By JAMES DAWSON Front Row Features Film Critic   The ingenious “Steve Jobs” updates the standard biopic operating system by stripping its subject’s life story down to backstage encounters at only three crucial events (with a few flashbacks): the 1984 launch of the Macintosh [...]

By ANGELA DAWSON Front Row Features Walt Disney Animation Studios’ “Moana” has found her voice following a worldwide search to cast the film’s title character. Native Hawaiian newcomer Auli’i Cravalho, 14, joins Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson in the big-screen adventure about a spirited and fearless t [...]

By ANGELA DAWSON Front Row Features HOLLYWOOD—Michael Shannon has played his share of characters who are a bit, if not completely, bonkers. Take, for example, his paranoid character in “Take Shelter” or the government Prohibition agent turned mob henchmen in “Boardwalk Empire.” He earned an Oscar [...]

By JAMES DAWSON Front Row Features Film Critic The cleverly imaginative and visually stunning “Pan” soars as a potential new fantasy-film franchise, easily overcoming a few flaws that threaten to drag down its maiden flight. Although ostensibly a prequel to “Peter Pan,” Ja [...]