer and director Damien Chazelle observes all this like an over-excited spectator at a tennis match.  So it goes in Whiplash , from the first to last frenetic touch of drum sticks upon snare. Young Andrew Neiman (Teller)  is a first-year student at the fictional Shaffer Conservatory in New York City.  First we hear then eventually espy the solitary drummer down a hallway, before the camera proceeds into the rehearsal room in which he is working a drum kit in determined fashion.  In steps the imposing figure of Terence Fletcher (Simmons), causing Andrew to stop abruptly and stand.  "You know what I do?," the older man asks.  Yes, the young man desperate for greatness and fame (if not necessarily in that order), is quite aware that F...