Kenneth Turan
Kenneth Turan is the film critic for the Los Angeles Times and NPR's Morning Edition, as well as the director of the Los Angeles Times Book Prizes. He has been a staff writer for the Washington Post and TV Guide, and served as the Times' book review editor.
A graduate of Swarthmore College and Columbia University's Graduate School of Journalism, he is the co-author of Call Me Anna: The Autobiography of Patty Duke. He teaches film reviewing and non-fiction writing at USC and is on the board of directors of the National Yiddish Book Center. His most recent books are the University of California Press' Sundance to Sarajevo: Film Festivals and the World They Made and Never Coming To A Theater Near You, published by Public Affairs Press.
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Ken Turan reviews the documentary Citizenfour from filmmaker Laura Poitras about Edward Snowden and his decision to leak information about the National Security Agency's surveillance activities.
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The WWII drama Fury is about a U.S. sergeant and his five-man crew on a mission behind enemy lines. Kenneth Turan reviews the film, directed by David Ayer and starring Brad Pitt and Shia LaBeouf.
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Kill the Messenger is based on the true story of a reporter at the San Jose Mercury-News who uncovers the CIA's role in arming the Nicaraguan Contras, then becomes the target of a smear campaign.
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When Denzel Washington and director Anton Fuqua collaborated on 2001's Training Day, the film won Washington an Oscar and changed the trajectory of his career. They're together again in The Equalizer.
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The late author wrote close to 50 novels, and several of them, including Get Shorty and Out of Sight, were made into films. His 1978 book The Switch has been turned into a film called Life of Crime.
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Begin Again is the latest effort by John Carney. This film and his previous Once have so much in common that you can't help asking yourself, "Can lightning strike twice?"
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Ida is a Polish film about a young woman who was raised as an orphan in a convent. She's planning to take her vows as a nun when she discovers she's Jewish and her parents were killed by the Nazis.
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Transcendence is an ambitious and provocative film about the perils and pleasures of artificial intelligence that is intriguingly balanced between being a warning and a celebration.
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Los Angeles Times and Morning Edition film critic Ken Turan reviews "Divergent," a sci-fi adventure about a world in which people are divided into groups representing a particular virtue — bravery, for example. It is based on the young adult novels by Veronica Roth.
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The crisp and efficient thriller Non-Stop benefits from the intangibles that Liam Neeson brings to the role of a U.S. air marshal dealing with a nightmare scenario.