Movies starring Dan

The Golden Compass, the long awaited cinematic adaptation of Philip Pullman's well-respected novel, is an adequate but not inspired translation of the source material. Writer/director Chris Weitz (one of the American Pie guys) brings a style that i...

Last week, the American Film Institute released its list of the 100 best American films of all time. Not surprisingly, Gone with the Wind placed in the Top 10 (#4, in fact). However, although this epic romantic melodrama is undoubtedly one of...

There's certainly no shortage of rich threads woven into the tapestry of Good Bye, Lenin! Wolfgang Becker's movie (produced by Stefan Arndt, who has been involved in everything by Tom Tykwer, from Run Lola Run to Heaven) offers the touching story ...

A film like Good Luck Chuck makes one appreciate what Judd Apatow has accomplished with his films The 40-Year-Old Virgin and Knocked Up. All three pictures belong to the "raunchy romantic comedy" genre, but Apatow has achieved something impressive...

"Those who cannot learn from history are doomed to repeat it." - George Santayana It's astounding that a treatment of a factual incident from five decades ago could have such powerful resonance today. Lessons learned, it seems, are not taken t...

Like fine wine, some film age well. The passage of years or decades does little to limit their capacity to provoke tears, laughter, or some other feeling. Then there are the vinegar vintages – movies that may be highly regarded at the time o...

For those who think reviewing films is easy and fun, I offer Grandma's Boy as my rebuttal. That's 96 minutes (plus travel time) and $6.00 (matinee price) that I'll never get back, no matter what I write here. Legal theft. This is one of those mov...

When the invasion of Iraq transpired in 2003, assurances came down from on high that this act was necessary to remove the clear and present danger represented by Sadaam Hussein's weapons of mass destruction (this is when the acronym WMD entered the...

Auschwitz, 1944. One of the darkest times in one of the darkest places in recent human history. The images are stark and unforgettable: furnaces belching black smoke, lifeless corpses piled atop one another like firewood, and gray ash - the inci...

The Grocer's Son is a pleasant, low-key drama about the healing power of country life. While one could argue that is has been three decades since such a "back-to-nature" theme was in vogue, it makes for an effective background to the story of how ...