On the Silver Screen

ON THE SILVER SCREEN: KENDRICK DECENT IN OTHERWISE FAILED HITCHCOCK SUSPENSE STORY (A SIMPLE FAVOR)

 

By Liz Alper

Photo via Dailymotion

September 14, 2018 (San Diego) - If you love the Pitch Perfect series like me, you love Anna Kendrick.  But after three Pitch Perfect films, she’s ready to branch out and do other genres.  A Simple Favor is her first foray into a drama after making Pitch Perfect 3 last year.


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ON THE SILVER SCREEN: VOLLEYBALL CINDERELLA STORY HAS YOU CHEERING TO THE END (THE MIRACLE SEASON)

 

By Liz Alper

Photo via Apple Trailers

April 4, 2018 (San Diego) - I’m a sportswriter who doesn’t know anything about volleyball.  Kind of pathetic, I know.  Of course I know how it’s played, but I don’t know the logistics of scoring, etc.  That’s why you won’t see any college or prep volleyball recaps on here.  But as a sports reporter and fan, of course I love a Cinderella sports story.  The Miracle Season was all of that and more.


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ON THE SILVER SCREEN: LARA CROFT RETURNS IN ACTION-PACKED BIG SCREEN FUN (TOMB RAIDER)

 

By Liz Alper

Photos via jeddjong.wordpress.com

March 13, 2018 (San Diego) - When I was a kid, my best friend had a PlayStation.  On that PlayStation, he had the original Tomb Raider game.  Gaming was simpler back then; feminists didn’t have to complain about the “sexualization of women” (there is none) in games because, you know, this was the 90s; women and men in video games were just...blocks (Goldeneye, anyone?).  So, I went to see Tomb Raider under the premise of nostalgia.


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ON THE SILVER SCREEN: GRIPPING AND CHILLING VIGILANTE ADVENTURE (DEATH WISH)

 

By Liz Alper

Photo via Vimeo

March 2, 2018 (San Diego) - I’ve never paid attention to Bruce Willis.  Not since it became a meme to list Die Hard as a Christmas movie (over The Thin Man?  Really?  Die Hard has Christmas in one scene, whereas The Thin Man has Christmas throughout the movie.  Besides, who doesn’t love William Powell’s effortless trolling and drinking?), I’ve semi-boycotted Bruce Willis.  It’s been a while since I willingly watched one of his films. Heck, it’s been a while since I willingly cared about him.  And so it was with slight unease that I walked into the theater for his latest film, Death Wish.  Boy, was I wrong to be nervous.


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ON THE SILVER SCREEN: CHURCHILL BIOGRAPHY BORING, BLAND (DARKEST HOUR)

 

By Liz Alper

Photo via Youtube

December 15, 2017 (San Diego) - A lot has been said about Winston Churchill.  Some people (the British) see him as a hero who won Britain the Second World War.  Americans probably see him as that too, but with an added dose of crazy.  And still, some people in darker circles don’t see him as a hero at all.  Focus Features’ Darkest Hour reveals the truth about the man. Or does it?


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ON THE SILVER SCREEN: LEARN A LESSON ABOUT FAMILY AND CELEBRATE DIA DE LOS MUERTOS! (COCO)

 

Story by Liz Alper

Photos courtesy Disney

November 6, 2017 (San Diego) - Just in time for Dia de los Muertos, Disney and Pixar’s Coco takes audiences on a colorful journey..  Right off the bat, the music introduces you to the rich Mexican culture you'll experience throughout the film.  Music continues to carry you throughout the movie.  In fact, the movie is about music!


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ON THE SILVER SCREEN: “WAKEFIELD” A DELICIOUS BIT OF ABSURDIST THEATER

 

“If the reader choose, let him do his own meditation; or if he prefer to ramble with me… I bid him welcome.”  

Nathaniel Hawthorne

Review by E.A. Barrera

June 21, 2017 (San Diego) -- What would it be like to become a ghost in your own life? To be a voyeur in your private world? In this film adaptation of E.L. Doctrow’s short story “Wakefield” we see Bryan Cranston in the role of Howard Wakefield, a man who wants a time-out on his life. He doesn’t want to change his life so much as put it on hold. This is not a story of  a mid-life crises as it is a tale of human breakdown from the daily pressures


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ON THE SILVER SCREEN: ARMENIAN GENOCIDE FILM HAS POTENTIAL, BUT FALLS SHORT (THE PROMISE)

 

By Liz Alper, ECM film reviewer

Photo via Facebook

April 10, 2017 (San Diego) - The Armenian genocide was a horrific event in September of 1915 in which Turkish forces (then still under the control of the Ottoman Empire) slaughtered thousands of Armenian men, women and children.  Director Terry George attempted to put this tragedy on screen in The Promise, starring Oscar Isaac, Christian Bale and Charlotte Le Bon.


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ON THE SILVER SCREEN: A DIFFERENT LOOK AT A SAN DIEGAN HERO (THE FOUNDER)

 

By Liz Alper

Photo:  Youtube screenshot

January 20, 2017 (San Diego) - One of San Diego’s most revered historical figures is Ray Kroc.  Kroc and his wife Joan donated billions of dollars to the Salvation Army and NPR.  The Kroc Center is practically a San Diego community landmark and where San Diego State men's hockey has their home games.  He's played by Michael Keaton in the film The Founder.  


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ON THE SILVER SCREEN: INSTILLING PRIDE FOR CITY AND COUNTRY (PATRIOTS DAY)

 

By Liz Alper

Photo via patch.com

January 10, 2017 (San Diego) - As a New England native, I felt I had an obligation to see this film.  As someone whose mother’s friend was running in the Boston Marathon at the time of the bombings, I had to see this film.  As someone who has family in Massachusetts, I had to see this film.  

I still remember the watching first Boston Bruins game after the bombing.  During the anthems, the entire TD Garden was silent.  Rene Rancourt began to sing and after "were so gallantly streaming," he stopped.  The crowd took it from there.  They carried Boston Strong flags as the American flag danced on the ice and on the junbotron.  I'm from New Hampshire, but I've spent a lot of my life in Boston and I call it my city too and I've never been more proud of my city than I have in that moment.

To this day, four years later, my cousin, who lives in Merrimac, Massachusetts, says she’s afraid to go into Boston.  Not to take her son to a Red Sox game or anything.  Her story and so many others are why I feel it was an excellent idea for Mark Wahlberg (a Boston native) to put this event on film.


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ON THE SILVER SCREEN: FIND WHO YOU ARE ON A HAWAIIAN JOURNEY (MOANA)

 

By Liz Alper

November 21, 2016 (San Diego) - I, like most little girls in the 90s, ate, slept and breathed Disney movies.  I was never a princess for Halloween--I was too tomboyish for that--but Belle was my favorite Disney princess and Beauty and the Beast was my favorite Disney movie.  I watched it all the time.  That and Toy Story.  That honor eventually went to 101 Dalmatians (seriously, I was obsessed with that movie.  I played the computer game all the time too).  Tonight I had the privilege of reliving my childhood as an almost 25-year-old.  I attended a pre-screening of the new Disney film Moana, directed by Ron Clements, Don Hall, John Musker and Chris Williams. 


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“I SAW THE DEVIL” DIRECTOR SHARES DIABOLIC SUSPENSE DETAILS IN INTERVIEW WITH ECM

By Brian Lafferty

March 18, 2011 (San Diego)--Opening today at the Ken Cinema is director Kim Jee-Woon’s thriller,  I Saw the Devil. I had an opportunity for a brief interview with the director about the picture, in which he shares secrets of creating cinematic suspense. 


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