Philippe Guez

Facebook

Twitter

Google+

StumbleUpon

Fark

Comment

Follow Philippe Guez

Philippe Guez

Philippe Guez Quick Links

Film RSS

Angel Of Death Review

By Christopher Null

Bad

Nearly three years ago, my wife and I toured France for a week. In every Metro station was a poster for a film called Semana Santa, starring Mira Sorvino and Olivier Martinez.

I didn't see it in France, but I waited, and waited, and waited for it to come to the U.S.

Continue reading: Angel Of Death Review

Early on in the period drama The Luzhin Defence, Emily Watson's Natalia proclaims that she wants something different, and that's just what we get through most of this adaptation, based on Vladimir Nabokov's novel of chess and madness. But as acclaimed director Marleen Gorris (Mrs. Dalloway) takes us toward the vital final act, that sense of originality seems to fade.

Luckily, we are saved throughout by Watson's performance. As a woman vacationing with her pesky mother in 1920s Italy, she stumbles upon eccentric, pained, chess genius Alexander Luzhin, or more accurately, he stumbles upon her. Luzhin, played by a solid and risk-taking John Turturro, is disheveled and awkward, the kind of absent-minded obsessive that draws stares of both scorn and jealousy. Watson and Turturro, both at the top of their talents, create a sort of Romeo and Juliet -- he's reckless and unkempt, she's proper and well-mannered.

Continue reading: The Luzhin Defence Review