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Film and the Arts
Broadway Play Review—James Graham's New Play, "Punch"
- Details
- Parent Category: Film and the Arts
- Category: Reviews
- Published on Wednesday, 29 October 2025 17:37
- Written by Kevin Filipski
Punch
Written by James Graham
Directed by Adam Penford
Through November 2, 2025
Friedman Theatre, 261 West 47th Street, New York, NY
manhattantheatreclub.com/Livestream available
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| Will Harrison in James Graham’s play Punch (photo: Matthew Murphy) |
Based on the true story of Jacob Dunne—who spent 14 months in prison for manslaughter after punching a stranger in a fit of anger—James Graham’s Punch is the kind of visceral, emotionally satisfying play we need more of on Broadway.
In 2011, Jacob was a feisty 19-year-old living with his single Mum and younger brother Sam in a working-class Nottingham neighborhood. Hating school, Jacob spent time with his buddies, drinking away the afternoons. One day, after celebrating a pal’s birthday, Jacob was informed about an altercation; without thinking, he jumped into the fracas and coldcocked James, a man he didn’t know. Running away, Jacob didn’t realize that a single punch made James crumple to the ground, hit his head and never regain consciousness in the hospital, where his grieving, stunned parents, David and Joan, sadly watched him fade away.
After Jacob’s release from jail, his sympathetic probation officer Wendy is contacted by Nicola from the charity Remedi, whose goal is restorative justice, trying to give victims’ families some sense of closure. Jacob ends up corresponding and—in a tense but unforgettably realistic scene—with David and Joan, who try to understand why their beloved and only son had to die so meaninglessly.
Jacob’s story is a rich ore for any playwright, and Graham makes few missteps dramatizing this stirring story of redemption. Although the play’s arc is familiar, as Jacob narrates his long and winding journey (he becomes a new man after prison, gaining unlikely allies in James’ parents), Graham’s savvy writing and Adam Penford’s resourceful staging turn what could have been a sentimental tale into something generous and humane. The first-rate production features Robbie Butler’s illuminating lighting design, Anna Fleische’s versatile set and evocative costumes, Leanne Pinder’s precise movement and Alexandra Faye Braithwaite’s atmospheric music/sound design.
Will Harrison is a perfectly pitched Jacob, effortlessly doing the heavy lifting of making seamless transitions as the story toggles between the hotheaded teenager and the mature adult atoning for his sin. Members of the flawless supporting cast—all of whom play multiple characters marvelously—include by the redoubtable Victoria Clark, who’s heartbreaking as Joan and hilarious as Jacob’s Nan, and Sam Robards, whose conflicted David is beautifully complex. Punch is a play that pointedly provokes.
October '25 Digital Week III
- Details
- Parent Category: Film and the Arts
- Category: Reviews
- Published on Wednesday, 22 October 2025 20:43
- Written by Kevin Filipski
In-Theater Releases of the Week
Auction
(Menemsha Films/Film Forum)
A painting by Austrian artist Egon Schiele turns up in the house of a young man, and André, an enterprising dealer from a famed Paris auction house, discovers that it was taken from its rightful owner by the Nazis in 1939, and the owner’s heirs are making a claim to it.
Director Pascal Bonitzer’s accomplished drama unfolds like a slow-burning thriller, but it’s also a clear-eyed look at ethics and morality in a world that’s anything but black and white. Bonitzer and top actors like Alex Lutz (as André), the great Léa Drucker (as Bertina, his colleague and ex) and Louise Chevillotte (as his oddball intern) help make Auction smart and involving from the get-go.
(Neon/Film at Lincoln Center)
The latest from Iranian master Jafar Panahi—who has made ironical dramas about contemporary Iranian life for the past 30 years, since his debut, The White Balloon—is possibly his most incendiary yet, confronting defenders of the current authoritarian regime through their vicious actions against those in opposition.
Vahid, who was arrested years earlier by an unapologetic pawn of the regime who’s nicknamed Peg Leg, realizes his torturer is living an ordinary family life and decides to kidnap him—but then hesitates about what to do next. Suspenseful and tense sequences abound, including a few truly stunning one-shot moments that make the flamboyant visuals of One Battle After Another look like amateurish meandering. Panahi filmed this surreptitiously—and illegally, according to incensed government officials—but every frame is filled with unparalleled urgency and artistry.
