The California Times is committed to reviewing theatrical film releases during the
COVID-19 pandemic. Because moviegoing carries risks during this time, we remind readers to follow health and safety guidelines as
Billy Crystal is always a welcome presence on screen. In his last film, 2019’s “Standing Up, Falling Down,” he played a quirky dermatologist helping a comedian get out of a rut. In “Here Today,” which Crystal wrote and directed (his first feature in 20 years), the tables are turned; he stars as a comedy writer who learns to love life again thanks to an unlikely friendship. A takeoff on the Alan Zweibel short story “The Prize,” Crystal writes himself a honey of a role that he performs with his signature charm and wit. But he seems to have forgotten to write any of the other roles with the same depth, which is a darn shame.
By Marisa SarnoffMay 3rd, 2021, 12:47 pm
(Photo by Ilya S. Savenok/Getty Images for Tribeca Film Festival)
Kevin Merida, longtime newspaper veteran and ESPN senior vice president, has been named the new executive editor of the
Los Angeles Times, the newspaper announced Monday.
The announcement comes after a five-month search, following the departure of executive editor
Norman Pearlstine in December.
LA Times owners
Patrick and
Michele Soon-Shiong said in a statement. “Kevin possesses a clear understanding of the rigor necessary for independent journalism and how to translate that journalism to multiple platforms. He also shares our passion for the unique opportunity we have to build the
The California Times is committed to reviewing theatrical film releases during the
COVID-19 pandemic. Because moviegoing carries risks during this time, we remind readers to follow health and safety guidelines
as outlined by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and local health officials.
Improbably reassuring of laughter’s healing properties, “Limbo,” the resplendent second feature-length brainchild from writer-director Ben Sharrock, is an immensely funny and profound tragicomedy centered on a group of refugees stuck on a barren Scottish island awaiting decisions on their asylum requests.
Sporting a pink cast on his immobilized right hand, Omar (Amir El-Masry), a Syrian musician famous back home for playing the oud, a Middle Eastern stringed instrument, is a recent arrival. Calls made from a phone booth to his relocated parents in Istanbul reveal a schism with his older brother Nabil, who stayed back to fight for the homeland.
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The California Times is committed to reviewing theatrical film releases during the COVID-19 pandemic. Because moviegoing carries risks during this time, we remind readers to follow health and safety guidelines as outlined by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and local health officials.
In the 1997 franchise-killing flop “Mortal Kombat: Annihilation,” the thunder god Lord Raiden delivers an ominous warning: “What closes can also open again.” He’s talking about the portals that separate Earthrealm (good!) from Outworld (bad!), though in retrospect it’s tempting to interpret his words as a vaguely optimistic prophecy about the state of moviegoing circa 2021. For better or worse, many of the theaters that closed last year are opening again, and starting this Friday they will be playing (what else?) a brand-new “Mortal Kombat” movie a blood-slicked reminder that, in arcade fighter games and Hollywood blockbusters alike, no fatality is ever truly perm
The California Times is committed to reviewing theatrical film releases during the
COVID-19 pandemic. Because moviegoing carries risks during this time, we remind readers to follow health and safety guidelines as
The prodding inquiries “Have you ever stolen anything?” “Are you religious?” “What’s the worst thing you’ve ever done?” that open Nikole Beckwith’s modest, charming dramedy “Together Together” don’t spring from a painfully intrusive first date. Rather, as an open Anna (Patti Harrison) spills her proclivity for thieving pens and her experience of putting her baby up for adoption while in high school to a perplexed Matt (Ed Helms), she’s interviewing to become his surrogate.