Gil Mansergh’s Cinema Toast
New Releases For the Week of 9/02/16
Little Men (PG)
Starring: Jennifer Ehle, Greg Kinnear, Paulina Garcia, Michael Barbieri, Theo Talitz, Talia Balsam, Alfred Molina
Directed By: Ira Sachs
In Little Men, a film written and directed by Ira Sachs, 13-year-old Jake moves into his recently deceased grandfather’s Brooklyn house where the shop downstairs is rented by a Chilean dressmaker and her son. Finding Brooklyn very expensive, Jake’s parents raise the rent on the shop, and ignite a feud between the two families—including the two boys.
3 and 1/2 pieces of ordinary events artfully presented toast
Hunt For the Wilderpeople (PG-13)
Starring: Julian Dennison, Sam Neil, Rhys Darby
Directed By: Taika Waititi
Sam Neil plays a curmudgeon New Zealand bushman saddled with raising a foster boy in writer/director Taika Waititi’s Hunt For the Wilderpeople. When circumstance dictates the boy must move on to another family, the old man and the boy run away to the relative safety of the wilderness. Problem is, the pair are quickly branded “outlaws,” and a massive manhunt begins.
3 and 1/2 pieces of an intergenerational friendship flavored with humor toast
The Light Between Two Oceans (PG-13)
Starring: Rachel Weisz, Michael Fassbende, Alicia Vikander
Director: Derek Cianfrance
Based on M. L. Stedman’s novel, The Light Between Oceans, a childless lighthouse keeper and his wife rescue a baby girl from an abandoned rowboat. Arguing that the child is a “gift from God,” the woman convinces her husband not to report the discovery, and instead, raise her as their own child. Two years later, the couple return to the mainland and discover that their action (or in-action) has devastated other people’s lives.
3 pieces of tear-streaked romance novel toast
Morgan (R)
Starring: Kate Mara, Anya Taylor-Joy, Rose Leslie, Paul Giamatti, Toby Jones, Jennifer Jason Leigh
Director: Luke Scott
A precocious artificial person evolving much faster than anticipated has a “tantrum,” and seriously attacks one of the scientists. The company’s corporate consultant (Kate Mara) is tasked with deciding whether Morgan will live or die and the movie stops being original and devolves into schlock sci-fi.
2 pieces of starts well, ends unimaginatively toast