The Hunger (1983)

“The Hunger” is so ’80s, I felt like popping over to MTV for a full night of music videos and the Moon Man. Drenched in equal parts German techno rock and blood, with sex on top, Tony Scott’s gothic thriller follows a love triangle between a vampire (Catherine Denevue), her undead boy toy (David Bowie), and a NYC doc (Susan Sarandon) who studies aging disorders, ironic as Denevue’s blood-sucker won’t age and Bowie’s poor sap is dying fast no matter how much young blood he drinks. (The couple tutors a neighbor girl on violin; let’s just say Mom and dad deserve a refund.) I won’t dive too much into plot or fates, but I can’t let go the bat-shit-crazy WTF studio-demanded epilogue that takes a stake and a blowtorch to every nuance and act of violence that came before it, all for the hope of a sequel. (Why!?!) It does not help that Scott, being Scott, overloads on smash edits, hellish strobe lights, and making everything so serious. A sex scene with Denevue and Sarandon should not be boring. Scott makes it boring. Hunger is overstuffed from the start. Often, being left hungry for more is better. Is it not? C+

Arbitrage (2012)

Richard Gere is never bolder/better than when he plays an amoral cockup with sins to hide and a clock to beat. He is that and more in “Arbitage,” a timely thriller with Gere as a billionaire hedge fund manager who in one week sees a longtime financial fraud shell game crumble and accidentally kills his mistress in a crash, all while dodging police and his suspecting wife (Susan Sarandon). This is a 1 percenter who has been thieving and lying so long, the light of truth gets him sweating. But he knows the rigged system. That’s the twist in this ethics quagmire: We see-saw between wanting this pig nailed and wanting him to escape unharmed. Writer/director Nicholas Jarecki also takes an open shot at the real “takers” in this land –- not the poor or African-Americans or Hispanics as Fox News preaches, but the rich white Wall Street elite who own the banks. The scene where Gere’s CEO cluelessly asks a young black man who he has drawn into his scheme, “What’s an Applebee’s?” (The man wants to open a franchise), exemplifies modern American values. Money is all. A-

Robot and Frank (2012)

My PR job allows me to work with humanoid robots, so I was ready for the sci-fi drama “Robot and Frank” big time. With sometimes clunky bodies, humanoid robots are still in developmental infancy and several decades will pass before ’bots hit, say, toaster status. But, Sundance wiz “R&F” matter-of-factly shows a future with automatons all about, in libraries, homes, and on the street. Frank Langella plays Frank, a 70-year-old ex-thief with prison and a broken family behind him. Frank is sliding into dementia when his son (James Marsden) buys him a mechanical housekeeper/mother hen robot. Frank balks and fumes until he learns that the ’bot can be taught … um … unlawful night activities. Frank’s back in the game, and the scores revitalize him, and that’s the sweet/powerful joke behind director Jake Schreier’s and writer Christopher D. Ford’s feature debut. Crime pays and robots rock. Langella nails the part -- no show-off old-man breakdowns, but pure frail human emotion. The script gives Frank a romantic interest (always lovely Susan Sarandon) and it’s great until fate (the pen) insists on a wild card that feels forced. B