dvd of the week Unlike 21 Jump Street, its sequel 22 Jump Street is, lucky for the gays, not a two-hour mockery of gay sex. The absurdist franchise about lame cops Jenko (Channing Tatum) and Schmidt (Jonah Hill) going undercover as much younger guys, this time in college, is based on the more earnest 1980s…
When I reviewed 21 Jump Street two years ago, I praised the broad comedy about cops going undercover in high school for being very funny. But I was unnerved by how much of the humor was firmly based in homophobia. Officers Schmidt (Jonah Hill) and Jenko (Channing Tatum) are such good friends that they had…
Actor Jonah Hill told Tonight Show host Jimmy Fallon that he lost his cool with a paparazzo and is heartbroken that he used a “disgusting” homophobic slur. Hill then went on to apologize for his comments concluding with, “If someone says something that hurts you or angers you, use me as an example of what…
Jonah Hill and Leonardo DiCaprio in The Wolf of Wall Street A couple weeks ago, a woman named Christina McDowell published a scathing essay in LA Weekly attacking The Wolf of Wall Street, its director Martin Scorsese and its star Leonardo DiCaprio. The movie, a three-hour orgiastic comedy about Wall Street con men, is based…
WASHINGTON – Just 50 days from the start of the Sochi Winter Olympics, the Human Rights Campaign (HRC), announces its first contribution to the Russia Freedom Fund (www.russiafreedomfund.org) in the amount of $100,000. The announcement is featured in a video holiday card to the Russian LGBT community, compiling support and solidarity for their cause across…
dvd of the week In this brilliantly funny satire, it’s Judgment Day, and among the few survivors are Seth Rogen, Jay Baruchel, James Franco, Craig Robinson, Jonah Hill and Danny McBride. They’re holed up in Franco’s mansion, trying to escape the gruesome demons loose from hell, and talking shit. Since all of the actors are…
There seems to be two ways to turn a TV series into a movie. Either you take the original show seriously and try to replicate the good stuff while making it grittier and widening the scope. This worked for The Untouchables and The Fugitive, while it was an abject failure for The Mod Squad and…
dvd of the week On my favorite movies list of 2011, Moneyball manages to make baseball statistics dramatic and funny. Bennett Miller’s crafty use of slow motion, muted colors and slyly gorgeous cinematography creates an epic grandeur for what is really a story of office politics. He and the screenwriters use American audiences’ sentimentality about…
