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Two Other Gatsbys, Two Better Nicks
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Brilliant Douglas 'Behind the Candelabra ...
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Surprises in 'Gatsby' (Review)
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Ozon's Cat-and-Mouse 'In the House'
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Mira Nair's 'Reluctant Fundamentalist'
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Watch Obama & Conan's Comedy at WHCD
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Affleck in Malick's 'To the Wonder'
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Ricky Gervais' Hilarious, Awful Music Video ...
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Danny Boyle's 'Trance'
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Ryan Gosling in "Place Beyond the Pines"
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Brandon Cronenberg's 'Antiviral'
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Black Comedy 'It's a Disaster'
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Brilliant Melissa McCarthy on SNL (Video ...
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'Room 237,' Kubrick & Malkovich
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Colbert Asks Franco: Are You A Fraud?
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Justin Timberlake's Latest SNL (Video)
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Watch Ricky Gervais in 'The Office Revisited' ...
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'Downton Abbey' Kills Off You-Know-Who
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'Downton' Does 'Breaking Bad' (Video)
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James Franco's Risk-Free 'Oz'
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'Downton Sixbey': Lady Hedith's Answer
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Smart Middle East Doc 'The Gatekeepers'
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Review: Ben Affleck's 'Argo'
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'Downton Abbey': They Killed Who?
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'Girls' Season 2: Lena vs. Hannah
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'Downton Abbey' Season 3 Review
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Bad Title,Good 'Silver Linings Playbook'
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Foxx,Washington On 'Django' & Race (Vide ...
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'Hobbit' Review (Not a Fan)
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Was 'Homeland' Finale Smart or Dumb?
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Hathaway and SNL do Homeland
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Keira Knightley's Chilly 'Anna K.'
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'Skyfall': An Older, Better-Written Bond
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Hugh Laurie,Catherine Keener on 'Oranges ...
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'The Master': Egotists and Cultists
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Jimmy Fallon Sings 'Romney & Bain'
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Fincher, Others in 'Side By Side' Extras
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Watch "Andrew Sarris: Critic in Focus"
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Amy Poehler on Sex, Music (Video)
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Fallon Does "Downton Sixbey, Part 2"
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Jimmy Fallon Goes To Downton Abbey
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Best Downtown Abbey Mashups and Parodies
Video Interviews
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Jamie Foxx, Kerry Washington on 'Django' and the N-Word -
Hugh Laurie and Catherine Keener -
Christoph Waltz on 'Django Unchained' -
Amy Poehler on Sex, Music, Comedy -
Whit Stillman On Damsels in DIstress -
Colin Firth On "Tinker, Tailor" -
Sundance Panel: The Power of Story -
Liam Neeson On Money and "The Grey" -
Gary Oldman On "Tinker, Tailor" -
Ralph Fiennes on Coriolanus -
Ed Burns and Caitlin FitzGerald: Newlyweds -
Jessica Chastain Talks About "Take Shelter" -
Ewan McGregor On "Beginners"
Video Clips
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SNL's Unaired, Bieber-Free Senate Sketch -
Tina Fey & Amy Poehler's Golden Globes Opener -
Anne Hathaway, SNL Do 'Homeland' -
Daniel Craig and SNL's Lost Bond Girls -
Christie, Bloomberg and Jersey Hand Gestures -
Jimmy Fallon Sings "Romney and Bain" -
Fallon, Ferrell Dance in Tight Pants -
Steve Carell Plugs Fake Books with Jon Stewart -
Jimmy Fallon Does Downton Abbey -
Edgy Obama At WH Correspondents Dinner -
Keanu Reeves' New Doc (Trailer) -
Daniel Radcliffe As Casey Anthony's Dog
Monthly Archives
Caryn James
Jimmy Fallon's 'Game of Thrones' Update: Watch 'Game of Desks'
- By Caryn James
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- May 25, 2013 1:24 AM
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- 2 Comments
I am not a Game of Thrones fan. For two seasons, I really
tried, but gave up when some unbearably awful line of dialogue sent me running.
In season 1, the line was "I am a Khaleesi of the Dothraki." As one
irate comment pointed out at the time, that's the equivalent of "I am the
Queen of England," which was pretty much my point - that's a terrible
line. My GOT aversion comes with some exceptions, though: Peter Dinklage, just
because he's fantastic as the wily Tyrion, and now Jimmy Fallon, whose parody
Game of Desks premiered last night. Guess
who announces herself as the Khaleesi?
