Author: Village Vidiot

  “Midway,” March 31, 2020 (2019), DVD.  I was really looking forward to this and, as has been the norm of late, was terribly disappointed.  Based on the true story of the battle of Midway in 1942, this script is about as trite as it could be.  The acting is flat and the characters one-dimensional. …

  “Ford v Ferrari,” March 21, 2020 (2019), DVD.  I’ve been very stressed out, what with the virus, the economy, online teaching, and the like.  I turned to this as a piece of cinematic escape, and it was that.  Carroll Shelby (Matt Daman) was the only American to win at LeMans (1959) but then had…

  “Downton Abbey,” March 13, 2020 (2019), DVD.  I had high hopes for this cinematic spinoff from the acclaimed English TV series chronically changes in England through the noble Crawley family and their servants.  I’d enjoyed the first few seasons although I dropped out at the end.  It was too much of a soap about…

No, not a movie. I’ve recreated this blog as thevillagevidiot.com, having lost the ‘villagevidiot.net’ url. So it goes. I’ll be entering more films in here and hope to edit many more already in with photos and other information.  Please return and browse at will.  Your friend, The Village Vidiot.

“Motherless Brooklyn,” February 11, 2020 (2019), DVD.  Edward Norton, an actor whose work I really enjoy, read the Jonathon Lethem novel this is based on in manuscript, bought the rights, produced, wrote, directed and starred in this Wynton Marsalis-jazz infused  noir fable of power, corruption, struggle, and resolute friendship.  He moved it from our present…

  “Pain and Glory,” February 5, 2020 (2019), DVD (Spanish with subtitles.)  I have a very strange relationship to and with the films of Pedro Almodovar.  If feels as though he intentionally alternates remarkable works of cinema with superb and emotionally powerful character development and incredible dialogue with works of self-indulgent crap.   This wonderful, thoughtful,…

“The Danish Solution: The Rescue of the Jews in Denmark,” February 4, 2020, DVD, Documentary, 2003.  In these difficult times, I would recommend viewing the 2003 documentary “The Danish Solution: The Rescue of the Jews in Denmark.” Narrated by Garrison Keillor, it recounts the actions of everyday people, rich and poor, that resulted in the…

  “Toy Story 4,” January 25, 2020 (2019), DVD, animated.  Woody (Tom Hanks), Buzz (Tim Allen), and all the gang (fine actors doing excellent voicing, although I missed Don Rickles, d. 2017) are now Jessie’s toys as she goes off to kindergarten where she makes “Forkie,” a spork/toy who becomes part of this community after…

  “Hotel Salvation,” (in Hindi, subtitled), March 9, 2019 (2016), DVD.  Who would have thought Disney would be distributing David Lynch or that he’d make a G-rated film, but both these things apply to this marvelous 1999 film about Alvin Straight (the late Richard Farnsworth) who drove his riding mower 300 miles to see his…

This is a marvelous Chinese film about a child prodigy violinist and his peasant father. The father, seeking the best for his child, sacrifices everything to get him to the city for lessons. It is a lovely and humane film. Really worth watching. See this film

There is much to recommend this documentary story of Vito Russo, author of The Celluloid Closet. An early and standout gay activist, he succumbed to AIDS in 1991. He was a founder of Act UP!, he figured in the major opening of gay life in post-Stonewall 1970s NYC and San Francisco. Interviews with friends and…

There are three movies in this Quentin Tarantino written/directed film about a freed slave (Jamie Foxx) who becomes a bounty-hunter along with his German liberator, Christoph Waltz in a brilliant turn. They work together killing white folk for the money and then go off to ‘rescue’ Django’s wife, now owned by the deranged, brutal Candie,…

The aliens have landed and linguist Louise Banks (Amy Adams) is called upon to try to figure out how to communicate with them. She works along with physicist Ian Donnelly (Jeremy Renner) and the US military as fronted by Forest Whittaker as Col Weber (who I usually really like but who for some reason adopts…

The 2004 sequel to the 1995 “Before Sunrise” about a young American man (Ethan Hawke) and French woman (Juliette Delpy) who meet in Vienna and spend one long day and night together before she has to leave. He’s now a successful author on a book took in Paris who’s talking about his novel about that…

Tense from the get-go, this Oscar-winning, high energy Katherine Bigelow action flick about a bomb/IED disposal unit in Iraq starts at the letter K in this Mesopotamian alphabet. There is no “why?” Only what’s there at that moment for the men of this 3-person team in the war’s deadliest job. Very well played, written (well,…

Tense and often painful story of a pilot, Whip Whitaker (very well-played by Denzel Washington-Oscar nomination), with some major substance abuse problems who saves the vast majority of his flight in a terrible crash but must nonetheless answer questions about his ‘condition’. Excellent supporting work from John Goodman (his drug buddy), Don Cheadle (the union…

Technologically sophisticated digital tracking joined to animation brings this children’s tale about a young boy and other kids who take a ride on the express on Christmas Eve. Believing is what it’s all about. Tom Hanks in several interesting roles and Steve Tyler of Aerosmith continues his film cameo run. Interesting as a technical piece,…

Team botanist Mark Watney (Matt Damon) is inadvertently stranded on Mars when, thinking him dead, his team makes an emergency evacuation. He must manage to renew contact with earth, stay alive, and manage an escape. This Ridley Scott film is the best sort of science fiction, as it’s very realistic fiction about science, not horrible…

Sylvester Stallone acts and does a good job as the slob cop who nonetheless has some scruples. Set up in a small NJ town to be a fake cop by cop-boss Harvey Keitel, Sly comes through in the end and is standup along with Robert DeNiro as the NYPD-DIA Lt. A real guy film, with…

Superb Chinese film from Zhang Yimou about a 13-year old substitute school teacher in a poor rural Chinese village. When one of her students leaves school and goes to the city to earn money to pay his family debts, she follows him in and hunts him down. The poverty is palpable, the emotion real, the…

Strangely, neither Bronwen nor I was impressed with this instant cult classic about some crook wannabes. Just sort of flat and uninvolving. Can’t say more because, tellingly, I barely remember it

Strangely dispassionate film about a woman’s passionate relationship to sexuality and literature. Creative multi-screen use of the film (a bit hard to see on tv but it would work well in the theater). About a Japanese woman’s attempt to revenge her father and create her own pillow book. I just can’t deal with director Peter…

Strange and occasionally funny piece about the end of disco as a scene built around Studio 54. Some horrid characters, vapid, and generally uninteresting yuppie-types, they are built out of the world this director first chronicled in “Metropolitan” and “Barcelona”. Pathetic lives lived by these successful folk, they make you feel ok about your own…

Steven Spielberg and Tony Kushner’s dramatization of the passage of the 13th Amendment. Daniel Day Lewis is profoundly patient/impatient, moderate/progressive, pragmatic/idealistic and accommodating/strong-willed as Abe, while Tommy Lee Jones (Thaddeus Stephens), Sally Field (Mary Todd Lincoln), James Spader (Theodore Bilbo) have a grand time with their roles and David Straitharn (Edwin Stanton) plays it low…

Steve Coogan goes on a junket reviewing restaurants in the Lake District. Instead of his girlfriend, Misha, who’s off in the US, he travels with Rob Bryden, an actor and radio personality, an old acquaintance if not a good friend Their quirky and often very funny interactions highlight this feature from IFC and speak pointedly…