The Mastermind
(Mubi/Film at Lincoln Center)
Kelly Reichardt’s latest stripped-down anti-comic drama is crammed with contrivances that show a filmmaker who’s run out of ideas. When James, a disaffected, unemployed father, decides to steal four Arthur Dove paintings from a Massachusetts art museum, he soon finds himself in trouble with his family, the mob and the law (duh). Although Jack O’Connor gives an appealing hangdog quality to James, a man who doesn’t quite know what his American dream but is desperate to try anything to achieve it, there’s not much else to recommend this shockingly sloppy movie. Rob Mazurek’s rhythmic score is more enervating than tense, while Alana Haim as Terri, James’ wife, is as inexpressive as she was in Paul Thomas Anderson’s worst movie, Licorice Pizza.
Though set in 1970, at the height of the Vietnam, evidence of the war is scant until there’s a climactic peace demonstration in which James gets his comeuppance; it’s one of the most leaden bits of dramatic irony I’ve seen in a long time but is the perfect ending for such a lazy film.
Deep Crimson
(Criterion)
Mexican master Arturo Ripstein’s take on The Honeymoon Killers is a fairly lurid, fairly sensational and fairly interesting crime melodrama—except that all those “fairly”s add up to a well-done missed opportunity. There are some very good, even memorable moments like each of the murder sequences, which are treated in a matter-of-fact fashion that’s all the more disturbing. And Ripstein’s vivid visual sense is made manifest by his subtly roving camera that moves among the criminals and their prey.
But a routine atmosphere soon settles in, and by the final scenes of the couple’s capture and execution, what started dynamically ends in lurching fits and starts. Even David Mansfield’s chamber score seems out of place. There’s an exceptional 4K transfer; extras are interviews with Ripstein and cowriter Paz Alicia Garciadiego along with a post-screening Q&A they gave.
Weapons
(Warner Bros)
In Zach Cregger’s convoluted thriller, new teacher Justine is the prime suspect when all of the young students in her classroom disappear one night, except for one—but there’s much more to the seemingly inscrutable happenings once she, Archer (father of one of the children) and policeman Paul (a married ex she’s still sleeping with) start snooping around.
Cregger cheats right from the start—shots of the kids running through the streets at night have an eerily similar look to the famous photo of a Vietnamese child burned by napalm, which I hope isn’t intentional—and he ends up telling a familiar tale of a witch’s spell that destroys all in its nonsensical path. The acting by Julia Garner (Julie), Josh Brolin (Archer), Alden Ehrenreich (Paul) and an unrecognizable Amy Madigan (the witchy villain) partially elevates Cregger’s derivative script and direction. The film looks impressive on UHD; extras are short on-set featurettes and interviews.
School in the Crosshairs
(Cult Epics)
Japanese auteur Nobuhiko Obayashi, whose unclassifiable but classic 1977 magnum opus House is his best-known film, made this even more surreal sci-fi parody-cum-homage in 1981. It follows the exploits of a high-school student (played by Hiroko Yakushimaru, a teen heartthrob at the time) who discovers she has telekinetic powers one day at school and soon realizes that a malevolent alien invasion is imminent.
Obayashi’s droll social commentary comes to the fore when several students’ minds begin to be controlled by extraterrestrials, stifling free speech; a welcome sense of playfulness in Obayashi’s directing and writing is on display, as it was in House. The restored film looks quite good on Blu; extras include a commentary and visual essay.
DVD Release of the Week
Niki
(Distrib Films US)
Charlotte Le Bon’s fiery performance as French-American artist Niki de Saint Phalle (1930-2002), who overcame incestuous abuse as a young girl from her father—which led to mental health issues for which things like shock therapy were deemed appropriate treatment—to find her voice in painting, sculptures and collages, centers this conventional but well-made portrait of the artist as a young woman.
Making her directorial debut, Céline Sallette imbues time-honored devices like split screens and title cards with remarkable freshness, but it’s all at the service of telling an honest account of a difficult story that ultimately shows how art can be a way to overcome trauma.
Bacewicz—String Quartet No. 4, Piano Quintet No. 1
(Evil Penguin)
It’s heartening that Grażyna Bacewicz (1909-69), the first 20th-century Polish female composer to earn deserved—if belated—recognition for her startlingly original scores, has in the past few had releases of several excellent discs of her music, even though they have primarily been recordings of her highly expressive orchestral works.
This disc features two of her most exhilarating chamber pieces, the Piano Quintet No. 1—which begins with one of the composer’s most haunting musical themes—and the String Quartet No. 4, which was composed in 1951, amazingly just a year before the quintet. The Kinski Quartet, with marvelous accompaniment from pianist Jâms Coleman in the quintet, gives these superlative pieces vigorous workouts alongside a beating heart.
