Shameless Self Expression

Lynn Whitfield plays real-life writer Barbara Becnel who when writing a book about ghettos and gangs approaches one Stanley ‘Tookie’ Williams (Jamie Foxx), founder of the Crips street gang. ‘Tookie’ is on death row for killing four people in 1981. What Becnel finds is a thoughtful and intelligent man who will not admit to the crimes he was convicted for, but who will eventually write several popular anti-gang books for kids. He even became a Nobel Prize nominee!   This 2004 Vondie Curtis-Hall (yeah, the actor who went on to direct “Glitter” ) biopic is somewhat formulaic, clearly biased in favour of the late Williams, and lacking in details about just what he did to get where he was. If you can accept it for what it is, it’s a fairly interesting and persuasive experience. Most of the credit must go to Jamie Foxx (in the same year he won an Oscar for “Ray” and a nomination for his equally impressive supporting turn in “Collateral” ) who, in a somewhat introspective, low-key tur...

The story of the title Romanov family, Tsar Nicholas II (Michael Jayston) and wife Alexandra (Janet Suzman), and their struggles through political unrest, family tragedy, and their acquaintance with a mad monk named Grigori Rasputin (Tom Baker). A teary-eyed Jack Hawkins and always sturdy Harry Andrews play Count Fredericks and Grand Duke Nicholas, Irene Worth is the Queen Mother, John McEnery is Kerensky a moderate revolutionary, with Trotsky (an almost unrecognisable Brian Cox, in one of his earliest roles) and Lenin (Michael Bryant) as the more extremist revolutionaries. Ian Holm and Alan Webb turn up late as Bolshevik Yakovlev and elderly Yurovsky, the former harsh and the latter somewhat reticent, but both ultimately sworn to their duties.   Slightly talky, overly-detailed (interesting or not, were Trotsky, Lenin et al really necessary to the story?), and perhaps overlong 1971 Franklin J. Schaffner ( “Planet of the Apes” , “Patton” ) historical drama is nonetheless mostly...

At a remote research station somewhere in Arctic Canada, esteemed scientist and passionate environmentalist Val Kilmer is studying the effects of global warming on polar bears when he uncovers a prehistoric mammoth beneath ice, now thawed due to global warming. Before long, his colleagues (including Anne Marie DeLuise) have started to get violently ill, but he assures Ms. DeLuise, that help is on the way. Meanwhile, three college students (eco-warrior Aaron Ashmore, jerk Kyle Schmid, and Schmid’s ‘kinda’ girlfriend Steph Song) have been chosen to fly out and join Kilmer, and Kilmer has also reached out to his estranged daughter Martha MacIsaac. However, when the foursome are set to fly out, they are told by helicopter pilot Viv Leacock that Kilmer doesn’t want her there anymore. MacIsaac (who could care less about global warming, really), still pissed at her dad for not attending her mother’s funeral, says the hell with that, and goes anyway. When they reach the station, they find it d...

Set at and around Niagara Falls, Jean Peters and bland hubby (an irritating Max Showalter, credited as Casey Adams) are on a belated honeymoon where Peters starts sticking her nose into the goings on of philandering Marilyn Monroe and her seriously neurotic, weary husband Joseph Cotten. Seems a certain someone is scheming to do away with a certain someone else so that they can do something unmentionable with a much younger someone else. And Peters plans on doing something about it! Don Wilson overacts outrageously in a few scenes as Showalter’s/Adams’ boss.   1953 Henry Hathaway ( “Garden of Evil” , “The Sons of Katie Elder” ) noir is one of the only bad girl characters Ms. Monroe ever played. Other than that, it’s pretty familiar stuff, albeit very well acted by the two stars, Monroe and Cotten. It’s a bit dull whenever they’re not on screen, but Marilyn has some of her best moments in this film). There’s also some lovely scenery filmed by Joseph MacDonald ( “The Young Lions”...