Category: Movie of the Week

Movie of the Week: ‘Gentlemen Prefer Blondes’

Jeff Mitchell

“Gentlemen Prefer Blondes” (1953) – AHFW’s movie of the week travels back 67 years to celebrate Marilyn Monroe and Jane Russell’s breezy romp “Gentlemen Prefer Blondes”, a film that offers a madcap platform for the ladies to showcase their comedic talents and sex appeal.  The plot follows a straight-forward, simple folly, but the picture works on all levels, and Monroe and Russell are at their very best. Lorelei (Monroe) and Dorothy (Russell) work as a lounge/club act, and on stage, they exclaim – through song – that they are two…

Movie of the Week: ‘In the Bedroom’

Jeff Mitchell

“In the Bedroom” (2001) – AHFW’s Movie of the Week is Todd Field’s remarkable directorial debut “In the Bedroom” starring Sissy Spacek, Tom Wilkinson, Marisa Tomei, and Nick Stahl. Set in a New England small town, Matt and Ruth Fowler (Wilkinson, Spacek) live a happy life, and their son Frank (Stahl) is home for the summer after his college graduation.   Frank has big plans – which please his parents – but starts a relationship with an older woman Natalie (Tomei), and his future designs may lie with her, a single…

Movie of the Week: ‘Mustang’

Jeff Mitchell

AHFW’S Movie of the Week takes a trip halfway around the world.  Turkey is the setting for director/co-writer Denize Gamze Erguven’s heartbreaking, Oscar-nominated drama about the perilous fate of five sisters in “Mustang”. “Mustang” (2015) – “Time misspent in youth is sometimes all the freedom one ever has” – Anita Brookner. For five, giggling, likable sisters – raised by their grandmother and ranging in ages between (about) 9 and 16 – they misspend their time like any group of schoolgirls.  On one fateful day, Selma (Tugba Sungur), Sonay (Ilayda Akdagun),…