October 3, 2003
I haven't absorbed the movie Requiem for a Dream in enough detail to give a thorough review, but I can give some impressions of it from two viewings. The primary feeling I got from the movie is hopelessness. There is no redemption in RFAD. From the first moments of the film, you know that the lives of its characters are sad and wretched, and the strong impression that they won't be going anywhere but down is quickly validated. This is a terrific movie nonetheless, and I think if you can handle the subject material and some graphic scenes of violence and sex (especially towards the end), you can't help but carry this movie with you. Both Jared Leto and Jennifer Connelly do great work, but Ellen Burstyn really walks off with this movie. Maybe it's because hers is the most sympathetic character and her destruction is so unbearably sad, but...
October 4, 2003
I don't know who the hell Alex Kingston is, but she gets a royal Fisking over at Give War A Chance. Kingston is apparently one of those spoiled Hollywood brats who think that the First Amendment provides freedom of criticism, or in other words, free speech for me but not for thee. What a joke. I'm glad Emily had the time for this. Nice job....
October 15, 2003
This demonstrates a problem with blogging -- when a source turns out to be incorrect, you wind up having to apologize to people you'd rather not. If you scroll to the bottom of Kevin McCullough's partial retraction, you'll see that Ed Asner was not expressing admiration for Stalin and was in fact quite open about putting him on the same plane as Hitler: "Well, you know something, they've played Hitler, nobody has ever really touched Stalin, it just occurred to me. It's not because I am a liberal or anything like that. Stalin is one big damn mystery, I wonder why nobody has tried it? Many people, you know, speak of the fact that he killed more people than Hitler – why does nobody touch him? It's strange. So, and he was about my size, my height – with a wig I probably could do it." In fact, in his...
November 16, 2003
What an odd film; it plays like a twisted version of Rock Star without the third act. If it weren't a true story, you'd almost suspect it was written by Focus on the Family as an R-rated Afternoon Special-sort of cautionary tale. Don't peek at nudie magazines because this could happen to you! Greg Kinnear plays Bob Crane, the star of "Hogan's Heroes" whose TV success haunted him until his murder in Phoenix in the mid-70s. Kinnear is excellent, as is Willem Dafoe as John Carpenter, the man whose sycophantic friendship allowed Crane to give free reign to the worst of his sexual demons by supplying him with the video equipment and the girls to keep a constant party rolling. Where most movies of this type use drugs or alcohol as the addiction, Auto Focus uses sex and pornography. The entire movie centers on the sick relationship between Crane and...
December 13, 2003
Folks, we are at T-minus 83 hours and counting until the official release of Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King, the final installment in the trilogy directed by Peter Jackson and already considered by many to be the finest epic ever filmed. In honor of such an achievement, I am planning on sacrificing an entire day off at work on the 17th so that I can get in early and see it on the first day of release. Yes, I am willing to eat up a personal day (which I would otherwise lose in exactly two weeks from that date anyway) just for the ability to get in ahead of 95% of the general public -- and also to avoid the crowds of children that may be at the later shows. So far as I know, school is still in on the 17th. If any of my...
December 14, 2003
Today's capture reminded me of a scene from Tolkien, although it's not the Lord of the Rings, it's from The Silmarillion. I suppose it may be a bit silly to use this as a reference to Saddam Hussein, but it sounds oddly familiar to his capture. This passage comes from the chapter titled Of The Voyage of Earendil and describes the capture of Morgoth, who was Sauron's leader during the First Age of Middle Earth: ... and all of the pits of Morgoth were broken and unroofed, and the might of the Valar descended into the deeps of the earth. There Morgoth stood at last at bay, and yet unvaliant. He fled into the deepest of his mines, and sued for peace and pardon; but his feet were hewn from under him, and he was hurled upon his face. Then he was bound with the chain Angainor which he had...
December 15, 2003
As we continue to count down to the wide release of The Lord of the Rings: Return of the King on Wednesday, the film has been selected for a prestigious award more commonly given to indies: Normally a champion of arty, independent fare, the New York Film Critics Circle on Monday chose "The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King" as the top film of 2003. The three-hour-plus epic, which is the final part of the "Lord of the Rings" trilogy based on J.R.R. Tolkien's fantasy novels, is a sweeping spectacle of computer-generated imagery — and it couldn't be more different from the rest of the films the group honored. Ever since the release of the first installment, The Fellowship of the Ring, speculation has abounded that Peter Jackson and his trilogy would get no serious Oscar consideration until all of the films were released and could be...
