Readers of a certain age may remember “women’s pictures,” those four-hankie weepies from the 1940s and ’50s. Celebrated British director Terence Davies has lovingly embraced the once-popular genre via an adaptation of the 1952 play The Deep Blue Sea.
There’s no faster way for a movie to earn the disdain of critics than to rack up exorbitant costs and then fall on its face. And yes, John Carter, based on the Edgar Rice Burroughs fantasy A Princess of Mars, would be a better picture if it hadn’t cost $250 million, most of which is clearly visible in the overextended, dull Martian battle sequences.
The Hunger Games, Gary Ross’s film version of the first novel in Suzanne Collins’s young adult sci-fi trilogy, is a predictable hit after the biggest opening weekend since ancient Rome staged gladiatorial combats. But that doesn’t mean it’s any good.
A Separation
is a highly ambitious piece of work. It successfully tackles a range of
topics and themes, from class, religion and gender to pride, guilt and
justice. It is a tale that appears uniquely Iranian but quickly
transcends physical and spiritual borders to portray the difficulty of
doing the right thing under difficult, even life-threatening
circumstances.