CHICAGO – Patrick McDonald of HollywoodChicago.com appears on “The Morning Mess” with Dan Baker on WBGR-FM (Monroe, Wisconsin) on March 21st, 2024, reviewing the new streaming series “Manhunt” – based on the bestseller by James L. Swanson – currently streaming on Apple TV+.
World War II
A Pivotal Debate in World War II Drama ‘Diplomacy’
Submitted by NickHC on November 14, 2014 - 8:39pm Rating: 3.5/5.0 |
CHICAGO – It’s late August in the year of 1944, and Paris is about to be destroyed by a vacating Nazi party. “Diplomacy” is a chamber film that imagines the crucial conversation between a Nazi general and a Swedish diplomat that is said to have saved Paris, a riveting story of personal actions influencing the course of world history.
Searing Performances Invigorate ‘Walking with the Enemy’
Submitted by PatrickMcD on April 26, 2014 - 12:19pmRating: 3.5/5.0 |
CHICAGO – In Movie Land, the World War II Holocaust drama has been more personal – and in many ways more horrific – in our modern era. From Steven Spielberg’s “Schindler’s List” to Roman Polanski’s “The Pianist,” the Jewish genocide of the Holocaust has been rendered more artfully and truthfully. The latest film to tell a different story, from a different angle, is director Mark Schmidt’s “Walking with the Enemy.”
Colin Firth, Nicole Kidman on Track in ‘The Railway Man’
Submitted by PatrickMcD on April 18, 2014 - 4:26pmRating: 3.5/5.0 |
CHICAGO – One of the hidden implications of World War II was the suffering of Post Traumatic Stress Syndrome (PTSD) from the millions of soldiers who survived the horrors of that war. The difficulties associated with PTSD are communicated with honor by Colin Firth in “The Railway Man”
‘No Place on Earth’ Puts Human Peril Underground
Submitted by PatrickMcD on April 20, 2013 - 8:11pmRating: 3.5/5.0 |
CHICAGO – The human face of the Holocaust – the Jewish genocide by Adolph Hitler and the Nazi Party – has been reflected through many incredible accounts of horror and survival. A new film focuses on another amazing story, set in a cave in the Ukraine, where five Jewish families hid underground from German soldiers in 1942. The survivors give their witness in “No Place on Earth.”
‘Bless Me, Ultima’ Commits Sin Against Cinema
Submitted by PatrickMcD on February 23, 2013 - 11:32am Rating: 2.0/5.0 |
CHICAGO – One of the major tenets of the “memoir” genre – the type of film in which a main character is looking back at their lives – is the unforgettable character that influences them forever. New Mexico during World War II is the setting for “Bless Me, Ultima.”
Meandering ‘The Master’ Serves Up Powerful After Effects
Submitted by PatrickMcD on September 20, 2012 - 5:20pm Rating: 4.0/5.0 |
CHICAGO – ‘The Master’ is the type of film that invites days of contemplation. It is a film about America, but only a certain type of American. It is a film about the need to belong, but in the end it separates all its characters away from each other. Lead actors Philip Seymour Hoffman and Joaquin Phoenix radicalize writer/director P.T. Anderson’s strange alchemy.
World War II-Era Tuskegee Airmen Fly in ‘Red Tails’
Submitted by PatrickMcD on January 20, 2012 - 3:50pm Rating: 3.0/5.0 |
CHICAGO – The courage of the Tuskegee Airmen cannot be denied. The all African American World War II fighter pilot squadron not only braved battle, but also the virulent prejudice of the 1940s. The new film “Red Tails” chronicles the circumstance of that squadron, with a sappy and overlong treatment.
World Conflict is a Boy’s Life For ‘Winter in Wartime’
Submitted by PatrickMcD on April 1, 2011 - 6:55pm Rating: 4.5/5.0 |
CHICAGO – When life collides with history, human beings are often both the perpetrators and the victims. In the excellent film “Winter in Wartime,” a boy grows up quickly when confronted with the realities of that history and life in the last days of World War II.
