Full Metal Jacket (1987)

Perhaps the most telling moment in Disney’s Hercules (directed by John Musker and Ron Clements) the latest in that company’s long succession of dreadful, vulgar and philistine cartoon movies, comes near the beginning with a musical recapitulation of Greek mythology (most of it garbled or deliberately altered to suit the use that Disney wants to…

A portrait of modern sanctity which — very oddly, in my view — asks not to be taken too seriously

[See “Entry from July 25, 2007” under “My Diary”] Discover more from James Bowman Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email. Type your email… Subscribe

La Vita è Bella or Life is Beautiful was directed and co-written by Roberto Benigni, who stars as Guido Orefice, a Jewish waiter in Arezzo before the war. He woos and wins his wife, Dora (Nicoletta Braschi), whom he calls la principessa — the princess — in memorably comic and romantic style and manages to…

A self-consciously Christian parable at odds with its own realistic setting

The fine Spanish director Alejandro Amenábar employs his talents unworthily on behalf of propaganda for “the right to die”