By Kevin Song
New York City, NY
Based on the real-life experience of actor and comedian Kumail Nanjiani, ‘The Big Sick’ tells the story of Kumail’s struggles living as a comedian and part-time Uber driver in Chicago. Kumail meets a girl named Emily at one of his shows, and the two embark on a turbulent relationship.
By Kiana Hunter
Chicago, IL
Based on the clash of traditional and modern Pakistani culture in American society, ‘The Big Sick,’ directed by Michael Showalter, touches on the themes of love, tradition, and stereotypes. The movie begins with the protagonist, Kumail Nanjiani, and his love interest, Emily, meeting at his stand-up comedy show. The pair starts dating, but Kumail’s family, strongly rooted in Pakistani cultural traditions, pressures him to marry a Pakistani woman.
By Aleksandra Wicko
Chicago, IL
Drifting away from traditional Hollywood romance, ‘The Big Sick’ takes a refreshing and hilarious approach to a conventional form and does justice to complicated real-life relationships. Based on the true story of Kumail Nanjiani and his wife Emily V. Gordon, the issue of interracial relationships provides a compelling narrative that includes a big secret and a medically-induced coma.
By Xuan Truong
Springfield, MA
Woody Allen opens the curtain once again to unveil his latest work, “Café Society.” He takes us back into a world filled with jazz, expensive wines, and wealthy socialites set against the backdrop of the raging ‘30s.
“Café Society” is the product of Allen’s finest cinematography, with a blend of vibrant colors and brilliant composition that create a dazzling mask. But behind the mask lies something much darker. Continue reading
By Angel Santana
Pennsauken, NJ
Woody Allen’s new film, “Café Society,” features some of the most flawless actors in Hollywood today: Jesse Eisenberg, Kristen Stewart and Steve Carell. Allen is a highly respected director and is one of the most experienced directors alive. While the film has a lot of potential, it falls short.
Taking place in the 1930s, Eisenberg plays an awkward, ambitious young man named Bobby Dorfman who leaves his bickering parents, gangster brother and loving sister in New York to pursue an acting career in Los Angeles. His uncle, Phil, played by Carell, is a major talent agent who hires Bobby to do odd jobs. Bobby meets Phil’s secretary, Vonnie, played by Kristen Stewart, and falls in love with her. However, Vonnie has a boyfriend. Continue reading
By Katie Okumu
Berea, KY
In the twilight of Woody Allen’s career, he has created a substantial array of movies that have struggled to match the originality and depth of his earlier works.
In “Café Society,” his most recent endeavor at storytelling, Allen tells a familiar narrative through another awkwardly bumbling lead actor in a different period (1930s America).
Jesse Eisenberg plays Bobby, a down on his luck, Jewish, New York-native who moves to Hollywood in order to work for his celebrity agent Uncle Phil (Steve Carell). Continue reading
By Kay-Ann Henry
Miami Gardens, FL
Just in: Meryl Streep is an unbelievable actress. OK, that isn’t anything new. After all, she has been nominated for 19 Academy Awards. She is the solute, and her roles are solvents; she always blends together outstanding solutions. Her performance in “Florence Foster Jenkins” is no different.
Streep plays the title character, a wealthy American socialite who seems to have everything —except the one thing she really wants. Set in 1944, the movie tells the true story of a woman whose love for music drives her to a memorable —and completely awful—concert in Carnegie Hall. Streep’s performance is both hilarious and poignant. She successfully portrays someone who is grounded enough to function in society, but detached enough that she can’t recognize her lack of musical ability. Continue reading
By Meherina Khan
Katy, TX
“Florence Foster Jenkins” is a biographical comedy that follows the eponymous New York socialite and philanthropist, played by Meryl Streep, as she strives to establish herself as a passionate—though not very talented—opera singer. Although enthusiastic, every yelp and moan was so awful; it was hard to suppress the tears and winces that came along with hearing such an unpleasant voice.
As a rich patron of the arts, it wasn’t hard for Jenkins to buy out Carnegie Hall and live out her deeply vested dream to perform. Her concert became legendary—more for her ability to be tone deaf rather than her skill to carry a botched tune. Continue reading
By Katherine Powell
Chicago, Ill.
In Bill Condon’s Mr. Holmes, Ian McKellen plays Sherlock Holmes, the famous fictitious detective. Holmes has retired to the countryside, to tend to bees and try to remember his last case, which led him to retire from his detective work. Holmes knows that the popular novel written by Watson has incorrectly made him the hero, but he has lost the threads of his memory. He lives in his home with a housekeeper, the widowed Mrs. Munro (Laura Linney) and her son Roger. Holmes is his typical gruff self, untangling the facts and investigating his own memory, while he grapples with his failing mind and feelings of loneliness.
One theme of the film is how much people need other people. Holmes spends his time trying to reconstruct the facts of his final investigation. He discovers that his fundamental mistake was not offering comfort to the woman, just cold facts. He realizes that logic is not the only thing that matters, and he becomes close to his housekeeper and her son, establishing a very sweet connection with the two. Continue reading
By Jasmin Lee
Oakland Gardens, N.Y.
When you hear the name Sherlock Holmes, an image of a lanky man wearing a deerstalker and smoking a pipe in the shadows of a dark alleyway comes to mind. Mr. Holmes, directed by Bill Condon and based on Mitch Cullin’s novel, “A Slight Trick of the Mind,” offers a very different Holmes.
The film features an elderly Holmes (Ian McKellen) residing in a Sussex village with a widowed housekeeper Mrs. Munro (Laura Linney) and her 14-year-old son Roger (Milo Parker). Set in 1947, the film centers on a tormented Holmes, who is haunted by fading memories of a 30-year-old case that caused him to go into retirement. Continue reading
The Princeton Summer Journal 