Bernard Boo's Movie Reviews
All movie reviews written by Bernard Boo
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Last Weekend
With its ethereal atmosphere and stunning vistas you can’t help but gawk at, it’s baffling that Lake Tahoe is so underrepresented in cinema. Co-directors Tom Dolby and Tom Williams’ debut feature Last Weekend gives the Northern California destination some much-deserved screen time, though the characters they...
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God Help the Girl
It’s a scary thing for a first-time director to take on a musical in his first at-bat, but Stuart Murdoch is a seasoned artist with experience in another art form. That art form happens to be music: Murdoch is the...
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The Trip to Italy
What an extraordinary, once-in-a-lifetime opportunity: Two actors are being paid to eat at the most lavish fine dining restaurants in Italy, tracing the Amalfi coast in a MINI Cooper and soaking up the gorgeous sun-drenched scenery. It’s a glorious thing. A wondrous...
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Life of Crime
A particularly muted Elmore Leonard adaptation, Daniel Schechter‘s Life of Crime has real value in its cast and their skillful performances, but the remaining elements of the film, while not disastrous, lack focus and flair, eliciting half-hearted shrugs and soft laughs. It’s like...
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The Expendables 3
Sylvester Stallone and his band of aging muscle-buddies probably had a blast making The Expendables 3, the latest by-product of Sly trying to help his pals out with a nice little payday in the twilight of their careers. Audiences get the wrong end...
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Palo Alto
Gia Coppola’s Palo Alto wades through the malaise of modern teen life as well as any movie has in years, reminding us of how dirty and distressing high school life can truly be. Based on a book of short stories by James...
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Guardians of the Galaxy
Most people–hell, most comic book readers–have little to no knowledge of the Guardians of the Galaxy, a team of misfit, cosmic Marvel superheroes introduced in print in 1969. James Gunn, the director of Marvel Studios’ film adaptation of the...
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Back Issues: The Hustler Magazine Story
First-time filmmaker Michael Lee Nirenberg interviews his father, Bill Nirenberg, in his new documentary, but fuzzy sentimentality and paternal adoration plays little to no part in their on-camera conversation. Michael’s father was, after all, a “pornographer”, as he so...
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Magic in the Moonlight
Woody Allen returns to his touristic tendencies in Magic in the Moonlight a film set in the gorgeous natural surroundings of the south of France circa 1928. This is a decidedly light and breezy outing for Mr. Allen, but one that has...
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Lucy
In a film like Lucy, Luc Besson’s new existential action flick starring Scarlett Johansson, the stakes are everything. High stakes, forged through effective storytelling, can imbue even the sleepiest action scene with an invaluable sense of urgency, excitement, and suspense. Lucy‘s fatal...