A repressed though stylish period film punctuated by “thrills” of violence, including barbaric cruelty against women, Changeling is another, studious chapter in the unfolding cinematic pathology of director Clint Eastwood. Based on an actual criminal case in late 1920s Los Angeles, J. Michael Straczynski’s intelligent script revolves around Christine Collins (Angelina Jolie, inept—stiff, lackluster, at […]
Daily Archives: February 17, 2009
Despite the best actor Oscar he won for it, Ray Milland gives a ham-fisted performance as Don Birnam, an alcoholic writer on a four-day binge following ten days of sobriety, in Billy Wilder’s The Lost Weekend. Wilder and co-scenarist Charles Brackett have structured their script, with its flashbacks, as if they meant the film to […]
Dennis Grunes 