Category: Movies at Home

Movie of the Week: ‘Election’

Jeff Mitchell

Happy Birthday, Alexander Payne!   This uber-talented writer/director turns 60 on Feb. 10, so let’s celebrate the man’s birthday by looking back at one of his very best films:  the sarcastic, cynical, and flat out hilarious dark comedy “Election”. “Election” (1999) – Pick Flick!  Tracy Flick (Reese Witherspoon), a resolute overachiever, relentlessly pushes to be picked/elected as the student government president, but history/civics/current events teacher Mr. McAllister (Matthew Broderick) tries to obstruct her seemingly-destined political culmination. Writer/director Alexander Payne’s wild, stressful ride first appears as a straight-forward, light comedy, but he…

Wilson and Hayek’s manic journey is anything but ‘Bliss’

Jeff Mitchell

“Bliss” – “Ignorance is bliss.” – Cypher (Joe Pantoliano), “The Matrix” (1999) “Most people say, ‘Ignorance is bliss.’” – Isabel Clemens (Salma Hayek), “Bliss” (2021) Greg Whittle (Owen Wilson) daydreams about a different life, and why not?  He works at Technical Difficulties, a call center for customers who have….well, you know, and the office and everyone else are painted in dank, gray hues.  Greg’s workplace may not be as cheerless as Joe’s (Tom Hanks) in “Joe versus the Volcano” (1990), a factory of mindless misery, but passions throughout the cubicles…

Movie of the Week: ‘Transit’

Jeff Mitchell

AHFW’s Movie of the Week:  Writer/director Christian Petzold’s movie is a surreal puzzler that begins two moves ahead of us, and then we play catch-up for most of the 101-minute runtime.  Georg (Franz Rogowski) is on the run.  He’s a German living in Paris, but he needs to quickly flee the city and country.  He’s close to his escape while hiding in Marseille and waiting for his getaway-ship to arrive.  As Georg lingers in this seaside city, one might wonder why the events occur during World War II, when everything…