Michael Caine can deliver as much to a role as anyone. He has as much screen presence as anyone. Time has seemed unable to change that. “Youth” as a film fits into a few categories that it will serve to describe. This is an “art” film–which broadly means that it is stylized enough such that not everything is explicit. You might have questions. Heaven forbid that this prompts conversation or discussion later (he said with a snicker directed toward today’s overstimulated virtual society). It is also, despite the plain English, a foreign film more than an American or UK film. It is set, mostly, in the Swiss Alps and the sensibilities are European (it was directed by Pablo Sorrentino, an Italian). This is not to

The movie “Room” is going to win its share of awards at the Oscars. If it were named Best Picture, I would not be surprised–nor would I disapprove. It has already won prizes at the Golden Globes and the Critics Choice Awards (to name only two). It’s exactly the kind of independent movie I love: it’s relatively simple, thought-provoking, inspiring, and balanced: at once sweet and somber. There’s a long-haired five-year-old boy, Jack, who has never seen the outside of a fortified garden shed. His only experience of the outside world is the sky through a skylight, and his mother’s explanations of the images on a cheap TV. They are captives. In an early scene, Jack begins his day by greeting the fixtures. “Good morning sink,

While most would dismiss the view that the US today is governed as a theocracy, it is not an entirely cynical viewpoint . I do not refer to the resurgence of evangelical Christianity; I suggest that the US believes in and is governed by its unshakeable faith in Capital. To borrow the language of the bible, it is all about Mammon. One proof that free-market capitalism is practiced and preached is the offerings given to share buybacks last year by corporate America: it was an obscene one trillion dollars. When you consider that most of those shares are below their average price for last year, you could say the capital was at least grossly misallocated. Unfortunately, the incentives are perfect for them: buybacks offer high

One of the themes I drum on is the gift that comes with a broad range of experiences, learning, or interests. If you’re lucky enough to have any of these and you are paying attention to current events and trends, you see how today more than ever we have a dynamic existence; all aspects of society connect and affect each other: it is like a mobile where you see the strings connecting the hanging pieces, but the relationships are not always linear. Yesterday I saw an article about how social moods are disrupting the election prospects with Trump and Sanders emerging as non-traditional players, the uncertainty around which is disrupting the stock market. Politics and economics are two sides of the same coin, of course.

Titles are a fascination for me. I have a good vocabulary, but I did not know what a revenant was. I took enough French to know it means “coming back,” or “one who comes back.” When you learn that French frontiersman are part of the plot, the French usage of that time for “ghost” or “spirit returned from the dead” makes sense. Alejandro Inarritu’s latest film, The Revenant, was almost an epic. It was almost a saga. I saw the most realistic bear mauling scene imaginable. Frontier survival and lore may never have been made so candid and graphic (it’s winter, your horse just died and you lost your coat: what do you do?). Per usual with this director, the action is interrupted with visits