Movies
These are video movie reviews, movie trailers, and websites of the latest movies. The C1N Movie section includes Dan Culberson’s Hotshots Movie Reviews with a new review every week. We also show our C1N trailer pick of the week by Aaron Smith which is about 40 years younger than Dans taste. Show times and ticket avails are up. Look for film festivals, movie news, events, and news about the pictures here too.
The Brothers Bloom – Movie Trailer
May 15th
When the younger of two notorious sibling con artists announces a plan to go legit, his brother implores him to carry out one last swindle in the eagerly anticipated sophomore feature from Brick writer/director Rian Johnson. Tired of a life on the run, a confidence man who has dedicated his life to the art of the grift decides to call it quits. Despite his plans to leave his criminal past behind, however, the reluctant scammer finds that his brother has masterminded one last scheme to claim the wealth of an eccentric millionaire (Rachel Weisz). With the opportunity to make enough money so that he would be able to live comfortably even if his legitimate endeavors fail, the heretofore unrepentant con man finds it increasingly difficult to refuse his sibling’s potentially profitable endeavor.
“The Soloist” Could Have Been Better
May 14th
Could Have Been Better
“Hotshots” looks at a movie!
THE SOLOIST is based on a true story, and yet it comes across as if the filmmakers weren’t exactly sure where they wanted the focus to be.
It stars Jamie Foxx as Nathaniel Ayers and Robert Downey Jr. as Steve Lopez, two men whose lives change dramatically when they meet each other and become friends.
Lopez is a columnist for THE LOS ANGELES TIMES, and one day he encounters Ayers in a park playing beautiful music on a violin that has only two strings.
Lopez thinks that Ayers could be the subject of an interesting column, writing “violin guy” in his notebook for ideas, and he begins finding out all he can about this homeless man with amazing musical talent.
He learns that Ayers had been a student at the Juilliard School of Music, but had dropped out before graduating. And when he tracks down the sister of Ayers in Cleveland, she asks him why he is interested in her brother, and Lopez says, “Everyone has a story, and it’s interesting.”
The sister tells Lopez that Nathaniel had become fascinated with music when he was a young boy and after that there was no more football, no more baseball, just music. She says, “That was all he did, just music.”
We see flashbacks to when Ayers was a kid that show his fascination and also to when he arrived in New York City to attend Juilliard, which also give us an indication as to why he dropped out before graduating.
Lopez begins writing some columns about Ayers, which cause one reader to send him a cello that she can’t play anymore to give to Ayers, because the cello was his first instrument of choice.
Lopez involves himself even more into the homeless man’s life, managing to obtain an apartment for Ayers, cello lessons for the first time in three decades, and even to arrange for Ayers to attend a rehearsal for a Beethoven concert.
However, things don’t always go the way Lopez plans them, and the relationship between Ayers and Lopez takes a turn for the worse.
Because we see so many details of Lopez’s life at home and at the office, we begin to wonder if the filmmakers wanted to tell the story about Lopez or about Ayers.
THE SOLOIST is good, but could have been better.
I’m Dan Culberson and this is “Hotshots.”
“Is Anybody There” Yes, There Is
May 7th
Yes, There Is
“Hotshots” looks at a movie!
IS ANYBODY THERE? is a film with a fairly familiar story about the contrast between youth and old age, but it has one thing in it that makes it stand out above all the others and that makes it worth seeing: Sir Michael Caine.
Caine doesn’t like to be called “Sir,” even though he was knighted by Queen Elizabeth in 2000, and he doesn’t like to be referred to by his title, which is a Commander of the Order of the British Empire, or CBE.
Pretty good for a Cockney kid who was born Maurice Micklewhite, but who has been making movies for more than 50 years, i’n’t it?
Here he plays “The Amazing Clarence,” a retired magician who checks himself into “a residence home for the elderly” that is run by a young couple with a 10-year-old son named Edward.
Edward isn’t happy to meet Clarence at first, because Clarence is given Edward’s old room, which Edward was hoping he would get back after the previous resident had died in it. In fact, Edward asked his parents, “Can I have my room back now that Arthur’s dead?”
Edward is fascinated with ghosts and the idea of people dying, and he had put his tape recorder under the bed of his room’s previous occupant in order to record the very moment when he died.
Clarence and Edward take a reluctant liking to each other, and Clarence gives Edward some practical advice, telling him, “Your life changes, Buster, and not always for the better.”
Clarence also teaches Edward some magic tricks, which Edward uses at school in order to impress his classmates.
Edward then convinces Clarence to put on a magic show for the residents of the old-folks home, and despite some polite resistance at first, Clarence is eager to perform, but to say that one of his tricks ends not quite how he planned it would be a major understatement.
Along the way, both Clarence and Edward help each other out in their respective troubling times, and you will probably predict how you think the story is going to end, but you could also be very wrong.
You will also never forget who is appearing in the film and what a privilege that is.
IS ANYBODY THERE? answers its own question with a resounding “Yes, there is.”
I’m Dan Culberson and this is “Hotshots.”
