Kalongwewe14

Gentle and lilting, “Lunana: A Yak in the Classroom” moves at a hiker’s pace. That’s literally the case in the film’s first act, a pilgrimage through the Bhutanese highlands that sees human populations dwindle as the altitude climbs. But even after its protagonist, Ugyen (Sherab Dorji), reaches the far-flung village of the film’s title, where he’s been consigned to teach the local children, “Lunana” proceeds with a slow, steady flow that complements the modest charms of its familiar fish-out-of-water narrative. Only the second movie submitted for Oscar consideration by the small landlocked Asian nation of Bhutan (the first was Khyentse Norbu’s “The Cup” in 1999), “Lunana” emerged as a surprise contender for Best International Feature Film when Oscar nominations were announced earlier this week. Itself a story of underdog triumph more astounding than anything “Lunana” puts forth in its tranquil 110 minutes, this awards recognition shines a welcome spotlight on both Bhutan and its philos...

Gentle and lilting, “Lunana: A Yak in the Classroom” moves at a hiker’s pace.  That’s literally the case in the film’s first act, a pilgrimage through the Bhutanese highlands that sees human populations dwindle as the altitude climbs. But even after its protagonist, Ugyen (Sherab Dorji), reaches the far-flung village of the film’s title, where he’s been consigned to teach the local children, “Lunana” proceeds with a slow, steady flow that complements the modest charms of its familiar fish-out-of-water narrative. Only the second movie submitted for Oscar consideration by the small landlocked Asian nation of Bhutan (the first was Khyentse Norbu’s “The Cup” in 1999), “Lunana” emerged as a surprise contender for Best International Feature Film when Oscar nominations were announced earlier this week. Itself a story of underdog triumph more astounding than anything “Lunana” puts forth in its tranquil 110 minutes, this awards recognition shines a welcome spotlight on both Bhutan and its p...

  “Separate your price from your worth,” Hugh Hefner paternally warns Pamela Anderson (Lily James) nearly two-thirds of the way through Hulu’s new limited series “Pam & Tommy,” about the theft and distribution of Pamela’s honeymoon sex tape with her husband, Mötley Crüe drummer Tommy Lee (Sebastian Stan), whom she married after a whirlwind four-day romance. It’s the first real piece of advice anyone’s given her about the explosive career she’s about to have—first as Playboy Playmate in the late ‘80s, then a TV bombshell on “Baywatch”—and, ignoring the dubiousness of the source, speaks to the thematic territory showrunner Robert Siegel and EP Craig Gillespie want to cover. It’s a show about a very specific moment in history, where the ‘90s was set to change the world forever with the rise of celebrity gossip mags and the mass reach of the Internet. But it’s also more broadly about the public’s relationship with celebrity, and the entitlement the average person feels to accessing...

  When I got the e-mail asking me to review this movie, a song started going through my head, and that song was Pet Shop Boys’ “What Have I Done To Deserve This?” I don’t want to make too big a deal of this here—or belabor the obvious, for that matter—but to deal with a Woody Allen picture these days is a nettlesome task. Some say that there are no authors, only works. Others swear that there are no works, only authors. But given that Allen as a filmmaker has frequently been the star of his own pictures, and that he constructed over the years a comic persona that became practically archetypal, neither tack really gives the nettled observer much of an out. Still. Relative to the scandals attached to his name, some still willing to contend with the films have pointed out that, for instance, 2013’s “Blue Jasmine” and 2017’s “Wonder Wheel” could be interpreted as spiteful rejoinders to Allen’s ex-partner Mia Farrow. I found “Blue Jasmine” intermittently effective and “Wonder Wheel” abs...