Michael Douglas, Kitsch and Depth: Soderbergh's 'Behind the Candelabra'
- By Caryn James
- |
- May 21, 2013 12:45 PM
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- 1 Comment
Despite the earnest pr spin surrounding it, Behind the Candelabra invites us to
laugh at - not always with - the grinning, gaudy Vegas spectacle that is
Liberace. But Michael Douglas' performance is also deep, sympathetic and brilliant,
an act of impeccable mimicry that reveals the essence of a man defined by his
fame as surely as he is encased in his spangled tux. The wonder of Steven
Soderbergh's hugely entertaining film is that it beautifully walks the line
between hilarious kitsch and character study.
Seth and Stefon's Big SNL Wedding, and Iran's Reply to Argo (Video)
- By Caryn James
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- May 19, 2013 11:35 AM
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- 0 Comments
Stefon -- the guide to New York's hottest, most twisted
clubs - was never my favorite Bill Hader character, but he grew on me.
And since last night's SNL was Hader's last, it was inevitable that Stefon
would pop up on Weekend Update. But who could have guessed that, tired of his unrequited love
for Seth Meyers, Stefon would leave to marry another man, only to have Meyers run
after him like Dustin Hoffman in The Graduate? Take a look at Stefon's big wedding,
with Amy Poehler and Anderson Cooper.
Watch Ben Affleck and Bill Hader's SNL Promo
- By Caryn James
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- May 15, 2013 1:10 PM
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- 1 Comment
Before Ben Affleck became Mr. Big-Time-Oscar-Winning-Director
... oh, never mind, that is so not his persona even now. Here he is in a promo
for the season finale of SNL, proving he still has his comic timing. And here's
Bill Hader (who will not be returning to the show next season) asking Affleck
if he made up that country Iran in Argo.
Good and Bad Surprises in Baz Luhrmann's 'The Great Gatsby'
- By Caryn James
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- May 6, 2013 10:26 PM
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- 4 Comments
Novel? What novel? I went into Baz Luhrmann's 3-D, Jay Z-soundtracked
The Great Gatsby assuming that the kindest, smartest approach would be to forget
there was ever a book behind it. Surprisingly,
the film is more attached to F. Scott Fitzgerald than I expected, and that
turns out to be its downfall.
Two Other Gatsbys, Two Better Nicks
- By Caryn James
- |
- May 6, 2013 10:24 PM
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- 3 Comments
The Great Gatsby
is both irresistible to filmmakers and notoriously hard to adapt. All that
color and glamour comes crashing up against the eloquence of Fitzgerald's prose
and the ineffability of Gatsby's dreams. Baz Luhrmann's new version gives us a wondrous
performance by Leonardo DiCaprio as Gatsby and a dreadful, flat performance by
Tobey Maguire as the narrator, Nick Carraway. (You can find my review here.) But take
a look at two better Nicks and one good, maligned Gatsby:
Watch Comedy From Obama, O'Brien, Spielberg at the White House Correspondents Dinner
- By Caryn James
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- April 28, 2013 11:59 AM
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- 0 Comments
This year's White House Correspondents' Dinner gave us a few
insights about comedy:
Underrated At the Tribeca Film Festival : 'Almost Christmas'
- By Caryn James
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- April 28, 2013 11:02 AM
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- 0 Comments
The new film from Phil Morrison (the director of Junebug)
has not been embraced by most critics at the Tribeca Film Festival (actually, most of them hated it) but I so disagree. Almost Christmas is one of my favorites from this year's festival, a thoroughly fresh dark
comedy - more sly and absurd than laugh-out-loud - with Paul Giamatti and Paul Rudd as down-on-their-luck
Canadians who come to New York to sell Christmas trees for a month.
Tribeca Review: 'The Patience Stone' Is a Closing-Weekend Standout
- By Caryn James
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- April 26, 2013 9:15 AM
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- 0 Comments
As the Tribeca Film Festival heads into its final weekend, there's
still time to catch one of this year's best films: The Patience Stone, Atiq Rahimi's eloquent drama about an Afghan
woman in a war-torn village, keeping watch over her once-belligerent, now comatose
husband. The plot turns on a question that gets to the heart of the problem
facing oppressed women everywhere: left alone to care for herself and her two daughters,
how can a woman whose every move had formerly been controlled by her husband
possibly fend for herself?
'The Reluctant Fundamentalist': Mira Nair's Mirror of American-Pakistani Relations
- By Caryn James
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- April 22, 2013 2:25 PM
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- 0 Comments
In a Lahore cafe, the Pakistan-born, Princeton-educated hero
of Mira Nair's The Reluctant
Fundamentalist tells an American reporter about his reaction to the World
Trade Center attacks. Changez (Riz
Ahmed) was as horrified as anyone – but at first there was an instinctive
smile, simple "awe," as he puts it, at the audacity of "arrogance
brought low." The journalist, Bobby Lincoln, (Liev Schreiber) responds
with a glare of pure, restrained fury.
