IT’S NOT ABOUT MAKING A LIVING. IT’S ABOUT LIVING. In 1981, just as the police are beginning to figure out that a string of bank robberies are committed by the same old men, Forrest Tucker (Robert Redford) meets Jewel (Sissy Spacek) by chance… This easy-going comedy-drama was based on a New Yorker article about a … Continue reading The Old Man and the Gun
SOME SECRETS ARE TOO BIG TO KEEP. When a lumberjack crew find an 11-year-old boy (Oakes Fegley) deep in the forest, they have no idea that he’s been living there for the past six years with a friendly dragon. The Disney animated version from 1977 may not be one of their great classics, but this … Continue reading Pete’s Dragon
HIS MOUNTAIN. HIS PEACE. HIS GREAT HUNTS. HIS YOUNG BRIDE. WITH ALL THAT, IT SHOULD HAVE BEEN DIFFERENT. Sometime after the Mexican War, Jeremiah Johnson (Robert Redford) heads into the Rocky Mountains to become a trapper, but it’s a hard life… Sydney Pollack reunited with Redford after This Property Is Condemned (1966) for a drama … Continue reading Jeremiah Johnson
BROADWAY’S BAREST, RAREST, UNSQUAREST LOVE PLAY. Newlyweds Paul and Corie Bratter (Robert Redford, Jane Fonda) move into their new Manhattan apartment… which turns out to be tiny, and a source of friction between the couple. A successful adaptation of the Neil Simon play, which was reportedly based on his first marriage. Redford and Fonda reunited … Continue reading Barefoot in the Park
When two elderly neighbors (Robert Redford, Jane Fonda) begin to share a bed at night, simply to cure their loneliness, the arrangement doesn’t sit well with everybody in their lives… The director of The Lunchbox (2013) delivers another romantic drama for grownups, one that unites the two stars onscreen for the first time since 1979. … Continue reading Our Souls at Night
Former professional rodeo rider ”Sonny” Steele (Robert Redford) only does PR events nowadays… until he’s fed up, steals a very valuable but mistreated race horse and goes on the lam. Sydney Pollack and Redford reunited for this pleasant romantic comedy after making several movies in the 1970s; Jane Fonda joins them as a reporter looking … Continue reading The Electric Horseman
TOM LOGAN HAS A LAW PARTNER WHO PUT A DOG ON THE WITNESS STAND. A CLIENT WHO CAN’T ENTER A ROOM WITHOUT A CRIME BEING COMMITTED. AND A CASE THAT COULD TURN OUT TO BE THE MURDER OF THE YEAR. HIS. When a case where a mysterious woman (Daryl Hannah) stands accused of having stolen … Continue reading Legal Eagles
In the 1910s, Karen (Meryl Streep) marries a Danish nobleman (Klaus Maria Brandauer) and they move to British East Africa to start a farm; she also befriends a handsome big-game hunter (Robert Redford)… Certainly not one of the year’s best movies, but it’s easy to see why it picked up so many Oscars – a … Continue reading Out of Africa
… ALL IT TAKES IS A LITTLE CONFIDENCE. One of David S. Ward’s first scripts introduced us to the world of confidence men. Not that they hadn’t been seen on screen before The Sting, but Ward found a new angle. He based his story on two actual grifters called Fred and Charley Gondorf, brothers who … Continue reading The Sting: Good-Hearted Grifters
NEVER GIVE UP. While J.C. Chandor was commuting to New York City during the editing period of his first film, Margin Call (2011), he was watching the boatyards and was struck by a feeling of waste and absurdity. A couple of hundred years ago, we relied on boats to explore the world and now … Continue reading All is Lost: Our Man and the Sea
IN HEROES WE TRUST. Captain America and Black Widow (Chris Evans, Scarlett Johansson) are sent on a mission to liberate S.H.I.E.L.D. hostages, but soon find the entire organization threatened from all sides. The filmmakers’ purpose was to fuse a 3D superhero movie with the trappings of 1970s paranoia thrillers, with Robert Redford serving as … Continue reading Captain America: The Winter Soldier
After the arrest of a former Weather Underground activist (Susan Sarandon) who’d been a fugitive for the last 30 years, reporter Ben Shepard (Shia LaBeouf) turns his attention to a seemingly honest Albany lawyer (Robert Redford). The 1970s terror organization is portrayed in rather simple fashion as consisting of essentially decent people who made undeniable … Continue reading The Company You Keep
THERE’S NO WISDOM WORTH HAVING THAT ISN’T HARD WON. When Cindy Meehl needed help with one of her horses, she went to see Buck Brannaman… and realized that everyone should have the opportunity to hear his story and watch him at work. Buck became Meehl’s first film, but it doesn’t look like it; strikingly … Continue reading Buck