October '25 Digital Week II
- Details
- Parent Category: Film and the Arts
- Category: Reviews
- Published on Wednesday, 15 October 2025 20:43
- Written by Kevin Filipski
4K/UHD Releases of the Week
F1—the Movie
(Warner Bros)
Brad Pitt’s laconic charm is on display throughout this overlong commercial for Formula 1 racing: for two and a half hours, director Joseph Kosinski takes us on a relentlessly formulaic journey through several races, each of which writer Ehren Kruger tries his damnedest to make singular rather than repetitive. Kosinski and Kruger fail, for the most part, while the off-track scenes of Pitt as retired daredevil driver Sonny (who comes out of retirement), Damson Idris as young hotshot driver Joshua, Javier Bardem as team owner Ruben (who talks Sonny into returning) and Kerry Condon as Kate, the brains of the outfit (who—of course—falls for Sonny against her better judgment) are pretty ordinary.
It’s shot and paced efficiently and slickly, and if you’re a fan of cars flying around a track at 200 miles an hour, then your—um—mileage may vary. The film has a sharply detailed 4K transfer; extras comprise several making-of featurettes.
(Mercury Studios)
Set to 27 Police and solo songs by Sting, this story of the global refugee crisis is told through the mesmerizing movement of Kate Prince’s dance company, ZooNation—and, as jukebox shows go, it’s closer to Twyla Tharp’s take on Billy Joel’s catalog, Movin’ Out, than to the Abba megahit, Mamma Mia.
Prince and dramaturg Lolita Chakrabarti have fashioned a narrative of sorts from which to hang Sting’s words and music, which have mostly been extensively rearranged and rerecorded. Whatever one thinks of how Prince and music supervisor and arranger Alex Lacamoire manipulate Sting’s tunes to fit the contrived narrative—sometimes a disservice to the songs, other times a disservice to the story—the dancing of Prince’s company, which specializes in effortlessly combining contemporary and hip-hop styles, is breathtaking. The UHD video and surround-sound audio are tremendous; also included is a Blu-ray of the performance.
A Nightmare on Elm Street—7-Film Collection
(Warner Bros)
Wes Craven’s 1983 horror entry has gained stature over the past four decades despite being simply a crudely effective horror film about a teenage girl’s nightmares getting intruded on by the now-legendary Freddy Krueger, who enters the real world and starts a killing spree.
No one expected six sequels and spinoffs over the next 11 years, but that is what we got—most are even more forgettable, but each has its moments of dream-like lunacy, whether it’s the cleverly bizarre murders or the sixth installment’s desperate use of 3-D for the finale (yes, 3-D glasses are included in this set). All seven films have an impressive hi-def look; the many extras include commentaries, interviews, featurettes, music videos and alternate endings.
Israel Palestine on Swedish TV 1958-1989
(Icarus Films/Film Forum)
From the director of 2011’s The Black Power Mixtape, Sweden’s Göran Hugo Olsson, comes another imposingly thorough archival collage that, if nothing else, becomes a valuable historical document of the Israel-Palestine conflict through the unique lens of Swedish journalists in the region.
Olsson has assembled footage, shown in this 3-1/2 hour film in mostly chronological order, from Sweden’s state television network SVT’s wide-ranging coverage of the always charged relationship between Israelis and Palestinians that display both the misunderstandings and missteps that have trailed that region and its people for so long. Whether Olsson agrees with what is being presented and how is not the focus; there is no editorializing (which some might perceive as a copout). Instead, it’s an absorbing chronicle of what viewers in Sweden saw on their TV sets over a period of three decades from a network whose stated mission was impartiality in news coverage. It’s a long way from “We report. You decide.”
Blu-ray Releases of the Week
The Bad Guys 2
(Universal)
This intermittently amusing sequel to the hit 2022 animated adventure again follows a squad of reformed crooks (Wolf, Shark, Piranha, Tarantula and Snake) who have further misadventures. Director Pierre Perifel hits on some colorful visual inventiveness that mirrors the first film while Yoni Brenner and Etan Cohen’s script has ricocheting one-liners that at times hit their intended targets.
What propels it all is the exuberant voice cast: Sam Rockwell, Marc Maron, Anthony Ramos, Craig Robinson and Awkwafina as the bad guys and Zazie Beetz, Danielle Brooks, Natasha Lyonne and Maria Bakalova as the bad girls. There’s a bright Blu-ray image; extras include a new short, Little Lies and Alibis; deleted scenes; making-of featurettes and interviews.
(Mercury Studios)
In 2010, Peter Gabriel released an album, Scratch My Back, his cover versions of favorite songs with orchestral accompaniment—on the ensuing tour (which I saw at Radio City Music Hall), Gabriel played those covers as well as his own songs performed with the New Blood Orchestra. This concert from that tour, filmed in Verona, Italy, at the venerable outdoor amphitheater Arena di Verona, comprises only Gabriel’s songs and is all the better for it.
