The Starling needs a pro vs. con scoresheet for its uneven story. The pros come in the form of a really lovely cast who make the material as good as possible. The cons are that the story is overly sentimental and employs knock-you-over-the-head symbolism to tell the tale. It’s streaming on Netflix. There is a big spoiler ahead.
Together Together is about a couple who spend a few intense months together, but they aren’t together together. It’s a story of the slow growth of respect and friendship between two people who are connected out of necessity, not love. This film is available on Hulu.
Thousand Pieces of Gold, newly restored in 4K and re-released after 30 years, is a wild west romance about Chinese immigration. It was directed by Nancy Kelly adapted from a fact based novel by Ruthanne Lum McCunn. Anne Makepeace wrote the screenplay. Pretty dang good women-cred for 1990!
The Laundromat isn’t a narrative. It isn’t a documentary. It isn’t a Vaudeville act. But it comes close to all those in an eccentric effort to explain the vast trail of emptiness behind the revelations in the Panama Papers.
