Old Man @ The Movies

I came out of the movie I saw yesterday not certain of what I had seen. THE WOMAN IN THE YARD is described as a horror, mystery, thriller. It was scary, there were some mysteries, but it was not thrilling in any way. The all African- American cast was more than competent in handling this film about a mother, on crutches as the result of an automobile accident that killed her husband, snd two children (teen-aged son and younger daughter) living in a comfortable house in a rural setting that her husband had been lovingly restoring. There are tensions which magnify when they discover a woman shrouded in clothes covering her head sitting in the yard. The mother, Ramona, goes out to confront the woman, who won't leave, and does not speak, and concludes that the woman is either lost or demented. They are unable to call for help because, for no reason, the electricity fails. Tensions increase, Ramona cannot go for help because their car won't start, snd the son confronts the yard woma...

As I was leaving the theater after watching A WORKING MAN, I asked the young couple behind me, "I lost count. How many did he kill? " They laughed and said, "We don't know. We lost count, too." Which is all you need to know about a film starring Jason Statham, a younger and more competent version of Liam Neeson. You can almost predict from the beginning what's going to happen. His movies rarely if ever stray.  In this one, he is a construction worker with s young daughter (no wife) with obviously violent skills gained in the military. His boss's young daughter is abducted by sex traffickers, and he reluctantly agrees to find and free her. And he proceeds to do his own version of population control by violently eliminating scores of evil men and women until he finds the abductors and the girl. He does not seem to be aware of the odds against him winning when he is confronted by six, eight or ten opponents. It's all the same to him, and he is a skilled...

The movie I saw today is one for the books. It's another two person movie, starring Anthony Hopkins and Bill Skarsgard. The twist is that Hopkins, as William, never appears on screen until the last five minutes of the movie. He is a voice on a car telephone. Eddie, a deadbeat father of a young girl, in desperation breaks into a deserted car only to find himself locked in and cannot start the car.. He begins to tear things apart in an effort to escape, ignoring the constantly ringing dashboard telephone. He finally answers and it is William, the owner of the car, who has set the whole thing up as a trip for someone like Eddie. Their conversation evolves into a sociological discourse on evil and good, but neither of the men is good. William has rigged the car to inflict pain on Eddie whenever he strays from the conversation. When Eddie falls asleep exhausted from his escape efforts, William presumably sneaks and leaves food and water. Eddie uses his...

It is hard to believe that I saw two movies starring penguins less than a year apart, and both were better than most films I've seen, and both were inspired by true stories. The first was My Penguin Friend, and it was simple and poignant and funny and gentle. The one I saw today, THE PENGUIN LESSONS, was political and funny with far less charm, but I liked it, although not as much as its predecessor. In both movies, the penguin was the ultimate star. They seem to be natural born actors. Lessons is the story of an Englishman hired to teach English in an Argentine prep school for the wealthy in a suburb of Buenos Aires. The country is in the midst of revolution, under military rule and there is unrest. On vacation in another South American country with a fellow teacher, he meets a girl and, while walking on the beach with her, they come across a penguin in distress covered with oil and she persuades him to rescue the penguin and clean it off. Anticipating a romance, he agrees, but sh...