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In “Drive,” director Nicolas Winding Refn crafts a cool, tight and stylish film that gets away with a lot. He managed to make a movie that works as some kind of bizarre but wonderful Michael Mann/Jean-Pierre Melville/Quentin Tarantino mash-up, helmed by star Ryan Gosling, who described it as a “violent John Hughes movie.”
Read More“The Lady With All the Answers” presents the columnist Ann Landers as a person who just might write a letter to Ann herself. Her faith in herself and her work is unquestioned, even as her own life takes a bump or two. Well, really, only one bump.
Read MoreGaleet Dardashti is a trailblazing musician: she is the first woman in her celebrated family to perform Persian Jewish music
Read MoreThe brilliance of Alberto Moravia’s cool diagnostic vision — sleek, clear, cruel, and existential no matter how emotional the conflict — puts us off. His male protagonists often self-consciously analyze their puerility to the point of comic masochism.
Read MoreThe impressive cast and lovely, atmospheric design of the Lyric Stage production cannot completely overcome the flaws of “Big River,” but they make the trip a scenic, often amusing, and enjoyable theatrical journey.
Read MoreA best-seller in France, Emmanuel Carrère’s quirky, but ultimately compelling memoir examines the effects of two disasters on very separate groups of people to whom the writer is connected, at the beginning, quite peripherally.
Read MoreDespite its serious script and premise, “Contagion” is somehow able to retain a subtle element of “fun,” an admirable feat for a movie in which scores of people die in nearly every scene.
Read MoreAutumn hasn’t officially arrived yet, but the fall season of jazz is already ramping up. First up are Mexican vocalist Magos Herrera, saxophonist Evan Parker, and a tribute to the late Joe Maneri.
Read MoreWhat drives serious writing about film? “When Movies Mattered” suggests an answer: it helps for a critic to take a side, not as consumer advocate, hipster crank, or box office predictor, but as a passionate advocate for standards, often taking on the role of separating overpraised films from the unfairly neglected.
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Arts Feature: Best Movies (With Some Disappointments) of 2025