I really liked and admired the evocative family portrait Nebraska from Alexander Payne (Sideways, The Descendants). The funny, poignant and thought-provoking Nebraska opens this weekend, and features strong performances from Bruce Dern (a certain Oscar nod) and Will Forte and June Squibb.
Please don’t miss the French drama Blue Is the Warmest Color , which explores first love, capturing the arc of a young woman’s first serious romance with remarkable authenticity and a stunning performance by 19-year-old actress Adèle Exarchopoulos. It’s three hours long, justifiably rated NC-17 and currently tops my list of Best Movies of 2013 – So Far.
Other good choices include the flawless true story thriller Captain Phillips and the space thriller Gravity – an amazing achievement by filmmaker Alfonso Cuarón with what may be Sandra Bullock’s finest performance. 12 Years a Slave is an unsparingly realistic depiction of the horrors of American slavery.
Check out my VOD Roundup, where you can find my comments on over twenty current movies available on Video on Demand. There are some good ones, some bad ones and some really, really good ones (including How to Make Money Selling Drugs).
My DVD/Stream of the Week is the entirely fresh and riveting Parkland, which sharply dramatizes the events of November 22-25 in Dallas from the viewpoints of the secondary participants. Parkland is available on DVD from Netflix and Redbox and streaming from Amazon, iTunes, Vudu, YouTube, GooglePlay and XBOX Live.
On TV, you can’t do any better than John Ford’s mold-breaking Western The Searchers, with John Wayne playing a man filled with racism, obsessed with revenge and never ever giving up. Turner Classic Movies on November 30.