Summer is the slow season for the FFG, so I all have to share with you are these random thoughts about the movies I have seen over the past two months:
LOVE & FRIENDSHIP (D. Whit Stillman) -- the best of the summer movies by far, this engaging, sophisticated souffle of a movie combines the talents of English author Jane Austen with the urbane wit of (Manhattanite) Whit Stillman to concoct a thoroughly entertaining, if somewhat broadly-drawn, romp through 19th-century British society. Kate Beckinsale's best role to date.
MAGGIE'S PLAN (D: Rebecca Miller) -- Ms. Miller wants to channel Woody Allen (circa when he was making funny movies) in this tale of dissatisfied, intellectual urbanites. She succeeds to a degree (the performances by Greta Gerwig, Ethan Hawke and especially Julianne Moore as the jilted wife in this love triangle, are excellent), but the characters they play are so frustratingly self-absorbed and selfish that you can only walk away thinking they deserve each other. Julianne Moore is brilliant as the cold Danish intellectual who ends up being the most-believable and sympathetic character in the movie.
THE LOBSTER (D: Yorgos Lanthimos) -- I have a two-word review of this movie (I saw the American version, with Rachel Weisz and Colin Farrell sporting an unflattering "Dad bod"--but I am sure the same review applies to the Greek original): "RELENTLESSLY STUPID." Put THAT on the promotional poster!
