This series continues, somehow, with its central conceit, which is that at 8:25 p.m. each night, dedicated surgeon Jason turns into debauched hedonist Ian. And tonight, that’s supposed to happen in the middle of a surgery, which has Jason Just Saying Yes to a risky new drug, hoping to keep Ian from surfacing on schedule. What I find most dramatic is that this show is still on NBC’s schedule, even as a summer write-off.

2013

Aug

AMC'S 'BREAKING BAD' RETURNS, BRILLIANTLY By David Bianculli

I won’t “spoil” Sunday’s return episode of AMC’s Breaking Bad by divulging the plot. The resumption of the story line, though, begins with a brilliant echo worth saluting…

2013

Aug

'HELL ON WHEELS' ARRIVES FOR SEASON THREE By Eric Gould

The gritty AMC western returns with a new showrunner, some new characters, and a new time slot... changes which aren't necessarily clear improvements...

2013

Aug

THE WITCHES OF EASTWICK By David Bianculli

This playful 1987 film version of the John Updike novel about a New England coven of modern witches teamed a terrific threesome – Susan Sarandon, Michelle Pfeiffer and Cher – and showed them all falling under the demonic spell of Jack Nicholson, as none other than the Devil. Great casting all around: the women all get to go through memorably chameleonic transformations, and Nicholson, better than almost any actor, can play sinister and seductive at the same time, in equally effective

2013

Aug

FUN WITH DICK AND JANE By David Bianculli

This 1977 comedy, starring George Segal and Jane Fonda, was remade (though not very well) in 2005, starring Jim Carrey and Tea Leoni. But even the remake may have been a few years ahead of its time: The plot has a middle-class, well-off couple suddenly squeezed out of the American dream by rising costs and falling incomes. Dick and Jane react to unemployment and the threat of foreclosure by staging a form of protest – and becoming bank robbers. This film itself is a little heavy-handed, bu

2013

Aug

THE WARRIORS By David Bianculli

Walter Hill’s 1979 action movie was part parable, part videogame, and part dystopian nightmare. It’s definitely an exercise in excess – a Walter Hill trademark – but it’s also a truly enlightening peek into its period, just before the dawn of the 80s. Michael Beck plays Swan, the leader of a street gang in New York, one of many called to a Central Park super-summit. When the street-gang boss of bosses is assassinated, Swan’s gang, the Warriors, is framed as th

2013

Aug

TAKEN 2 By David Bianculli

Liam Neeson, action hero, was an idea, and a performance, that caught many by surprise when he starred as the quiet but deadly daughter-seeker (and revenge-seeker) in Taken. By the time this sequel was made in 2012, Neeson had firmely established himself in the genre – and, with this film, revisits both his character and his original dilemma. In the first Taken, his daughter was whisked away by sex traffickers. In this follow-up, Neeson’s Bryan Mills and family are targeted by the fa

2013

Aug

A CLOCKWORK ORANGE By David Bianculli

This 1971 Stanley Kubrick film, based on the futuristic, linguistically inventive novel by Anthony Bugess, is the film that inspired me to be a professional critic. When this movie came out, I was so disturbed by it, yet so impressed, that I went back many times, just to watch it over and over again, focusing on different elements each time to figure out what Kubrick was doing. What he was doing, I finally figured out, was making a cinematic masterpiece. It starts at the Korova milk bar, and nev

2013

Aug

2013 PGA CHAMPIONSHIP By David Bianculli

The 95th PGA Championship, a contest won handily last year by Rory McIlroy, begins today, with both McIlroy and Tiger Woods, among others, determined to find the recently missing parts of their game and fight for final-day contention. Among the tee times for today’s opening round: Woods at 8:35 a.m. ET (before TNT begins coverage), McIlroy (pictured) at 1:25 p.m. ET, and Phil Mickelson at 1:45 ET.

2013

Aug

BEN-HUR: A TALE OF THE CHRIST By David Bianculli

This 1929 version of the biblical epic (the famous 1959 version of which was shown by TCM Monday night) is presented this evening, and it’s a really fascinating compare-and-contrast exercise. You’d think, for example, there would be no way that a silent movie could capture the kinetic excitement of the chariot race as grandly as the later film – but you’d be wrong. Plenty of animals, and humans, I suspect, were harmed in the making of this picture.

Posts 891-900 of 2272

89 90 91 92 93

New From TVWW

PBS' 'Frontline’ Examines Pension Promises and — Spoiler Alert — Finds the Math Doesn’t Add Up

The Decadence of ‘Versailles’ Comes to Ovation

Prescribing Mamie Gummer in 'Emily Owens, M.D.'

Looking for a Free Ride? HBO Can Deliver

'Pass the Biscuits' Part of the Hatfield-McCoy Pop-Culture Legacy

Dispatches From TVWW

'Extinction: The Facts' is a Sobering Call to Action

How 'Mayans' Has Been Influenced by the Show's Creator Elgin James

For Whom the Bell Tolls: Ken Burns and Lynn Novick Take on Ernest Hemingway, the Man and the Myth

In the Final Season, Sutton Foster's Liza is Now the Genuine Version of Her 'Younger' Self

Season 2 of 'City on a Hill' Returns with Kevin Bacon, Aldis Hodge, and Boston Corruption