December 16, 2003
On the final evening of the countdown to the release of The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King, I looked around the Internet for a good tie-in to wind it all up. I found out that the producers of the film are into scientific research, specifically regarding bladder capacity: For would-be Hobbits, Elves and wizards, it was a can't-miss opportunity. Die-hard "Lord of the Rings" fans enjoyed "Trilogy Tuesday," a back-to-back-to-back marathon of all three films, including the first public screenings of the third and final movie, "The Return of the King." ... Ordinary moviegoers, though, may feel daunted by the New Line Cinema trilogy, directed by Peter Jackson and starring Elijah Wood, Viggo Mortensen, Ian McKellen and Sean Astin. It began with the "extended edition" of "The Fellowship of the Ring" from noon to 3:30 p.m. "The Two Towers," also in extended form, was to follow...
December 17, 2003
Spacekickers has a list of 20 things you can do to amuse yourself and embarrass your friends when you see The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King today when it opens. Go read the whole thing, but these are the two that made me laugh my tucchus off: 15. In TTT when the Ents decide to march to war, stand up and shout "RUN FOREST, RUN!" 20. Come to the premiere dressed as Frankenfurter and wander around looking terribly confused. See you at the early show! (via Hugh Hewitt)...
For those who have not read the books, this review may contain spoilers; read at your caution. After taking the day off from work, and from blogging for the most part, I went to the first showing (in daylight hours) of The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King, Peter Jackson's final installment of the trilogy. And all I can say is ... Brilliant. Brilliant. And brilliant. Jackson moves at three speeds interchangeably throughout the movie: slow and pensive, normal and tense, and breackneck action. Tolkien's books are full of action -- enormous battles, hand-to-hand combat, desperate rides at great speed ... and you could probably make a two-hour movie of the last book if you just concentrated on that, and never would have to worry about pacing at all. But LotR is more than just a book about war; it's about philosophy, about fear, about love, about...
January 25, 2004
Hugh Hewitt posts a lengthy review of the new and controversial Mel Gibson movie, The Passion of the Christ (no permalink yet). Hugh's enthusiasm for this film is evident in this review, as it was in his radio show on Friday night: The Passion of the Christ is a phenomenal work of art; a moving and inspiring film that will certainly be shown again and again for generations to come. Though I am a follower of Jesus Christ, I do not believe that one needs to be a believer in the divinity of Christ to appreciate the majesty of the movie and its extraordinary commitment to authenticity and an objective recounting of the story of the passion and death of Christ as relayed through the Gospels. I have wondered how well Gibson would adhere to history in the Passion story. After all, his previous efforts at historical cinema fell somewhat...
January 27, 2004
Now onto the real election news -- The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King has snagged 11 Oscar nominations, including Best Picture and Best Director: Along with best picture and director, the nominations for "Return of the King" included original score and song, visual effects, film editing and adapted screenplay for the script based on J.R.R. Tolkien's fantasy classic. "Return of the King" led last weekend's Golden Globes with four wins, including best dramatic picture and director, and its broad critical and fan support give the film the inside track at the Oscars. No word on acting nominations as yet. To no one's surprise, however, Renee Zellweger received a Best Supporting Actress nomination for her terrific performance in Cold Mountain, one that likely will be rewarded with a win. UPDATE: No acting nominations, despite great performances in supporting roles. I guess a picture gets to be considered...
Lovers of classic 1970s films, especially sports films, may need extra blood-pressure medicine after reading this item on Adam Sandler's latest project: Adam Sandler will star in a remake of the 1974 Burt Reynolds comedy "The Longest Yard," the story of a former football player turned convict who challenges prison guards to a game. Adam Sandler -- remaking one of the icons of men's films? I ask you, how many of you can see Sandler as even an adequate replacement for Burt Reynolds? Sandler must be hallucinating, which would explain his Mr. Deeds remake, too. I don't believe that someone can ruin a classic movie by remaking it poorly -- after all, the original movie still remains -- but you can certainly insult its standing by making stupid casting decisions. One could hardly get more foolish than by casting Sandler as a hardened and corrupt NFL quarterback who stands up...
