Articles by Diana Beechener

Article - Movie Reviews; by Diana Beechener - 1/19/12

The Iron Lady

Meryl Streep is all teeth, no bite, in this boring biopic

What do you do when you’re making a movie about a political figure whose politics you don’t agree with? Avoid the subject, cast Meryl Streep as Margaret Thatcher and give her an immense set of dentures. The formula worked. Streep and her dentures just took home a Golden Globe. The teeth are right. But the rest of the film is all wrong. The Iron Lady shows a feeble Thatcher pottering around her house. She’s still got some of her feisty...

Article - Movie Reviews; by Diana Beechener - 1/12/12

Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy

There’s more to espionage than car chases, explosions and bikinis

In the cinematic world of James Bond and Jason Bourne, spies are men with hard abs, steel fists and fast cars. Theirs is a world of high-octane excitement: car chases, shoot outs and loads of hand-to-hand combat. Usually there’s a pretty lady or two to dote upon them when the action slows. So when we see pudgy, gray-haired, bespectacled George Smiley (Gary Oldman: Harry Potter) meekly enter a room, we don’t think spy. That’s precisely what Smiley is hoping...

Article - Movie Reviews; by Diana Beechener - 1/5/12

The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo

How many dysfunctions can you cram into two hours?

To say that The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo is a dark film is like saying Ted Bundy was a bad date. Rape. Beatings. Sexual sadism. And that doesn’t even cover the murder mystery at the heart of the film. A close adaptation of author Stieg Larsson’s equally graphic and disturbing mystery novel, director David Fincher’s (The Social Network) Girl shows you the bowels of humanity in every one of its darkly beautiful frames. Fincher’s...

Article - Movie Reviews; by Diana Beechener - 12/29/11

The Artist

C’est magnifique

In 1927 a new fad was sweeping the film industry: Talking Pictures. You may have seen one or two if you’ve been to a movie in the past 84 years. With the advent of the new technology, an entire industry fell to the wayside. Silent film actors and actresses became the cassette tapes of their times, cast into obscurity seemingly overnight. In French film The Artist, director Michel Hazanavicius (OSS 117) chronicles the rise of talkies in a black-and-...

Article - Movie Reviews; by Diana Beechener - 12/22/11

Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows

An entertaining investigation heavier on brawn than brains

The master of deduction Sherlock Holmes (Robert Downey Jr.: Due Date) has been dealing with a lot of loss of late. His romance with Irene Adler (Rachel McAdams: Midnight in Paris) is untenable. He’s at a stalemate trying to foil the plans of arch nemesis Dr. Moriarty (Jared Harris: Mad Men). Worst of all, his best mate and sleuthing sidekick Dr. Watson (Jude Law: Hugo) is getting married. Holmes isn’t taking it well. In response to his...

Article - Movie Reviews; by Diana Beechener - 12/15/11

The Sitter

Stay home with the kids instead of seeing this waste of celluloid

The Sitter is the kind of movie reviewers hate: It’s so tedious, lazy and humorless that it’s nearly impossible to mock. Nearly. In the last of his pre-weight-loss movies, Jonah Hill (Moneyball) plays Noah, a college dropout content to live off his barely-getting-by mother. He’s in a fake relationship with Marisa (Ari Graynor: Ten Year), who’s so obsessed with her ex that she uses Noah like a pudgy sex toy. Noah volunteers to...

Article - Movie Reviews; by Diana Beechener - 12/8/11

Arthur Christmas

A Christmas tale for the iPod generation

‘Twas the night before Christmas and all through the house, not a creature was stirring as a spaceship arrived. Wait. Is that how the story goes? In Arthur Christmas, a charming if not brilliant update on the story of Santa Claus, St. Nick is driven more by a palm pilot than eight tiny reindeer. On the eve of his 70th trip around the world, Santa (Jim Broadbent: Harry Potter) is going thru the motions, letting his eldest son and...

Article - Creature Feature; by Diana Beechener - 12/8/11

This Week’s Creature Feature ... Give a Wild Gift...

Hang a gift on the National Zoo’s Enrichment Giving Tree

Grateful for the wild things that enrich your world? Choose a wild gift from the Animal Enrichment Wish List to hang on the Smithsonian National Zoo’s Enrichment Giving Tree. Speaking for the animals, zookeepers and researchers have asked for toenail clippers, bubble machines, natural-colored feather dusters and shower radios with CD players. Lest you worry that next year the lions will want iPads, understand that every item on the Zoo’s Wish...

Article - Movie Reviews; by Diana Beechener - 12/1/11

The Descendants

A father loses paradise but finds his family in this touching drama

Matt King (George Clooney: The Ides of March) is too busy for tragedy. The lawyer is the family trustee of the last untouched beach in Kauai, and his cousins are pressuring him to sell. But before King can make a final decision on which $100 million offer to take, his wife has a boating accident that lands her in an irreversible coma. Now, King must come to terms with that fact and two daughters he barely knows. The process is even harder than it sounds. ...

Article - Movie Reviews; by Diana Beechener - 12/1/11

The Muppets

It’s easy to like green in this light-hearted tale

Brothers Walter and Gary (Jason Segel: Bad Teacher) are extremely different. Gary is tall, Walter is short. Gary has a girlfriend, Walter is single. Gary is human, Walter is a Muppet. Just typical family stuff. In spite of these differences, the brothers are close and spend their nights watching reruns of their favorite show, The Muppets. Since Walter doesn’t have much of a life beyond hanging out with Gary, The Muppets become his obsession. Being a...