Quickies for October, 2013

Celeste and Jesse Forever (2012) ✭✭✭1/2

After a rocky start - you’ll be tempted to give up in the first ten minutes - this sunny romantic comedy settles into a pleasing rhythm. Rachida Jones carries much of the load here and she’s terrific. The script, which she co-authored, offers some sharp skewering of L.A.’s celebrity culture and the film’s supporting cast of Elijah Wood, Eric Christian Olsen and hilarious Will McCormick give the proceedings a lively bounce. Check out Rebecca Dayan as Veronica,; you’ll think she’s the doppelgänger of young Jennifer O’Neal. Celeste and Jesse Forever is funny, engaging and an infinitely better rom-com than Silver Linings Playbook

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Dick Tracy (1990) ✭✭✭✭ 1/2

Warren Beatty’s great, neglected masterpiece. Ok maybe not a masterpiece but a huge colorful ball of entertainment. Complete with superb make-up, art direction and Vittorio Storaro’s sublime cinematography, Dick Tracy captures the spirit of the original comics better than a dozen Iron Men or Dark Knights. Let’s not forget Madonna, at the height of her career and hotter than a pistol, and spacey Glenne Healey as long suffering Tess Trueheart. Al Pacino gets to be a bit much as head gangster Big Boy however he’s clearly having a great time so what the hell.

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Ginger and Rosa (2012) ✭✭✭

Saw this a few weeks ago remember very little about it. London in the 1960s and Christina Hendricks. Yep that’s about it. What more does one need?