February 16, 2004
Writing in today's LA Times, William Kowinski decries the existence of separate acting awards at the Oscars based on gender: After all, there is no award for the best screenplay by a woman. Sofia Coppola wasn't nominated as best female director. There's no award for a best picture by a woman producer. Why are there separate acting awards divided by gender? There doesn't appear to be anything about acting skill that is gender-specific. In fact, many women insist on being called actors and bristle at the designation of "actress" because they believe it to be demeaning, like the term "authoress." A writer is a writer, and an actor is an actor. Aren't these gender-designated categories just relics of a less-enlightened time? There are no separate categories based on race, ethnicity, religion, age, sexual preference or any other element of diversity. Why not best performance by a Latino in a leading...
Mel Gibson appeared on a special Primetime Special Edition, interviewed by Diane Sawyer about his soon-to-be-released film, The Passion of the Christ, to both publicize the movie and to explain it. Gibson appeared along with panels of Christian and Jewish scholars to debate points of theology and intent in Gibson's vision of the last twelve hours of the temporal life of Jesus. I have not yet seen the film (which opens next week, on Ash Wednesday), but I do plan on seeing it as soon as I can, especially after seeing Sawyer's interview. Gibson, who looked uncomfortable throughout the show, still appeared to answer as honestly as he could, being charming perhaps even despite himself, especially when he claimed that he was thinking about pitching his tent next to the WMDs, so that "no one could find me". The only time he looked angry instead of uncomfortable was when the...
February 23, 2004
CBS's Andy Rooney apparently doesn't like Mel Gibson or his latest movie, The Passion of the Christ. How Rooney has made up his mind without actually seeing the film may strike some as odd, but Rooney has it from a good source that it stinks -- God is Andy's stringer, you see: I heard from God just the other night. God always seems to call at night. "Andrew," God said to me. He always calls me "Andrew." I like that. ... “As far as Mel Gibson goes, I haven't seen his movie, 'The Passion of the Christ,' because it hasn't opened up here yet. But I did catch Gibson being interviewed by Diane Sawyer. I did something right when I came up with her, didn't I,” added God. “Anyway, as I was saying, Mel is a real nut case. What in the world was I thinking when I created him?...
February 29, 2004
I will be live-blogging the Academy Awards tonight, and it appears that this will be a long, long night -- the Academy has removed speech restrictions for the Oscar winners for the first time in recent memory. Odd, don't you think, or perhaps the Presidential election has something to do with it? 7:25 - Catching the pre-awards show, and it's as lame as ever. I felt sorry for Nicole Kidman and Renee Zellweger, who were cursed to sit on either side of Billy Bush and forced to respond to his inane non-question commentary. As if that wasn't bad enough, he then re-enacted the "Uma-Oprah" debacle from several years back. I'm sure that the Academy appreciates that walk down Memory Lane ... 7:35 - The opening sequence rocked! Loved the elephant stepping on Michael Moore as he protested the Battle of Gondor, and Jack Nicholson made a great Gandalf. Seriously. Somehow,...
March 7, 2004
After two weeks of release, I finally went to see Mel Gibson's The Passion of the Christ this afternoon. Until now, all I had done was read some of the reviews, both professional and in the blogosphere, as well as the various interviews from some of the principals like Gibson and Jim Caviezel, who plays Jesus. I have also kept up with some of the attacks on the movie, Gibson, and his motivations, such as Andy Rooney's late last month. Now that I have seen the film, I understand the passion about the Passion. Either a viewer will love this film or hate it; there is little room for middle ground, and that's precisely the point. One of the images in the film that stuck with me the most -- one that is present in most of the advertising as well -- is a slow-motion shot of Jesus drawing a...
