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Hygienic begins its Summer Flickers

 June 13, 2013; Updated: 1:57 pm

Watching stars under the stars

You may ask yourself, well, how did I get here?

How you got here: You heard that this year's Summer Flickers at the Hygienic Art Park is kicking of with the Talking Heads concert film "Stop Making...

Fletcher’s ‘Violet & Daisy’ in limited release today

 June 7, 2013; Updated: 4:20 pm

Today is a big day for Geoffrey Fletcher. It's when his first feature-film directorial effort, "Violet & Daisy," is being released.
Fletcher, who grew up in Waterford, won the Academy Award for...

Movie tip: "Star Trek Into Darkness"

 June 6, 2013; Updated: 12:55 pm

For his latest big-screen "Star Trek," director J.J. Abrams has managed to keep the fundamentals of the TV show but also to tart it up with movie action and CGI-happy effects. So, you still get TV sentimentality (wow, does Abrams know...

Ancient redwood forests evoke look of future in ‘After Earth’

 May 31, 2013; Updated: 4:36 pm

When producers of the upcoming science fiction movie "After Earth" wanted to create an image of what the planet might look like 1,000-plus years in the future, location manager Dow Griffith knew just the place.

‘Cleopatra’ feted at 50 with restoration, theatrical re-release and more

 May 24, 2013; Updated: 4:19 pm

There was the spectacle, the runaway budget, the fights with the studio. But almost everyone thinks about the 1963 movie "Cleopatra" for one thing: Liz and Dick.
Martin Landau remembers the day when he...

Director labors eight years to get ‘Epic’ on the screen

 May 24, 2013; Updated: 4:20 pm

All those years since "Ice Age" and "Robots," you'd figure Chris Wedge had retired on the "Scrat" bucks he and Blue Sky Animation pulled in from that saber-toothed squirrel.
"Yeah, I'd have starved,...

Movie tip: "Mud"

 May 23, 2013; Updated: 2:11 pm

Few recent films have the evocative sense of place that "Mud" does. Writer-director Jeff Nichols sets his drama in the deep South, in a stark, downtrodden Arkansas town, but he doesn't fall into stereotyped traps. Out along the...

The new ‘Star Trek’ is all about ‘ensemble’

 May 17, 2013; Updated: 5:36 pm

Say this much for the new films in the long-running "Star Trek" franchise. They're real "share the wealth" exercises. It's not just about Kirk, Spock and Bones and a couple of red shirts boldly going while everybody else sits idly by.

Movie tip: "The Great Gatsby"

 May 16, 2013; Updated: 2:28 pm

Don't think of this as an F. Scott Fitzgerald story. Think of it instead as a Baz Luhrmann flick. Because this is a total Baz extravaganza: the razzle-dazzle! the quick-cuts! the over-the-topness of it all! The party scenes in Gatsby's...

Film tip: "Iron Man 3"

 May 9, 2013; Updated: 1:40 pm

Robert Downey Jr. IS Iron Man! And I don't just mean that he plays Iron Man. I also mean that he is what makes this franchise spark. Without Downey - his wit, his irreverence, his tortured soul - the whole Iron Man film series would have...

Film review: 'Girl Rising' sends message of empowerment

 May 4, 2013; Updated: 11:39 pm

At the heart of the documentary “Girl Rising” is this idea: educating a girl is a powerful force for change. At a Friday screening of the film at the Garde Arts Center, a panel discussed that notion on a global scale — the movie...

Review: ‘Iron Man 3’ loaded down by heavy metal

 May 3, 2013; Updated: 6:00 pm

In the galaxy of big-screen superheros - a rather glum lot - Robert Downey Jr.'s Iron Man is the snappy one.
He's the sarcastic, motor-mouthed, preening, self-referential do-gooder, as opposed to all...

Movie tip: "The Big Wedding"

 May 2, 2013; Updated: 1:26 pm

Well, at least it's short. I went into this movie thinking, "The critics must be wrong. How bad could something be if it stars Robert DeNiro, Diane Keaton and Susan Sarandon?" The answer: pretty bad. This 90-minute piece is based on a...

DVD tip: "A Late Quartet"

 May 2, 2013; Updated: 1:22 pm

It's not often that the dynamics of a classical music ensemble, as opposed to, say, a bunch of old rockers on the road, is the core of a feature film. But in "A Late Quartet," the tensions of musicians in a decades' long collaboration...

"Girl Rising" to be screened, with panel discussion, at the Garde

 May 2, 2013; Updated: 1:05 pm

The lives and dreams of nine girls born into what's described as "unforgiving circumstances" around the world are the focus of a new documentary.

"Girl Rising" is directed by Oscar nominee Richard E. Robbins and features narration by...

Review: Bay’s latest a bit ‘Pain’-ful

 April 26, 2013; Updated: 5:07 pm

There's a siege mentality about Michael Bay's movies, as though viewers are the enemy holed up in a bunker and he's the guy ordering heavy-metal music around the clock to wear down our morale and force us to surrender.

DVD tip: "Django Unchained"

 April 25, 2013; Updated: 2:24 pm

Caveats first: Yes, Quentin Tarantino's latest feels a bit like his "Inglourious Basterds," with slavery subbing in for Nazism. And, yes, "Django" goes on 15 minutes too long (maybe so Tarantino could save his own cameo?). But this film...

Review: Elegant if familiar, ‘Oblivion’ mesmerizes

 April 19, 2013; Updated: 5:14 pm

Early in the sleek sci-fi thriller "Oblivion," Tom Cruise, as a flyboy repairman living a removed, Jetsons-like existence above an invaded and deserted Earth, intones his home sickness.
"I can't shake...

DVD tip: "The Impossible"

 April 18, 2013; Updated: 1:55 pm

To be released April 23
Let's hope you have a big-screen TV. And high-def would help, too. This film - about a family swept up in the 2004 tsunami while they are visiting Thailand -...

Oscar winner Geoffrey Fletcher previews new film locally

 April 16, 2013; Updated: 6:35 pm

Winning an Oscar doesn't just mean a trophy - it also means opportunity.
For Geoffrey Fletcher, who won a 2010 Academy Award for best adapted screenplay for "Precious," he has gotten the chance to...

New film boosts immigration fight

 April 15, 2013; Updated: 6:04 pm

The immigration overhaul pending before Congress is picking up more high-profile support as Apple co-founder Steve Jobs' widow, Laurene Powell Jobs, bankrolls a new documentary to promote the effort, directed by Academy Award-winner Davis...

Biopic '42' is classy but tame Robinson tale

 April 12, 2013; Updated: 3:15 pm

Jackie Robinson was the ideal class act to break the barrier and become the first black player in Major League Baseball.
Writer-director Brian Helgeland's Robinson biopic "42" is a class act itself,...

Campbell tells fans not to prejudge the new ‘Evil Dead’

 April 5, 2013; Updated: 5:59 pm

More than 30 years after its release, there remains something delightfully transgressive about "The Evil Dead," the low-budget horror flick that launched one of horror cinema's most oddball franchises and the directing career of Sam...

The Jewish Film Festival expands its reach

 April 4, 2013; Updated: 1:32 pm

SIDEBAR SCHEDULE
The 19th annual International Jewish Film Festival of Eastern Connecticut runs April 6 to 25 at various locations. For more information, call the Jewish Federation of Eastern...

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