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Enter the Dragon
(1973)
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Hal Crowther
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It's not hokey. In this ballet of pain and mutilation, Lee is a matchless Nureyev. The others are just athletes -- he made karate a film art.
Posted Mar 20, 2023
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Come and See
(1985)
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Jeff Simon
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Come and See is as harrowing and horrifying a war film as I've ever seen. It may well be a masterpiece, in fact.
Posted Mar 14, 2023
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3.5/4
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Boys on the Side
(1995)
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Scott Thomas
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The three women on Boys on the Side start out caricature and then begin casting shadows.
Posted Mar 14, 2023
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3/4
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The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants
(2005)
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Elizabeth Barr
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The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants thinks before it speaks and therefore is endearing and entertaining in a way that's empathetic without being sentimental.
Posted Mar 14, 2023
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The Dark Angel
(1935)
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Rollin Palmer
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A war-time romance, dewy with sentiment and pathos.
Posted Mar 10, 2023
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Gentlemen Prefer Blondes
(1953)
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Ardis Smith
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Howard Hawks lost everything subtle and really humorous by dropping the period aspects.
Posted Mar 08, 2023
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One Sings, the Other Doesn't
(1977)
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Jeff Simon
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The film begins and ends with homilies, slogans and hackneyed dialectics of female struggles (the struggles are real, it's the dramatic dialectic that's hackneyed).
Posted Mar 07, 2023
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9 to 5
(1980)
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Jeff Simon
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Farce is the operating word here, and trivializing is the result.
Posted Mar 03, 2023
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Sayonara
(1957)
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Ardis Smith
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Brando comes equipped with one of the deepest Dixie accents ever served up without corn pone and turnip greens...
Posted Mar 02, 2023
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4/4
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Thelma & Louise
(1991)
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Jeff Simon
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The film is funny, jaunty, and gorgeous to look at. It also has a deeply serious undercurrent and an extraordinary ending in which desperation and exhilaration are somehow in eerie balance.
Posted Mar 01, 2023
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Flower Drum Song
(1961)
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Jeanette Eichel
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Flower Drum Song is well endowed with music, [and] beauty.
Posted Feb 28, 2023
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Godzilla
(1998)
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Jeff Simon
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The new American Godzilla is a major disappointment. It’s not quite the mega-hyped bust that the Seinfeld finale was, but it’s close.
Posted Feb 15, 2023
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Requiem for a Heavyweight
(1962)
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Jeanette Eichel
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The taut, concise characterizations that the stars so perceptively delineate grip one's innermost self and force the question, "Is the victory's success worth the trampled lives of the others?"
Posted Feb 10, 2023
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4.5/5
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The Truman Show
(1998)
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Jeff Simon
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It is brilliant art about the supremacy of life over art.
Posted Feb 03, 2023
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3/4
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Wild Things
(1998)
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Jeff Simon
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It's cheerful swill. If you're anything like me, don't tell me that some small part of you didn't have a lowdown good time.
Posted Feb 02, 2023
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Back to Bataan
(1945)
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Ethel Hoffman
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The picture's strength is its fast action.
Posted Feb 01, 2023
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Diabolique
(1955)
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Ardis Smith
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A rather startling victory of art -- or anyway fiendishly skillful craft -- over the language barrier.
Posted Jan 31, 2023
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Main Street
(1923)
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Buffalo News Staff
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Florence Vidor imparts a distinguished grace to the role of Carol.
Posted Jan 25, 2023
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3.5/4
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The Big Lebowski
(1998)
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Jeff Simon
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In American movies, the Coens are the reigning eccentric poets of the loser class. Who else could get away with quoting Theodore Herzl in a bowling alley?
Posted Jan 24, 2023
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13: The Musical
(2022)
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Jeff Simon
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“13: The Musical” may have arrived too late for maximum impact (“Mean Girls” and “The Prom” were better looks at teendom) but it does make junior high seem more innocent than anyone imagined.
Posted Jan 23, 2023
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Good Luck to You, Leo Grande
(2022)
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Jeff Simon
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A very likable sample of a periodic rarity, a first-rate film actress making a serious film about female sexuality with as much frankness and even nudity as the era will permit.
Posted Jan 23, 2023
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Hustle
(2022)
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Jeff Simon
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For those of us who miss the NBA's increasingly magnetic daily existence on the tube, Sandler's abject love of the sport and partnership with James is ready to stanch our regular deprivation – at least for a couple of hours.
Posted Jan 23, 2023
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The Fabelmans
(2022)
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Jeff Simon
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Fabelmans is admirable garden variety Spielberg – entertaining, manipulative, funny and endearing. And when Judd Hirsch and Michelle Williams are onscreen, delectably performed.
Posted Jan 23, 2023
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Tár
(2022)
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Jeff Simon
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What thrills me about Tar is that it's a completely uncompromising film. No discernible effort has been made to dumb anything down.
Posted Jan 20, 2023
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Frankenstein
(1931)
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Buffalo News Staff
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The last reel of the exciting film takes the breath away from the spectator.
Posted Jan 17, 2023
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3/4
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Just Another Girl on the I.R.T.
(1992)
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Carl Herko
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Johnson -- a 21-year-old dancer in her first film role -- more than holds her own as Chantel. But the real presence here belongs to Harris the director.
Posted Jan 10, 2023
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Eve's Bayou
(1997)
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Lauri Githens
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A long, unblinking stare into the abyss of adultery, abuse, incest, and heedless passion. But on a deeper level, it's a celebration of the full spectrum of womanhood...