March 10, 2004
In a statement that has gathered way too much attention already, an anti-smoking activist has challenged Hollywood to consider tobacco use when assigning MPAA ratings: If Nicolas Cage lights a cigarette in a movie, Hollywood's ratings board should respond as if he used a profanity, according to authors of a new study that criticizes glamorous images of smoking in movies rated for children under 17. Nearly 80 percent of movies rated PG-13 feature some form of tobacco use, while 50 percent of G and PG rated films depict smoking, said Stanton Glantz, co-author of the study, which examined 775 U.S. movies over the past five years. "No one is saying there should never be any smoking in the movies," Glantz, a professor of medicine at the University of California, San Francisco, said Tuesday at a press conference at Hollywood High School. "What we're simply asking for is that smoking be...
March 15, 2004
After the incredible success of Mel Gibson's The Passion of the Christ, it's not a big surprise that the same Hollywood Establishment that has shunned Gibson and his movie are considering how to cash in on the audience he's discovered: The movie's box-office success has been chewed over in studio staff meetings and at pricey watering holes all over Hollywood, echoed in interviews with numerous executives in the last week. In marketing departments the film is regarded as pure genius; its director, Mel Gibson, is credited with stoking a controversy that yanked the film from the margins of the culture to center stage, presenting it as a must-see. There is little doubt at the studios that the movie will affect decision making in the short and the long term. Some predict, as one result, a wave of New Testament-themed movies or more religious films in general. Actually, I think that...
April 3, 2004
In a rebuttal to the adage "sex sells,", the London Telegraph reports on a new study that demonstrates a lower box-office return on films that have explicit sexuality: A new study has found that films containing explicit sex or nudity do much worse at the box office, earning nearly 40 per cent less on average than more wholesome movies. An analysis of 1,120 cinematic releases over the past four years has shown that films without sex scenes, such as Disney's Finding Nemo or Toy Story 2, earned an average of $41.1 million (£22.3 million), while films with sex have grossed 38 per cent less with an average of $16.7 million. In 2003, the final year of the study, the gap was even wider, with films without sex earning more than double those with explicit scenes. Hollywood has long been concerned with a gradual decline in box-office sales, and this may...
April 24, 2004
Tomorrow's New York Times features a story on a too-typical example of bureaucratic mountain-making from molehills, as NASA at first gagged its scientists from commenting on an upcoming movie that shows global warming causing a new Ice Age -- in five days: In "The Day After Tomorrow," a $125 million disaster film that is to open on May 28, global warming from accumulating smokestack and tailpipe gases sets off an instant ice age. Few climate experts think such a prospect is likely, especially in the near future. But the prospect that moviegoers will be alarmed enough to blame the Bush administration for inattention to climate change has stirred alarm at the space agency, scientists there say. "No one from NASA is to do interviews or otherwise comment on anything having to do with" the film, said the April 1 message, which was sent by Goddard's top press officer. "Any news...
May 5, 2004
Michael Moore and Disney subsidiary Miramax found out that the Mouse meant what it said when it earlier told Miramax that it would not allow any Disney companies to distribute Moore's new film, Fahrenheit 911: Disney executives indicated that they would not budge from their position forbidding Miramax to be the distributor of the film in North America. Overseas rights have been sold to a number of companies, executives said. "We advised both the agent and Miramax in May of 2003 that the film would not be distributed by Miramax," said Zenia Mucha, a company spokeswoman, referring to Mr. Moore's agent. "That decision stands." Typically for Moore's team, his agent tried to blame the Bush administrations (George and Jeb) for Disney's decision, claiming that Disney chief Michael Eisner told him that the distribution deal would endanger tax breaks at the federal and state (Florida) level: "Michael Eisner asked me not...
May 6, 2004
The London Independent reports in tomorrow's edition that Michael Moore, instead of being a victim of evil, corporate America in the form of the Disney Corporation, instead lied about Disney's intentions to promote his film as well a an illusion of martyrdom: Less than 24 hours after accusing the Walt Disney Company of pulling the plug on his latest documentary in a blatant attempt at political censorship, the rabble-rousing film-maker Michael Moore has admitted he knew a year ago that Disney had no intention of distributing it. ... In an indignant letter to his supporters, Moore said he had learnt only on Monday that Disney had put the kibosh on distributing the film, which has been financed by the semi-independent Disney subsidiary Miramax. But in the CNN interview he said: "Almost a year ago, after we'd started making the film, the chairman of Disney, Michael Eisner, told my agent he...
