Reviews

The charismatic Sami Staitman stars in this series as Sami Sherman, a would-be actress doing her best to make it in New York. (If she can make it there ... oops, wrong song, wrong show.) Her life unfolds in a way that feels like an updated version of That Girl. It's sweet, but not saccharine. Nor is it too innocent, as Sami's hilarious YouTube commercial attests. But finding success isn't going to happen overnight, not when some of the roles she auditions for are of hilarious dubious quality (think of it: a musical version of The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo). Offering support along the way are her best friend, Sammy (Karim Hazime), her mother (Kerry O'Malley) and her grandmother (the great Cindy Williams in her final role).

In each episode, we're treated to just how gifted Staitman/Sherman can be, usually in the form of a song written by series creator and writer Bruce Kimmel. Along the way, she gets to perform with and for some stage greats like Karen Ziemba and Brad Oscar. My favorite song from the 10 winning episodes was Staitman by herself giving her all to a beautiful ballad called "Simply." Irresistible. Your choice could vary as strong arguments could be made for "Annie," O'Malley's over-the-top "I'm-on-a-Diet Blues" and Williams' hilarious "I Married a Schnook."

Their combined efforts and Kimmel's witty scripts make Sami a sure-fire winner. I'm looking forward to season 2.

What fun. Sami Staitman stars as an actress trying to make it in the fabled New York, New York of song. That means commercials for questionable products as well as auditions for musicals that we would all hope are never staged. Bruce Kimmel, who gave us the great Out of the Box several years ago, returns to the short series with a new winner, judging by the first two episodes. And he has a winner in Sami Staitman, who shines as the title character. Cindy Williams in her last role and Kerry O'Malley add to the fun, as does another newcomer, Karim Hazime, as her best friend, also a Sammy. It's fun, it's fresh and while it has some great 13+ belly laughs, there's also an innocence and nostalgia for shows of the past like That Girl. Looking forward to watching the whole series.

This sappy, tired little movie proves that Fellini's magic was his own and it can't be carelessly copied or easily interpreted. The actors are fine, but the script and the direction leave everyone stranded in a cliched mess. OK, it was more enjoyable than Fellini Casanova, but that's not saying much.

People who read the title, Jane Austen in Manhattan, are likely to come to this film expecting something other than what James Ivory and his frequent collaborators present us. It's not the sparkling comedy of manners, of love and money, that Ivory gave us in A Room with a View. It's more of a drama, and it's not about Jane Austen really at all.

But it's not a lost cause, thanks to some fine performances, especially from Anne Baxter, in her last starring role. Sean Young is luminous, with her big, intoxicating eyes. Robert Powell has a more difficult role of being hypnotic to some while being openly transparent to others.

I was on the road researching a book on Texas barbecue when I read Philip Roth's novel, Indignation. I had managed to shelve it away in my brain until I saw a movie of the same title playing at a second-run movie house near me. Could it be? Yes, it was the same story. Better than it, the sleek yet powerful prose made its way onto the screen with its integrity intact. And you know what? A crowd of about 30 of us sat rapt for 110 minutes. Nobody talked until the credits rolled, but everybody laughed at the appropriate moments and there were even a few well-placed gasps of surprise. A good story, an intelligent script and a fine cast will work that magic. Give yourself an evening to find out.

The cast is so perfect that I have to single out one performer as an example of the great work provided by all. Danny Burstein plays a father so proud of his own son and so worried by his son's future in an uncertain world marked by war that he seems to be descending into madness. The actor is harrowing to watch because you can feel all the love that burns inside of him and that he just can't bring himself to express properly. Maybe it would not be manly or maybe he doesn't know the right words or maybe he just doesn't think he needs to say anything directly. Yet we can feel his every fear, his mixture of hope and despair, his pride, his love, his frustration. Wow.

Back in the days when movies could be fun with plenty of laughs and not a lot of unnecessary subtext, there was this sweet, silly and often outrageously funny musical comedy with deliciously low-down songs. After all, who cares what the plot is when you've got Dancing Dildos, a naked chorus line and doughnuts?

Sure, there was no budget, but that actually seems to reflect the can-do spirit of the film.

Cindy Williams gives a charming performance, as does writer/co-director/songwriter Bruce Kimmel, who takes cluelessness to a whole new level. Also, look for Ron Howard in an unbilled cameo.

Don't expect the works of Eisenstadt and you'll have a great time.

Spike Lee and Kevin Willmot have taken Aristophanes' hilarious Lysistrata and turned it into a phantasmagoria of satire and heartache that asks some important questions about America's fixation with firearms and sex -- and all in rhymed couplets. When the women of Chicago go on a sex strike to protest the out-of-control violence of their city, Lee fills the screen with some indelible images and more creativity than most films of 2015. He's also blessed with an amazing cast, from the empowering Teyonash Parris as Lysistrata to Jennifer Hudson as a mother who loses her child to gang violence.

Lee is the most adventurous and gifted director working in America right now. Chi-Raq is ample proof of that.

Spike Lee's comedy has been reviled by people who don't seem to understand comedy. This is a really funny movie about people who make a great many moral decisions in their lives because of money. Jane Austen could have written it, if she'd been living in the 21st century. What I especially appreciated about it is that it starts out like a gripping crime drama in order to get the comedic setup established. That shift in tone is wonderful, because it keeps you off balance for the rest of the movie. There are no easy answers here. You may not like the choices the characters make, but so what? You might learn something from the way they behave and they way they face the consequences for what they do. The cast is uniformly excellent, right down to the weird doorman and the some of women who seek out the main character as a sperm donor.

It's not a perfect movie by any means. It could lose about 10-15 minutes without losing any of its punch. But I had stayed away from this for 12 years because of the incomprehensible reviews it had received when it opened. Don't fall victim to the same. Spike Lee is one of American cinema's most gifted and unique directors, and this fits easily in near the top of his work. Think of it alongside Girl 6, another funny movie that left you off balance for much of the picture.

Mira Nair's gift for storytelling is not often evident in this strident, one-dimensional film that manages to turn the complex emotions that surround 9/11 into a dull, clichéd story of how racism in America could cause more global horror. Some good acting can't rescue a fairly trite script that sounds like highlights of the much better novel that it was based on.

Nair's Monsoon Wedding was about real people, and it remains one of the greatest films of the past 30 years. Even her Vanity Fair was more emotionally connected than this.

Save yourself the 2:10 running length and pick up the book.

Some excellent musicals have been made out of some truly unlikely subjects ("The Diary of Anne Frank," for example). But they are in the minority. That's why this series is so hilarious. It isn't afraid to explore the worst, most mind-numbing musical adaptations that are lurking in the hearts of the untalented among us.

Writer/director Bruce Kimmel mines this in both songs and jokes that will keep you laughing -- and even humming -- long after each short episode ends. I would list some of the tasteless topics covered here, but that would require too many spoiler alerts. Just watch and enjoy. Great guest stars add to the fun.

Big Happy Pants, indeed.

Yes, Spike Lee has an agenda. So what? So does every documentarian. No one who has an ounce of humanity can deny that what happened in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina was a failure of grotesque proportions. We can get food and water to people in Southeast Asia in two days, but it took five days for the same government to get food and water to our fellow citizens!?! That is deplorable, and it makes the mayor, the governor, the president and everyone in government look bad. What makes them look worse is that an actor, Sean Penn, is able to do more -- and do more in a timely manner -- than anybody supposedly in power. What I appreciated most were the stories of those whose faith saw them through this catastrophe. I watched this during Holy Week, and that amazing rendition of "The Old Rugged Cross" stayed with me for days and will likely echo in me for weeks to come.