They are the type of headlines that instantly grab your attention. You read them with morbid curiosity. Train derails, no survivors. Plane crashes on take-off. No survivors. Bus plunges off icy road. No survivors. Read the rest of this entry »

He’s been around so long that sometimes we take him for granted. Even when he’s in a bad film, I’ve never seen a bad Paul Newman performance. Although he prefers to dabble in salad dressing and popcorn, Newman is like a fine wine. He only gets better with age. Read the rest of this entry »

Brendan, a Dublin high school history teacher, lives his life like a movie. When we first meet Brendan, he’s lying face down in a rain-filled gutter. The scene looks familiar. It’s supposed to. It’s the scene that opens “Sunset Boulevard.” Read the rest of this entry »

Flashback. 1974. I was a junior in high school. I was also among those privileged to catch “The Rocky Horror Show” at the Roxy Theater on Sunset Boulevard in Hollywood. Way too young to appreciate the freak show that made up the audience, but old enough to appreciate the freak show on stage. Read the rest of this entry »

CABLE CONNECTIONS…

TWILIGHT OF THE GOLDS

This Showtime Original Movie isn’t on video yet, but you can still catch it as it plays on the cable network. A video release is due next Fall. What would you do if you had the opportunity to take a DNA test to find out if your unborn baby is healthy? Better yet, what would you do if the same test also produced evidence that the baby would be born homosexual? Read the rest of this entry »

Remember the good old days when if you wanted to get someone in trouble, you would “drop a dime” on them. Thanks to the prolific rise of cellular phones, calling plans, and exuberant pay phone charges, “dropping a dime” on someone has lost all its meaning. Read the rest of this entry »

You’ll laugh! You’ll cry! You’ll pay $7 to see Meryl Streep kiss her butt goodbye! There isn’t any living actress on the face of this Earth who can hold a candle to Meryl Streep. She’s truly amazing. She can do anything, and that includes saving the teary-eyed chick flick “One True Thing” from slipping into maudlin. Read the rest of this entry »

Since Miss Congeniality 2: Armed and Fabulous is set in Las Vegas, it’s almost a safe bet to say the sequel will clean up in theaters. Like tumbling dice, the odds are against anyone hoping to repeat the success of the first roll. After all is said and done, Miss Congeniality 2 craps out. Read the rest of this entry »

Sitting through co-writer/director Bernard Rapp’s delicious thriller “Une Affaire de Gout” reminded me how much better French filmmakers are at creating suspense. While American thrillers are almost always plot driven, most French thrillers are character driven. Like “With a Friend Like Harry,” “Une Affaire de Gout” is about how people react to each rather than to extraneous plot devices like car chases and explosions. Read the rest of this entry »

“Shakespeare in Love” is one of those great, wonderful “what if” movies. What if one of the worlds greatest writers had writers block? What if producing plays in Elizabethan England was the same as hawking screenplays in Hollywood? What if one of the most treasured romantic tragedies of all time was originally called “Romeo and Ethel, the Pirate’s Daughter”? Read the rest of this entry »