May 16, 2004
Michael Moore, whose new film Fahrenheit 911 was rejected by Disney over a year ago for distribution, continues to claim that Disney actually refused to distribute the film due to pressure from a "top Republican" in the White House: The White House tried to halt the making and release of Michael Moore's new film Fahrenheit 9/11, the film-maker alleged in Cannes on Sunday. The director told a Cannes audience the Bush administration wanted to keep the film off screens in the run-up to November's US election. ... He has given no evidence to substantiate his allegations, but said "someone connected to the White House" and a "top Republican" had put pressure on film companies not to release the film. The BBC fails to note the London Independent's report from two weeks ago, Moore knowingly lied about Disney in order to promote his new film: Less than 24 hours after accusing...
May 19, 2004
The Guardian (UK) reports on a controversial new film, Nine Songs, being released in Britain, and its lead actress who took Method acting to a level not seen anywhere else except ... er, California? You could, perhaps, have seen it all coming. Or maybe not, if you were a 21-year-old with no significant acting roles to your name. What is clear is that Margo Stilley, the female lead in Michael Winterbottom's film Nine Songs - already famous as the most sexually explicit film in the history of mainstream British cinema - is at the centre of an almighty media ruckus. On Tuesday, tabloid headlines gleefully announced the arrival of the "Muckiest Film Ever" and the "Rudest Film Ever to Hit Our Cinemas". By yesterday Fleet Street's finest had caught up with friends and family in Stilley's native North Carolina. "Mother of Beauty in 'Real Sex' Film Shocker Prays For Her...
May 25, 2004
USA Today published an op-ed piece by Patrick Michaels, a senior fellow in environmental studies at the Cato Institute (via Drudge), that reviews the science in the upcoming disaster flick The Day After Tomorrow and finds it ridiculous and impossible: Global warming causes the Gulf Stream to shut down. This current normally brings tropical warmth northward and makes Europe much more comfortable than it should be at its northerly latitude. The heat stays stuck in the tropics, the polar regions get colder, and the atmosphere suddenly flips over in a "superstorm." The frigid stratosphere trades places with our habitable troposphere, and in a matter of days, an ice age ensues. Temperatures drop 100 degrees an hour in Canada. Hurricanes ravage Belfast. Folks in Japan are clobbered by bowling-ball-size hailstones. If we had only listened to concerned scientists and stopped global warming when we could. Each one of these phenomena is...
June 9, 2004
Let's say you want to promote a new film -- or, more accurately, a new remake of a classic sci-fi thriller that probably should have been left alone. Seeing as how the film stars top-drawer talent, including the beautiful Nicole Kidman in a lead role as well as Bette Midler and Glenn Close, how would you go about attracting people to the box office? Would you try to show us a sexy Nicole, or some scenes with Close, Midler, or perhaps Christopher Walken or Matthew Broderick? I'd bet you wouldn't strip Condoleezza Rice to the waist and put Hillary Clinton in a swimsuit holding a plate of cookies: Some people are saying the way Hillary Clinton and Condoleezza Rice are portrayed in an ad for the new "Stepford Wives" film is distasteful, even outrageous. The spot shows an image of Rice made to look nude from the waist up, and...
June 30, 2004
Michael Isikoff and Mark Hosenball, Newsweek reporters who regularly pen the magazine's Terror Watch column, reviews the major distortions of Michael Moore's new "documentary" Fahrenheit-9/11. Even though Isikoff and Hosenball express sympathy for Moore's efforts in building criticism of the Bush administration, they acknowledge that most of Moore's major criticisms are nothing but a tissue of lies. In a moment of journalistic understatement, the subtitle of their Newsweek article is "Some of the main points in ‘Fahrenheit 9/11’ really aren’t very fair at all". To start, F-9/11 makes the extraordinary claim that the Saudis have given the Bush family over $1.4 billion since the early 1990s, effectively buying them off in a sweetheart deal with the Carlyle Group and defense contractor BDM. Moore took the information from a book written by Craig Unger that is often referenced (incompletely) by conspiracy theorists on the Left, and Moore obviously did little research...
