In general, it is not my way to feel great sorrow when someone dies with whom I do not have a personal relationship. A case in point: movie actors. With Heath Ledger and Natasha Richardson, there was a sense of shock and sympathetic sadness for ...
Let me start with a disclaimer: In no way do I condone or support the illegal downloading of copies of the Wolverine work print. Although I am fully cognizant of where and how to download it, I have not done so nor will I do so in the future. ...
In the northern hemisphere, when does spring begin? Is it based on what the groundhog decrees? Is it when the first robin shows off its red breast? Is it the day of the vernal equinox? Is it when the Easter Bunny hops from house-to-house doing ...
In Oliver Stone's Wall Street, Gordon Gecko famously said, "Greed is Good." It's a mantra we in the United States have been living by for the better part of three decades, and it's part of the reason the current recession is as deep as it is. ...
For me, 1983 was an "off" year as far as movies were concerned. The reason? No new Star Trek films. In fact, when I think of that year, the first thing that comes to mind is the snowstorm of February 11, which dumped nearly two feet on Southern ...
As has been widely reported, movie theater attendance is up about 10% in 2009 over a similar period in early 2008. A paradoxical aspect of this stat is that the spike in attendance comes at a time when excitement about films is at a low ebb. People...
SPOILERS!!! For the final episode of Battlestar GalacticaFor about five years, on-and-off as a result of the Sci Fi Channel's irregular first run schedule (the cable network converted four seasons into the equivalent of six by breaking two of them - ...
It's all about the green - could there be a better subject for today?I recently read an article in which the author referred to the early 2009 box office as "inexplicable." I must challenge that description. Confusing? Perhaps. Surprising? ...
After seeing Coraline, I was hopeful that the hype emerging from the major studios about 3-D being the "wave of the future" might have a basis in reality. Granted, 3-D wasn't used perfectly in Coraline, but it seemed to be at best an enhancement and...
The thing I remember most forcefully about 1982 isn't the Falklands Islands conflict, the crash of Air Florida Flight 90 into the Potomac, the attempted assassination of Pope John Paul II, or the death of Brezhnev. It was the arrival in theaters of ...
Can there be a March blockbuster? This is a question that hangs over Hollywood, casting its shadow into every nook and cranny. Even those who don't care a whit about Watchmen as a film recognize that the implications of its success (or lack thereof...
The problem with being 13 years old and wanting to go to the movies every weekend was that transportation was an issue. With the nearest theater not within bicycling distance (my preferred means of traveling to most nearby destinations), that meant ...
Last year, The Chicago Tribune filed for Chapter 11 Bankruptcy Protection. Today, Philadelphia's major papers, The Philadelphia Inquirer and The Philadelphia Daily News, joined the parade. The same fate has befallen many smaller papers, and more ...
Over the past 24 hours, I have given some thought as to why I find the Oscar telecast utterly unentertaining and more than a bit of a chore to sit through, and I think I have figured it out. Much as I love movies, I don't care about the trappings of...
How much of what we enjoy as adults is influenced by what we enjoyed as children? As I have been exploring the 1980s by re-visiting many of the movies of my youth, it has occurred to me that much of what I valued as a teenager doesn't seem as good ...
Predicting Oscar winners is as much a skill as an art, and it has little to do with who deserves to win. Anyone who predicts on the basis of quality is doomed to score low. The first lesson to learn when predicting Oscars (especially if you're ...
Regular readers of ReelThoughts know that, for about a year, I have struggled with the concept of somehow making ReelViews interactive. Reader opinion was split: about half of the e-mails I received encouraged me to go in this direction. The other ...