Hearing classics “San Jacinto,” “Red Rain” and “Darkness” backed by the power of a full orchestra (led by conductor Ben Foster) is a rare privilege. The highlights are “Blood of Eden” and “Don’t Give Up,” duets with vocalist Ane Brun, who impressively takes the Sinead O’Connor and Kate Bush parts. The hi-def video looks fine, and the surround-sound audio is fantastic.
When Fall Is Coming
(Music Box Films)
Prolific French director François Ozon’s latest follows the travails of retired grandmother Michelle, who’s been banned from seeing her grandson Lucas after he has an accident while visiting her rural home—but when her daughter Valérie is suddenly gone from the picture, she must deal with that unexpected absence from their lives.
There’s a welcome matter-of-factness to Ozon’s storytelling, but it’s too one-note when a fateful twist upends everyone and everything. On the positive side, Ozon gets uncluttered performances from his cast, led by Hélène Vincent (Michelle), Ludivine Seignier (Valérie) and Josiane Balasko (Michelle’s friend and neighbor Marie-Claude).
Peanuts—Ultimate TV Specials Collection
(Warner Bros)
What better way to celebrate the immortal Charlie Brown and his pals and commemorate their creator Charles Schulz’s genius than with this comprehensive collection of 40 Peanuts television specials, from A Charlie Brown Christmas (1965)—still the greatest animated TV special of them all—to the most recent, Happiness Is a Warm Blanket, Charlie Brown (2011).
If you have other favorites, they’re probably here, like It’s the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown (1966) and A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving (1973); along with all 40 specials on five discs, there’s also a collectible 28-page booklet.
CD Release of the Week
Walton/Britten/Tippett—Works for Piano and Orchestra
(BIS)
Vibrant works for piano and orchestra by three prominent 20th-century British composers make up this luminous-sounding disc with the exceptional pianist Clare Hammond as soloist. First is William Walton’s Sinfonia Concertante, a sprightly 1927 work that Walton revised in 1943; Hammond beautifully performs the revision, which makes clear this is less a concerto than a symphonic work with a prominent piano part.
Benjamin Britten’s 1940 Diversions was originally written for piano left-hand for Paul Wittgenstein, who lost his right arm in World War I. Hammond and the BBC Symphony Orchestra led by George Bass get the tricky balance between the soloist and the orchestral players exactly right. Finally, there’s Michael Tippett’s 1953 concerto, one of the composer’s most exuberant works: again Hammond and the orchestra perform with passion, alternating between power and finesse throughout.
NYO-USA All-Stars Play Carnegie Hall
- Details
- Parent Category: Film and the Arts
- Category: Reviews
- Published on Thursday, 09 October 2025 14:37
- Written by Jack Angstreich
Photo by Chris Lee
At the superb Stern Auditorium on the night of Tuesday, October 7th, I had the great pleasure to attend Carnegie Hall’s terrific, opening night gala concert featuring the NYO-USA All-Stars—i.e., the Alumni of the National Youth Orchestra of the United States of America—under the admirable direction of Daniel Harding.
The event started brilliantly with a sterling realization of three selections from Leonard Bernstein’s marvelous Symphonic Dances from West Side Story from 1960, beginning with the intensely lyrical “Somewhere,” one of the most beautiful songs in the score. The ensuing “Scherzo” is an elegant interlude, while the set finished with the jazzy, exuberant, propulsive “Mambo,” which concludes forcefully.
The sexiest of contemporary virtuosi, Yujia Wang, then entered the stage to conduct and dazzlingly play Peter Ilyich Tchaikovsky’s fabulous Piano Concerto No. 1 in B-flat Minor, Op. 23, completed in 1875. The famous opening of the initial movement, marked Allegro non troppo e molto maestoso, is exhilarating, quickly becoming immoderately passionate; a lilting, Slavic melody then comes to the fore, ushering in a moodier, more reflective section, but the music then at length ascends to a climactic passage succeeded by more elaborate developments, before accelerating to an exciting close. The following, Andantino semplice movement begins with a lovely, subdued theme that leads to a livelier episode before ending softly. The spectacular, Allegro con fuoco finale is animated and dance-like, even vigorous, but with quintessentially Romantic moments that progress toward its triumphant conclusion.
The evening finished at its acme, with a masterly version of Igor Stravinsky’s stunning 1919 Suite from his ballet The Firebird. It opens with an ominous Introduction followed by the delightful if almost disorienting The Firebird and its Dance and the Variation of the Firebird. The impressionistic, enchanting Rondo of the Princesses precedes the arresting, sinister but mesmerizing Infernal Dance of King Kashchei. The subsequent Lullaby is glorious and unutterably beautiful while the Finale is majestic and exultant.
The artists deservedly received a standing ovation.
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