Dirty Work

A glib and unpersuasive attempt to identify the primitive and savage “other” with the super-rich

A brilliantly conceived and executed Argentinian “sting” is only bettered by the movie that describes it.

Yet another moral tale to illustrate how much is to be deplored by all right-thinking people the “cycle of violence”

My Name is Joe, written by Paul Laverty (in Glaswegian with English subtitles) and directed by Ken Loach, stars Peter Mullan as the title character, an unemployed laborer (a surprisingly unobtrusive reminder of Loach’s usual left wing themes) and recovering alcoholic who is introduced to us at an AA meeting. He is now ashamed that,…

Anyone who is still familiar with Washington Irving’s “Legend of Sleepy Hollow” will find little to recognize in its Tim Burtonification as Sleepy Hollow. Burton has filled this bit of belletrist whimsy from the now almost-unimaginable past with his familiar, not to say trademark devices. All takes place amidst spooky landscapes in grey and black,…

A bit of magical realism that is too heavy on the magic and too light on the realism