Cinema Paradiso

In the same way novels can be better and worse than journalism at processing history, so can movies be better and worse than novels: too unreal, yet too specific. For the movie of Mohsin Hamid's novel, director Mira Nair mounts a sensitive... More »

In the same way novels can be better and worse than journalism at processing history, so can movies be better and worse than novels: too unreal, yet too specific. For the movie of Mohsin Hamid's novel, director Mira Nair mounts a sensitive retrospective procedural of radicalization: Here's how a bright young Pakistani man (Riz Ahmed) goes straight from Princeton into a boutique corporate valuation firm (with Kiefer Sutherland as his sharkish boss), then has a promising meet-cute with an emotionally unavailable American woman (Kate Hudson), then has his priorities rearranged by the fallout of 9/11. He returns to Pakistan as a university lecturer whose ideas may or may not encourage terrorism, drawing attention from a journalist (Liev Schreiber) whose lengthy interview-cum-standoff serves as the film’s narrative frame. At times it’s dense and sluggish, too much like a novel. But there is some exhilaration to be had from Nair's sincere interested in Hudson's character, who is appealing but hung up by grief over a previous relationship. In the richest moment, she offends her new suitor with a naively exploitative art project-- she calls it an expression of love; he says it's defamation-- and he stuns himself with the cruelty of his response. Thus the central arc is a function not just of sadly expected post-9/11 affronts-- the airport strip search, the tire slashing, the colleagues getting nervous about his beard-- but of doomed romance, with a vision of America that's all the more alluring for being so tragically stunted. « Less

6:00 PM

Part The Diary of Anne Frank, part The Swiss Family Robinson, and part The Shawshank Redemption, No Place on Earth, about a Ukrainian Jewish family in WWII who hides from the Nazis by living in caves, has all the elements of a great story: an... More »

Part The Diary of Anne Frank, part The Swiss Family Robinson, and part The Shawshank Redemption, No Place on Earth, about a Ukrainian Jewish family in WWII who hides from the Nazis by living in caves, has all the elements of a great story: an epic quest (survival), formidable obstacles (Nazis discovering each hiding place), and clever solutions to those obstacles (digging new exits, finding new caves). Unfortunately, the telling, by director Janet Tobias, is no match for the story. At the beginning, the film seems to be a documentary about a spelunker, Chris Nicola, who years later discovers the remains of one of the family's encampments and seeks survivors and relatives with little luck. But our luck is much better; without explanation, the family is suddenly narrating, and in a pastiche of styles. At times, some survivors, now in their dotage, give interviews; at others, Tobias re-enacts scenes, all narrated in voiceover, making it a feat just to tell who’s talking, when, and whether what we’re seeing is straight-up fictional. Those narrators aren't always the clearest storytellers, either, so viewers must often rely on the re-enactments, but Tobias keeps those shrouded in darkness, making the picture often as murky as the words. The stats relayed at the movie's end-- the women, who unlike the men never left for food or supplies, hold the world record for the longest time spent in a cave-- almost have more impact than the narrative. « Less

8:15 PM

4:00 PM