July 24, 2004
Reader Mark Warner points me to this Washington Post article that details the Polish reaction to the launch of Fahrenheit 9/11 in their country. [Lazy day, today, Captain? -- I prefer to think of it as being responsive to the CQ community...] The Poles are unimpressed with Michael Moore's film, as they get a strange sense of deja vu: "Fahrenheit 9/11" opened Friday in Poland - a U.S. ally in Iraq - with some critics comparing director Michael Moore's style to totalitarian propaganda. ... A critic for Gazeta Wyborcza, Poland's largest daily newspaper, condemned the movie as a "foul pamphlet" too biased to be considered a documentary and said it reminded him of methods used by Nazi propaganda filmmaker Leni Riefenstahl. "In criticizing Moore, I have to admit that he has certain abilities - Leni Riefenstahl had them too," reviewer Jacek Szczerba said. The Rzeczpospolita newspaper wrote that, "Michael Moore...
July 28, 2004
During most of his professional life, the world hailed Lord Laurence Olivier as one of the greatest actors on stage and screen, and Olivier remained remarkably prolific right to the end of his life. Now the London Guardian reports that he will launch a great comeback, a neat trick for a man who's been dead for fifteen years. First-time filmmaker Kerry Conran cast the dead actor in support of Jude Law and Gwenyth Paltrow as a holographic villain: In September, however, Olivier will break much more remarkable ground. Fifteen years after his death, he is due to feature as one of the billed stars of the Paramount film Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow. ... Law is quoted by the AP news agency: "He plays my nemesis. And he's referred to throughout the movie so you know eventually you're going to get to see this bad guy. It builds...
August 4, 2004
While so many of us are focused on elections and Islamofascist terrorists, many of our younger citizens await the next cinematic installment of the wildly popular fiction series that focuses on a battle between good and evil. Harry Potter and The Goblet Of Fire has been filming all summer without any indication who would portray the corporeal evil that haunts Harry and his friends, Lord Voldemort. At one point, practically every British actor who hadn't yet appeared in the series was rumored to have been cast in the role, including -- laughably -- Rowan Atkinson, better known as Mr. Bean. Now Warner Bros. has finally announced who will fill the robe of the character so evil that witches and wizards avoid speaking his name, a man whose very face inspires fear and dread. Ralph Fiennes? He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named has been named. Ralph Fiennes, who played memorable evil guys in "Red Dragon" and...
August 17, 2004
How would you feel if these guys all got together at an Italian restaurant while you were the waiter? As long as Joe Pesci wasn't around, at least you wouldn't worry about getting a bottle upside the head as a tip: The theme of the night was "breaking bread, not legs" when some of the cast and filmmakers of "Goodfellas" reunited for a traditional sit-down dinner Monday night. Ray Liotta, Paul Sorvino and real-life mob informant Henry Hill — whose gangland experiences inspired the story — showed up to gobble baked ziti, swap stories, sing some Italian opera and recall director Martin Scorsese's acclaimed mob movie. If you haven't seen it, Goodfellas is really one of the best Mafia pictures ever made -- less artistic than the Godfather series, but more realistic in its depiction of organized crime. Rather than indulge in a false romance about gangsters and codes of...
October 17, 2004
The First Mate and I went out to church this afternoon and followed Mass with a screening of the new movie Thérese, the biopic of the Catholic saint nicknamed "The Little Flower". The FM had looked forward to the movie opening in our area as Thérese is the saint which she admires the most -- an unassuming young girl whose saintliness expressed itself in the many small acts of faith she did. I'd like to say lots of nice things about this film, whose heart definitely is in the right place. The filmmakers treat their subject quite respectfully -- in fact, too much so, to the extent that the film fails to work. Thérese lost her mother when she was very little, and as a result wound up being doted upon by her entire family. She became a bit spoiled, as youngest children often are, and a bit willful. At...
December 17, 2004
The Guardian (UK) reports in today's edition that Harrison Ford has signed onto a project depicting the Battle of Fallujah based on a book coming out in the spring. This film would be the first Hollywood has produced that looks at the Iraq War, an odd omission noted by several prominent entertainment figures including Roger L. Simon: Hollywood has joined the war. Universal Pictures announced yesterday that it is to make The Battle for Falluja. To prove it is serious, it has enlisted Indiana Jones himself, actor Harrison Ford, to help defeat the insurgency. The film - Hollywood's first foray into the second Iraq conflict - is due to go into production next year and will be based on a yet-to-be-finished book, No True Glory: The Battle for Falluja by Bing West, a former marine, politician and now war correspondent. The movie and book take as their starting point the...
