So what if it was on a Wednesday.  So what if the good seats were $50 and sold out immediately.  So what if nosebleed seats cost $17.50 and made the screen about the size of a TV at a friend’s house.  So what if we had to re-arrange our work schedules, drive up there in the middle of the day, stay with an Austin friend, stay out until 1:30 ( Read more... )

A lesser work from the director of “Hero” and “House of Flying Daggers,” “Curse of the Golden Flower” (*** out of ****) lacks the fable-contraption perfection of those films.  In it, the Emperor circa 900 (Chow-Yun) is slowly poisoning the Empress (Gong Li, heartstopping in a push-up bra).  She drips with sweat and plays for the balcony and, wow, ( Read more... )

Two movies, really, with the jumbled all-over-the-place narrative to prove it. One movie is engaging in a shallow, pop way, about a charming-yet-tyrannical music manager who sells out and commercializes R&B music in the 1950s and ‘60s. Because the manager is played by Jamie Foxx, he instantly brings to mind Ray Charles, another of the era’s ( Read more... )