Entertainment reporter Sandro Monetti’s business take on this weekend’s new movie releases.
ALL THINGS MUST PASS – A cautionary business tale largely set on the Sunset Strip. Anyone with fond memories of the old Tower Records store on Sunset Boulevard will enjoy this documentary about the rise and fall of the music retail company, which used to have 200 stores in 30 countries. The film explains how Tower Records made $1 billion in 1999 but by 2006 had to file for bankruptcy.
BEASTS OF NO NATION – America’s four largest movie theater chains have refused to show this Netflix Inc.-funded film, starring Idris Elba, about child soldiers in Africa. The decision is part of exhibitors’ backlash against the rise of simultaneous release dates for video-on-demand and theatrical films. Might be easier to catch it on Netflix then.
TRUTH – Learn how CBS anchorman Dan Rather, played here by Robert Redford, lost his job in this newsroom drama based on Rather’s controversial 2004 report into George W. Bush’s alleged efforts to avoid serving in Vietnam. The film examines not only the crucial importance of fact checking but also the corporate value of playing nice with the White House.
BRIDGE OF SPIES – A patriotic American lawyer, played by Tom Hanks, is forced to defend a suspected Soviet spy at the height of the Cold War and fears his career and reputation will be harmed – until the case presents him with a chance for professional and personal advancement.
CRIMSON PEAK – An heiress who sets out to be a writer of ghost stories marries a penniless aristocrat, and the couple moves into a creepy old mansion. The writer thinks she’ll find plenty of inspiration for her dream career, but she’s got to survive the place first.
GOOSEBUMPS – A famous author of supernatural horror novels shuts himself away from the world in a small Delaware town and urges no one to enter his house. But when curious neighborhood kids ignore the warning, they find the monsters he created are not all fictional. Among the carnage, the writer is left to reflect on the difficulties of finding privacy as a public figure.