Posted Jan 09, 2023
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The Lady Eve
(1941)
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Ardis Smith
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Possibly Preston Sturges is the U.S. Wodehouse of the screen. Certainly he has that master's tendencies to make the trivial amusing... That's how he seems at present, anyway, exhibiting his third smash hit, The Lady Eve.
Posted Dec 29, 2022
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Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs
(1937)
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Rollin Palmer
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This is certainly one of the greatest pictures made thus far.
Posted Dec 21, 2022
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Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs
(1937)
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Eileen Jones
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It’s the first, freshest, and arguably still the fairest one of all [Walt Disney's] features.
Posted Dec 19, 2022
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3.5/4
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Groundhog Day
(1993)
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Jeff Simon
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Sweetly slight and slightly sweet.
Posted Dec 07, 2022
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The Maltese Falcon
(1941)
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Ardis Smith
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The Maltese Falcon belongs with the year's superior movies of all classes. In the crime and mystery categories it makes its competitors look like the Little Peppers series.
Posted Nov 16, 2022
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Gentleman's Agreement
(1947)
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Buffalo News Staff
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It’s a long and talkative picture; in fact, it’s mostly talk, and you may agree with this reviewer that it’s a little too long. But you won’t be bored, we promise you.
Posted Nov 15, 2022
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King Kong
(1933)
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E.H. Gooding
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King Kong is that rare talkie phenomenon, a production that lives up to its tidal wave of advance ballyhoo.
Posted Nov 10, 2022
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Meet Me in St. Louis
(1944)
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Buffalo News Staff
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Its sparkle, innocence and sweet-natured fun give it a charm which will touch everyone. Seldom has a single highly-agreeable mood -- one of happiness and tenderness -- been so strongly evoked by a film.
Posted Nov 10, 2022
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Mr. Smith Goes to Washington
(1939)
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Ardis Smith
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[Stewart] is more fiery in this performance than one is accustomed to expect... With Mr. Capra's expertness human touches are injected into the play which bring laughs one after the other like machine-gun fire or stir emotions to the depths.
Posted Nov 09, 2022
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The Shop Around the Corner
(1940)
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Ardis Smith
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Little feats of salesmanship become exciting and funny under [Lubitsch's] touch; also the rages of the leather goods merchant and his pride of establishment, and the corps spirit that prevails in the Christmas rush.
Posted Nov 08, 2022
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Stalag 17
(1953)
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Ardis Smith
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[The film] Stalag 17 is superior to the play as written; liberation from a cramping stage set the dusting out of some especially embarrassing dirt arid the brisker pace in Billy Wilder's script and direction account for most of the improvements.
Posted Nov 05, 2022
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The President's Mystery
(1936)
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Victor Knox
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Whereas the original story was crammed with brilliant twists of plot and clever incident, the film is crammed with the most disingenuous and humdrum stuff imaginable.
Posted Oct 25, 2022
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The Thief of Bagdad
(1924)
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Gladys Hall (Junius)
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One doesn't have a professional mind when one sees The Thief of Bagdad. For one is a child again, believing in the thing one sees.
Posted Oct 22, 2022
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A Study in Scarlet
(1933)
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E.H. Gooding
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Reginald Owen has captured the spirit of Sherlock Holmes without resorting to the trick hat and curled pipe that used to characterize the famed sleuth as we remember him some 20 years ago on the stage
Posted Oct 22, 2022
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Shanghai Express
(1932)
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Rollin Palmer
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It is a somewhat reminiscent plot, but it is enhanced by skillful direction and excellent photography.
Posted Oct 20, 2022
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Daughter of Shanghai
(1937)
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Victor Knox
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Anna May Wong really gets a rood role in Daughter of Shanghai.
Posted Oct 18, 2022
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I Walked With a Zombie
(1943)
|
Ed Kowalewski
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As a pure shocker, I Walked with a Zombie has its moments. Weird lighting effects and the Calypso music and singing of Sir Lancelot heighten the eerie illusion.
Posted Sep 28, 2022
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The Bird With the Crystal Plumage
(1970)
|
Buffalo News Staff
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Sadistic but superb.
Posted Sep 26, 2022
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3/4
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Addams Family Values
(1993)
|
Jeff Simon
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Addams Family Values has its moments -- rather a lot of them, in fact. You knew that just from the title, which is a nice way of turning Charles Addams' family of ghouls, monsters and vampires loose on Dan Quayle.
Posted Sep 21, 2022
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Cobra Woman
(1944)
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Ethel Hoffman
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The fiery colors, movements of the exotically-dressed crowds and the sumptuous palace settings add up to an eyeful, but the adults will regard the far-fetched doings indulgently and wish they'd brought along the youngsters.
Posted Sep 21, 2022
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House on Haunted Hill
(1959)
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Jeanette Eichel
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It could be a carnival funhouse; it is an abode of ghouls and ghosts.
Posted Sep 20, 2022
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Rain Man
(1988)
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Jeff Simon
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Yes, Levinson's realization of the long-delayed film project is a road film, a buddy film, a long-lost brother film. It is also the best drama of the season and one of the best of the year.
Posted Aug 04, 2022
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The Life of Emile Zola
(1937)
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Buffalo News Staff
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Superbly acted by one of the screen’s greatest character actors, aided by a splendid cast of fellow players, The Life of Emile Zola... is one of the most important historical dramatic entertainments to come out of Hollywood in recent years.
Posted Aug 03, 2022
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