Top Ten 2015: Women land box-office blows for a surprise win
Movies: Top Ten 2015
Women stormed the box-office with raw power and profound emotional insight, overcoming Hollywood's institutional misogyny
By Katherine Monk
Let’s hear it for the girls. Though the year started slowly with just a handful of bright moments on what seemed to be a rather bleak horizon — from a pruny soak in a Hot Tub Time Machine and a disappointing date with The Avengers — 2015 ended up celebrating the fair sex in surprise fashion, starting with Mad Max’s furious females lead by Charlize Theron. The movie was kicked from the ticket wicket by Elizabeth Banks’s Pitch Perfect chorus, but there was still plenty of room for revision as Melissa McCarthy took on the spy genre and Amy Poehler and Phyllis Smith deconstructed the adolescent female psyche in Inside Out. James Bond lost a bit of box-office mojo with Spectre – pulling in $196 million domestically, compared to Skyfall’s $304 million – but while Hollywood expressed concern over a grim ...
Murder, He Wrote
Movie review: The Hateful Eight
Quentin Tarantino creates a self-conscious cartoon that puts a bullet through the brain of western myth
Pointless and broken
Movie review: Point Break
The remake of Kathryn Bigelow's cult classic about two dudes on opposite sides of the law is a murky bore
Mississippi Grind percolates
Movie review: Mississippi Grind
The team behind Half Nelson and Sugar return with a film about chronic gambling that isn't as depressing as it probably should be, thanks to a pair of pocket kings in Ryan Reynolds and Ben Mendelsohn
Creed knows where it’s coming from
Movie Review: Creed
Fruitvale Station's Ryan Coogler and Michael B. Jordan reunite in Creed, an elegant and surprisingly emotional reboot of the Rocky franchise
Three movies that helped me understand terrorism
Brazil, The Green Prince and Taqwacore: The Birth of Punk Islam
If movies are empathy machines, can they help us understand the incomprehensible reality of intentional violence against the innocent masses? Veteran film critic Katherine Monk says maybe, and offers a list of titles that helped her gain a better understanding of the big picture.
By Katherine Monk
A drunk man reels backward in a burka as the random thump of a bass drum ricochets through the basement walls, sweating from the heat of writhing humanity. “This one is called Sharia Law in the USA!,” screams the shirtless, bearded man on the mike. “I am an Islamist! I am the Anti-Christ!!”
It’s a scene from the 2009 Omar Majeed documentary Taqwacore: The Birth of Punk Islam, a film that didn’t make much of an impression the first time I watched it, but something pulled me back to the movie about young, thoroughly westernized Muslim men who found a sense of tribal belonging in a form of vocal and violent ...
Spotlight’s tarnished details make it shine
The real story behind a Pulitzer-winning series
Director Tom McCarthy creates cinematic tension by setting two institutions on a collision course as the Catholic Church and The Boston Globe wrestle arrogance and ego while professing human compassion
Justin Trudeau: Is he just like us?
Talking 'bout my generation
When he is sworn in as Canada's 23rd Prime Minister November 4, Justin Trudeau will assume the reins of power and speak for Generation X -- but how much of an X-er is he? We made a checklist.
By Katherine Monk
Canada’s Prime Minister-designate has already been called the voice of his generation, and at the age of 43, that places him in the middle of Generation X — which only seems fitting given he’s the child of a West Vancouver dynasty, another one of Douglas Coupland’s obsessions. But as an X-er, I wanted to make a checklist of the traits that define our oft-cited but little understood generation, to see if our new voice will be speaking for us, and the cluster of people and experience that make us who we are.
Justin Trudeau: Is he just like us?
He grew up when Pierre Trudeau was the Prime Minister.
He looks good in a suit, but not like he was born in one.
He’s into being a parent.
He’s got a kid named Xavier.
The older generation ...
Ramin Bahrani forecloses on 99 Homes
People: Rahmin Bahrani
The writer-director of Man Push Cart returns with 99 Homes, another story about social justice and an economic system that he says creates Donald Trumps, rewards greed and fails to protect families
By Katherine Monk
After directing Man Push Cart a decade ago, the late great Roger Ebert described director Ramin Bahrani as one of the most important new voices in cinema, hailing his ability to see the outsider and sympathize with those silently struggling to find their way.
His low-budget dramatic debut focused on a former Pakistani rock star who ended up selling food on the streets of Manhattan, and his more recent At Any Price starring Zac Efron took on the reality of genetically modified crops and their effect on America’s family farms.
He is unapologetic about his interest in themes concerning social justice, but Bahrani’s most recent feature, 99 Homes, may be the most trenchant piece of social commentary he’s made so far as it brings us ...
Why I’m addicted to The Knick
Clive Owen and Steven Soderbergh create a volatile dramatic mix in The Knick, the HBO-Cinemax series about turn-of-the-century surgeons that broke viewing records last year
The Knick: Season One
4/5
Starring: Clive Owen, Juliet Rylance, André Holland, Eve Hewson, Michael Angarano, Eric Johnson
Directed by: Steven Soderbergh
Cinemax/ HBO Home Entertainment
Available now on VOD, DVD, Digital HD, Blu-ray
By Katherine Monk
September 3, 2015 -- It’s as addictive as the cocaine our lead character injects between his toes, and for that, we can thank the unsheathed thespian potency of Clive Owen. The 50-year-old English actor who emerged as a force in the wake of Croupier takes the gloves off for his portrayal of John Thackery, a turn-of-the-century surgeon trying to save lives at the Knickerbocker Hospital.
If he sounds like your standard soap opera doctor, you’re partly right. Dr. Thackery engages in all kinds of heroics, as well as sexual escapa...