The Edge of Heaven. A multi-stranded drama of post-war Turks in Germany and back home. The characters are full-bodied, the social contexts dense, the acting and directing outstanding. The structure depends overmuch on coincidence and lacks cohesion; still it holds. (Reviewed 6/11//08)
Mongol. An old-fashioned large-scale adventure epic made by a fine serious director, Sergei Bodrov. The boyhood, youth, and young manhood of Genghis Khan seem to enlarge the screen with outsize emotions and very busy action. A non-guilty pleasure. (6/11/08)
Savage Grace. The dizzyingly decadent lives of a super-rich American family, from 1946 onward, mostly abroad. The sex is more than frank and is spicily varied, but the film succeeds, in its visually gorgeous way, mostly through its acting -- particularly Julianne Moore as a wife-mother subtly ensnared. (6/11/08)
When Did You Last See Your Father? Admittedly, this English story is one more picture about a grown man who dislikes his father and, through enforced retrospect, has to reconsider. But it is so delightfully acted by Colin Firth and Jim Broadbent that familiarity breeds gratification. (6/11/08)
SK
By Stanley Kaufman