Liz Licorish’s Film Reviews
- LizFlix Reviews: The Dark Night
I went to go see The Dark Knight with (what turned out to be) a very unnecessary attitude. Don’t get me wrong, I’ve been up for a good Batman movie for the last twenty years, and I have never been disappointed by the man behind the mask as portrayed on the big screen. However, for [...]
- LizFlix Reviews: The Happy Hooker: Portrait of a Sexual Revolutionary (world premiere reviewed at the Philadelphia Independent Film Festival)
I knew very little about the history making “Happy Hooker” before attending the 2008 Philadelphia Independent Film Festival. “Xaviera Hollander” wasn’t a household name in my family’s home, but to me its lush syllables suggest the kind of exoticism meaning “sex goddess” in any language. Xaviera Hollander: ‘The Happy Hooker’: Portrait of a Sexual Revolutionary [...]
- LizFlix Reviews: The English Surgeon (reviewed at Silverdocs)
I was very apprehensive about viewing Geoffrey Smith’s latest feature-length documentary film, The English Surgeon. I think it was the picture on the movie’s poster - the grave, concerned face of the film’s neurosurgeon subject - that set me up to be a cynic. At first sight, Dr. Henry Marsh seems to satisfy all [...]
- LizFlix Reviews: Bigger, Stronger, Faster*
Chris Bell grew up a middle child, stuck between two tough guy brothers bent on being the biggest, the strongest, and the fastest. All three siblings shared the dream of becoming body building celebrities, similar to cultural superheroes like Arnold Schwarzenegger and Hulk Hogan. But while two of the Bell boys turned to steroids to [...]
- LizFlix Reviews: Standard Operating Procedure
I was really excited to see Errol Morris’ latest documentary film, Standard Operating Procedure, an investigation into the controversial photos taken of the prisoners at Abu Ghraib. My excitement stemmed, in large part, from seeing Danny Elfman score a documentary film about war torture; of course, I was curious about the nature of and inspiration [...]
- LizFlix Reviews: Indiana Jones and The Kingdom of the Cystal Skull
I’m not an Indiana Jones girl. So I was not, in any way, excited about seeing the fourth installment of the Indiana Jones series - twenty years after the last one crusaded across the big screen. It was my hope, however, that this latest Jones movie would incite a new found passion for silly action [...]
- LizFlix Reviews: Roman De Gare
Roman De Gare is veteran French director Claude Lelouch’s forty-ninth movie; fittingly, this film is a masterfully constructed feast for the eyes and, for the most part, an intricate, engaging story. The plot is intended to weave together the accounts of three very unique souls: ultra powerful novelist, Judith Ralitzer (Fanny Ardant), who lives as [...]
- LizFlix Reviews: The Babysitters
I knew The Babysitters was going to be bad when I sat down to watch it on its opening night in a theater full of no more than twelve people. I knew that The Babysitters was going to be really bad when I happened to notice that the relatively small Canadian film about a babysitting [...]
- LizFlix Reviews: Iron Man
Sitting down to see Iron Man was immensely exciting to moviegoer me, even before the opening credits burst onto the screen. Prior to the main event, I was treated to an assortment of summer superhero movie previews: fruitful and furious and having my heart aflutter at an intensity level disproportionate to the short time [...]
- LizFlix Reviews: Du Levande (You, The Living) (reviewed at the Philadelphia Film Festival)
Du Levande (You, The Living) seems an incredible piece of work to me, partly because I understand it, and (mostly) because I don’t. Swedish director Roy Andersson takes us, the living, through the complete range of human emotions with his darkly comic, unabashedly funny, and almost unbearably depressing short, sketch-like stories surrounding characters who are [...]
