Actress Mary Steenburgen (1953)

Nightmare Alley (2021) is a neo-noir psychological thriller film co-written and directed by Guillermo del Toro. Based on William Lindsay Gresham’s novel of the same name from 1946, it is the second adaptation following the 1947 version. In 1939, Stan Carlisle sets ablaze a rundown house after hiding a corpse under its floorboards. Later that night, while attending a carnival, he witnesses a disturbed individual consuming a live chicken as part of the geek show. Meeting Bruno, the strongman of the carnival, Stan is offered a temporary job for the evening. After being ...

The American biographical comedy-drama film, A Walk in the Woods (2015), directed by Ken Kwapis, follows author Bill Bryson’s return to the US after living in the UK for ten years. Now in his 60s and settled in New Hampshire, Bryson’s peaceful life is interrupted when a TV interview reports on his successful books and speculates about future writing plans. Despite this attention, Bryson has no intentions of writing more and instead focuses on attending a funeral with his wife Catherine. During their walk afterwards, he becomes inspired to hike the entire length of the nearby Appalachian Trail. While ...

The Proposal (2009) is an American romantic comedy film directed by Anne Fletcher and written by Peter Chiarelli. It follows the story of Margaret Tate, an abrasive Canadian editor-in-chief at a New York City book publishing company who finds out that her visa renewal has been denied due to violation of her term. In order to avoid deportation, she convinces her personal assistant Andrew Paxton to marry her so she can obtain a green card. She reminds Andrew that if she gets deported, it would mean losing years of his work as her assistant and hindering his dream of ...

Step Brothers (2008) is an American comedy film, directed by Adam McKay and produced by Jimmy Miller and Judd Apatow. The screenplay was co-written by Will Ferrell and Adam McKay. The movie follows the story of Brennan Huff, a 39-year-old living with his divorced mother Nancy, and Dale Doback, a 40-year-old residing with his widowed father Robert. When Nancy and Robert get married, the two step brothers are forced to live ...

Oliver Stone’s American epic historical drama film, Nixon (1995), follows the events of the Watergate scandal. In 1972, members of the White House Plumbers break into The Watergate and are arrested. A year and a half later, Richard Nixon’s Chief of Staff, Alexander Haig, provides Nixon with audio tapes regarding the scandal. As they discuss the chaos that ensued from Watergate and the passing of J. Edgar Hoover, Nixon expresses his anger towards John Dean, James McCord, and others involved in the scandal. He even questions why he has not been given a pistol to end his own life like an honorable soldier. Most ...

The American legal drama film, Philadelphia (1993), was written by Ron Nyswaner and directed by Jonathan Demme. Andrew Beckett, a senior associate at the largest corporate law firm in the city, keeps his homosexuality and status as an AIDS patient hidden from his colleagues. Despite attributing a lesion on his forehead to a racquetball injury, it is actually Kaposi’s sarcoma, a defining condition of AIDS. Beckett takes several days off work to try and conceal the lesions and manages to finish the paperwork for an assigned case. He then instructs his assistants to ...

What’s Eating Gilbert Grape (1993), a American coming-of-age drama film directed by Lasse Hallström, follows the story of Gilbert Grape in the small town of Endora, Iowa. He is busy taking care of his autistic younger brother, Arnie, who is turning 18. As the town prepares for the annual Airstreamers’ Club gathering at a nearby recreational area, Gilbert’s days are filled with watching out for tourists’ trailers passing through. Since his father’s suicide seventeen years ago, Gilbert’s mother Bonnie has been consumed by her couch and TV and excessive eating. With her severe obesity ...

Parenthood (1989) is a hilarious and touching family dramedy, helmed by director Ron Howard who collaborated with screenwriters Lowell Ganz and Babaloo Mandel on the story. Gil Buckman, a salesman from St. Louis, is struggling to juggle his job and his family. He faces a tough situation when he discovers that his oldest son Kevin needs therapy for emotional problems, and that his younger children Taylor and Justin also have their own issues. As he begins to blame himself and question his parenting abilities, Gil’s ...

A Midsummer Night’s Sex Comedy (1982) is an American science fiction film written and directed by Woody Allen. Set during the transition from the 19th to 20th century, the movie follows Andrew and Adrian, a couple who spend every summer at their cottage in the New York woods. While Andrew is a Wall Street investment advisor with a knack for inventing novelty items, Adrian has been struggling with a mental block that has caused them to go six months without intimacy. Seeking some excitement, they invite two couples to stay with them for a weekend. Among them is Andrew’s close friend Maxwell, a promiscuous ...

Time After Time (1979) is an American sci-fi movie written and directed by Nicholas Meyer. Set in 1893 London, it follows H.G. Wells as he showcases his time machine to skeptical guests at a dinner party. He explains its inner workings, including a ‘non-return key’ that locks the traveler’s destination and a ‘vaporizing equalizer’ that maintains equilibrium between the traveler and the machine. Suddenly, police constables interrupt the event, searching for notorious serial killer Jack the Ripper. Upon finding blood-stained gloves belonging to ...