Black & White

Pros: Brooke Shields gives the finest performance of her career.
Cons: Nobody else does, including the director.

There is a moment in Black and White that almost floored me. It comes early in the film as Rich Bower talks to his friend Dean about that one subject that - according to James Toback, anyway - obsesses every African-American in the country: White...

Pros: Riveting sequences, lots of energy.
Cons: Too many stories; didn't fully explore main theme.

When writing a book/essay/article/film, said my former teachers, be sure to catch your audience’s attention with a powerful opening line. Writer/director James Toback (“Two Girls and a Guy”, “The Pick-Up Artist) couldn’t have captured his audience’s...

Pros: Three well acted scenes. Robert Downey Jr.
Cons: Condescending at times, several scenes fall flat, tired plot told in convoluted fashion.

James Toback's latest film is a mess. It's rude, outrageous, condescending, insulting, and boasts three interesting scenes. It's also not worth your time.

The film opens on a pastoral setting. It's fall in Central Park. The place has never...

Pros: Brooke Shields' best work to date, if you call that a 'pro'
Cons: Exploration of race ends up barely scratching the surface

The most interesting facet of BLACK AND WHITE, James Toback's latest ensemble film about race in America, is the way it differs from other films about the same subject. While it manages to titillate erotically and find a decent comedic rhythm, the...

Pros: Great improvisation on the part of the actors
Cons: clunky plot devices

James Toback’s “Black and White” is meant to be an incendiary movie, but it’s really only just OK. This movie awkwardly juxtaposes moments of pure energy with a manifesto of old-fashioned ideas and soap-box chattering.

“Black and White”...

Pros: thought-provoking, bizarrely amusing
Cons: weak ending

This heavily improvised race-relations saga is one of those rarities in that I wouldn't call it a good movie per se, but I would suggest people see it.

At the center, some rich white kids appropriate hip-hop idioms and follow around some...

Pros: Thought provoking subject matter that is changing the face of America
Cons: Strained performances and jilted story lines

Judging from the controversial reception to previews of this movie at Harvard, one would walk in expecting this movie to be outrageous, disconcerting and edgy. Where is the controversy?? I found Black and White upbeat, honest, and refreshingly simple in...

Pros: Performances
Cons: A Bit Too Messy at Times

The first, and most striking, message of all that come out of James Toback's latest opus, Black and White, is that we are a posh, elitist white American society that strives to be black. Such is the case with a Charlie (Philips, half-sister of Mackenzie...

Pros: Some interesting scenes and performances.
Cons: A muddled focus; limited vision.

The trailers for James Toback's Black and White make it look like a run-of-the-mill 'hood drama, but Toback has a deeper concern in mind. As the title suggests, his film wants to explore the relations between blacks and whites, namely the...

Pros: May be enjoyed by Blacks or Whites
Cons: May offend Blacks or Whites

I've always hated rap...makes me wanna snap;
Don't wanna be a sap...tried to Dap that gap.
Director James Toback tossed it in my lap:
Checked out "Black and White" on my cinematic map.

Flick starts out like a big b*tch...

Pros: Engaging and fascinating.
Cons: Too clean cut when all is said and done.

Film critics dread these movies. Ensemble pieces. They don’t dread them because they’re often bad. They don’t dread them because they’re often mismanaged. They dread them because they have to type up the damn filmographies. When you have an average...

Pros: Performances: Power, Raekwon, Ben Stiller, Robert Downey Jr., Mike Tyson
Cons: Performances: Bijou Phillips, Claudia Schiffer

This is a movie I've been looking forward to seeing for quite a while now. I wish more filmmakers were as willing to take chances as James Toback.

1)Most of the film was improvised. There were quite a few actors in this movie with little or no...

Pros: Different, great cast
Cons: Loose ends, weak performances

You have to give Toback some credit for tackling such a controversial topic, and he makes quite a few good points, but his overall presentation is lacking.

Toback takes a large and quite talented cast and allows the action to move in such a...

Pros: Great ideas, bizarre cast
Cons: misused and mishandled

Sometimes you have a film that may work better on video, or better as
a stage play. Well, James Toback's "Black And White" may be the first
movie that would actually work better as a book. The script is acidic--
although...

Pros: James Toback, director.
Cons: James Toback, writer.

When I was in high school I had a teacher who, from the first day of class, took an intense dislike to me.

Why?

In time I came to find the source of this dislike was because of something called 'smarts'.

How's that? (I...