January 9, 2005
Today our family will put aside our labors for a long-planned event, one that has my daughter-in-law, her sister and her sister's boyfriend and I giddy with anticipation. Now that we have all three Lord of the Rings director's cut releases, we plan on watching all three in a row today, starting at 10 am today. We think that the day should last around 12 hours of hobbits, Elves, Nazgul, and the One Ring that binds them all. I plan on live-blogging from time to time to let you know the effects of intense Tolkien on an otherwise sane mind. Keep checking back in! Oh, by the way -- the First Mate disputes the "already sane mind" part of that last statement, and insists that the Rings marathon provides prima facie proof. I report, you decide ......
11:23 - We're deep into the Fellowship of the Ring now, and the Fellowship of the Marathon are all in rapt attention. One of our number decided to take a pass (my naturally sensible daughter-in-law), but the three true fans still hang in there. Right now we're hearing about the Hobbit habits of second breakfasts and "elevensies", while Frodo makes his way to Weathertop. The First Mate has wisely avoided coming downstairs to the home theater since the beginning... 11:57 - Intermission, which means that Arwen and Aragorn are speaking Elvish to each other with choruses of sopranos in the background. It's a good thing, too, because I'm noticing some hair growing on the top of my bare feet. Andy just pointed out that all of the good guys in the movies -- at least the main ones -- have blue eyes. Some of that was accomplished digitally by director...
January 17, 2005
The First Mate and I took my sister to see the new Martin Scorsese film, The Aviator, which wangled a couple of Golden Globes last night. (Actually, in the interest of full disclosure, my sister took us.) The long-anticipated film looks at the life of Howard Hughes, the aviation pioneer and noted eccentric whose life cast a long shadow in the movie, aviation, defense, and financial industries. While I have a lot of admiration for the attempt, I think The Aviator is fundamentally flawed, if still entertaining. First, the film only looks at a 20-year period of Hughes' life, from 1927 when he began work on Hell's Angels to 1947, when he flew the Spruce Goose across the water in Los Angeles. He never even mentions RKO, the studio owned by Hughes from 1948 to 1955. That narrow focus disappointed me, as it shortchanged the impact that Hughes had on...
January 23, 2005
Stacy Harp at Media Soul has launched a new initiative to market the upcoming DVD release of In The Face Of Evil, a 2004 documentary on Ronald Reagan. She's gathering a network of bloggers to publicize and sell the DVD to its readership. I have yet to see the documentary (full disclosure: I'm getting a complimentary copy), but I do look forward to it. I think that the mainstream media has ignored the Reagan legacy, and independent conservative documentarians will probably be the only way Reagan and his presidency gets any kind of realistic overview. Keep checking in at Media Soul. I'll let you know about the documentary when I get a chance to watch it....
January 25, 2005
The AMPAS announced the Oscar nominations this morning, and ironically enough, neither film championed by the right and left got nominated for Best Picture. The Passion of the Christ wound up with three nominations, for best score, cinematography, and make-up. Fahrenheit 9/11 got nada, spurned by the Academy after Michael Moore deliberately held the film out of the feature-length documentary category. Who knew the Academy was so balanced in their approach?...
February 5, 2005
One of the classiest presences on film and stage passed away yesterday. Ossie Davis, husband to Ruby Dee and together two of the most visible campaigners for civil rights during those most turbulent years, died at 87 of natural causes in a Miami hotel room: Ossie Davis, whose rich baritone and elegant, unshakable bearing made him a giant of the stage, screen and the civil rights movement — often in tandem with his wife, Ruby Dee — has died. He was 87. Davis was found dead Friday in his hotel room in Miami Beach, Fla., according to officials there. He was making a film, “Retirement,” said Arminda Thomas, who works in his New Rochelle office and confirmed the death. Miami Beach police spokesman Bobby Hernandez sa