She’s a sultry starlet. He’s a neurotic nebbish. But really Scarlett Johansson and Woody Allen are just two peas in a pod, the actress tells USA Today: “I just adore Woody,” she says. “We have a lot in common. We’re New Yorkers, Jewish. We have a very easygoing relationship. “I’ve seen things like, ‘Are you…
The father of slain Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl is criticizing “A Mighty Heart,” the new movie about his son’s abduction, suggesting that it falls into the trap of “moral equivalence.” In an article for The New Republic Online, Judea Pearl writes: You can see traces of this logic in the film’s comparison of…
When it was released in December 2005, Steven Spielberg’s “Munich” — the story of the Israeli agents tasked with assassinating those responsible for the 1972 Munich Olympics massacre — was criticized in some corners of the Jewish world for what was seen as lily-livered progressivism or, worse, downright hostility to Israel. The New Republic’s Leon…
For one night, at least, MTV may as well have been the Jewish Television Network. Yesterday’s MTV Movie Awards had an unusually large number of young, hip celebrity Jews taking center-stage. The show was hosted by comedian-of-the-moment Sarah Silverman, who, in typical faux-innocent fashion, mercilessly roasted Paris Hilton (conveniently in attendance). Silverman noted — to…
As I watched the bonus outtakes on the DVD version of Sacha Baron Cohen’s box-office hit, “Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan,” I realized that while the Borat routine might get old in the temporal sense, it somehow never stops being funny. That’s why I was excited to read…
The Forward has earned a reputation for uncovering the Jewish ancestry of figures both real and fictional. Comics, in particular, have been a rewarding realm of inquiry: My friend and former colleague Max Gross outed The Thing, while executive editor Ami Eden discovered an uncanny Jewish X-Men connection. So it was only natural that we’d…
Great news. Variety recently reported that Marvel Studios and 20th Century Fox are moving forward with an “X-Men” spinoff — “Magneto,” the back story of the villain portrayed by Ian McKellen in the original trilogy. The film, according to Variety, will open with Magneto coming “to grips with his mutant ability to manipulate metal objects…
In the long-running comic book series “The Uncanny X-Men,” a string of genetic mutations gives birth to a sub-species of humans endowed with super powers. The mutants strike fear in political and military leaders, who worry that this new breed will supplant its genetic predecessors. This alternate reality forms the basis for two movies, “X-Men”…
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