As the recent wildfires ravaged Los Angeles, there were rumblings of canceling Oscar 97, but AMPAS held firm despite the flames. The ceremony would proceed on March 2, come hell or no water.Even before a …
March 4, 2025
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Random thoughts and observations on Oscar 97
Movie Review: LOVE HURTS (2025)
LOVE HURTS (2025) Jonathan Eusebio. Writers: Matthew Murray, Josh Stoddard, and Luke Passmore / Photographer: Bridger Nielson / Music: Dominic Lewis / Design: Craig Sandells / Cast: Ke Huy Quan, Ariana DeBose, Mustafa Shakir, Analeigh …
February 28, 2025
Movie Review: ONE OF THEM DAYS (2025)
ONE OF THESE DAYS (2025) Lawrence Lamont. Writer: Syreeta Singleton / Photographer: Ava Berkofsky (2.35:1) / Design: Monique Dias / Music: Chanda Dancy / Cast: Keke Palmer, SZA, Katt Williams, Joshua David Neal, Vanessa Bell …
February 28, 2025
Movie Review: VERMIGLIO (2024)
VERMIGLIO (2024) Maura Delpero. Writer: Maura Delpero / Photographer: Mikhail Krichman (1.85:1) / Design: Pirra & Vito Giuseppe Zito / Music: Matteo Franceschini / Starring: Tommaso Ragno, Roberta Rovelli, Giuseppe De Domenico, Martina Scrinzi, Orietta …
February 21, 2025
Movie Review: WICKED (2024)
WICKED (2025) Jon M. Chu / Screenplay: Winnie Holzman & Dana Fox / Novel: Gregory Maguire, the origins of which scream L. Frank Baum / Photography: Alice Brooks (2.39 : 1) / Design: Nathan Crowley / …
February 21, 2025
Movie Review: FLIGHT RISK (2025)
Low-budget thriller submits three characters and a chroma key in search of a landing strip. Deputy U.S. Marshal Harris (Michelle Dockery) hires the services of a flyboy cum hitman (Mark Wahlberg, constantly showing his hand) …
February 21, 2025
Blood purity fight among Pala Mission Indians
Pala tribe cuts dissident members off rollsThe cited cause of tribal disenrollment is a blood-purity dispute. All 164 disenrolled members are relatives of the late Margarita Brittain, a woman whose lineage has long been questioned …
November 4, 2023
Cinema insights from Kensington Video owners
Movie lover's paradise Meanwhile, Blockbuster and Hollywood Video have shuttered their local outlets. Owner and buyer Guy Hanford understands why. “When you went into a Blockbuster or Hollywood to rent a film, you never engaged …
July 2, 2023
To dream in the dark: Scott Marks says, “That’s all, folks!”
After what management said, I found it impossible to continue any further as The Reader’s film critic. What did they say? “Scott, I’m sorry to say we’re laying you off.” The real shocker is that, …
August 25, 2022
Who fired the shot or shots that killed Pat Tillman?
This week’s trio was found lounging in an unmarked file box, stuffed with DVD screeners and buried deep in the inner-recesses of my storage locker. The Tillman Story (2010) Director Amir Bar-Lev (My Kid Could …
August 17, 2022
Sammy Davis, Jr.’s “Salt” meets Peter Lawford’s “Pepper”
Democrats in Washington could stand to take a lesson from Hollywood’s demise in the late ‘60s. Voters’ cries for something new, something different, something progressive in a president were answered with a pair of starchy …
August 11, 2022
The Gray Man: a comic book movie by any other name
Netflix dropped $200 million for their latest star-studded CG extravaganza The Gray Man. That’s $40 million more than the studio sprung for Scorsese’s likewise effects-driven The Irishman, making it the costliest film yet to debut …
August 4, 2022
Popeye, Ghost World, How to Murder Your Wife, and other favorite comic book movies
The banners are down, the fanboys back in their parents’ basements, and the Gaslamp Quarter no longer resembles a giant roll of flypaper used by corporations to ensnare the costumed souls fortunate to acquire the …
July 28, 2022
RRR: pulse-pounding action that outperforms any of its contemporary American counterparts
From India, an epic worthy of your attention. RRR (2022) After two hours of having the snot beat out of them, a pair of unwittingly adversarial revolutionaries, pitted against each other by their British overlords, …
July 21, 2022
John Carpenter’s Elvis: the first of many collaborations between the director and star Kurt Russell
The competition was stiff on February 11, 1979, the night John Carpenter’s Elvis debuted on ABC. Gone With the Wind was on CBS and One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest was on NBC; both kneeled …
July 14, 2022
Day of the Animals: Leslie Nielsen meets the Preston Sturges of ’70s schlock
Who didn’t like Leslie Nielsen, the white haired journeyman actor who went from B movies and recurring character roles in episodic TV dramas to breaking typecast and becoming an overnight comedy sensation? Day of the …
July 7, 2022
Pondering pernicious Papas: Jasper Hadley, Wade Hunnicut, Joey LaMotta, and others
The arrival of Father’s Day started me pondering on pernicious Papas, and I wound up with five movie dads who probably didn’t get cards. 5) Jasper Hadley in Douglas Sirk’s Written on the Wind (1956) …
June 30, 2022
Mirage : an entertaining, regulation black-and-white mistaken-identity paranoid thriller
Inspiration prevails in the strangest places, places like the 805 off-ramp while tooling towards Chula Vista. Mirage (1965) The trash-hauling buggy before me was piled so high with furniture, appliances, and the like that I …
June 23, 2022
Paul Haggis’ Crash and burn
This week sees the opening of David Cronenberg’s latest, so what better time is to put in a bad word about Crash? No, not Cronenberg’s ode to a desensitized societies dependence of sex in cars, …
June 9, 2022
Save the Cinema: Samantha Morton’s feel good flop
The poster art proudly presents the lead actors standing on a red carpet beneath a gleaming marquee, but don’t let that fool you. The cinematic savior in the piece devotes more time to hanging onto …
June 2, 2022
Martin Scorsese sells Armani, Claude Lelouch sells Renault, Jean-Luc Godard.sells jeans
Welcome to this week’s second and final installment of Kings of Ads. Watch the Kings here. KINGS OF ADS, PART 2 Hugh Hudson. British Airways: “Face” Advertisement. (0:22 - 1:49). Great Britain, 1989. How many …
May 30, 2022
Commercials by Godard, Scorsese, Chabrol, Wenders, Lynch, Fellini, Cronenberg, Coppola, Argento, etc.
We’ve all seen compilations of great director’s student films, so why not an anthology that pays tribute to their work as commercial pitchmen and women? Earlier this week while paging through the stacks at Rarefilmm, …
May 19, 2022
Writer-director Elisa Amoruso offers Bella Thorne the best of both worlds
This week brings a twofer from your friendly neighborhood Bella Thorne completist: Time is Up and Measure of Revenge. Plus a surprise bonus! Time is Up (2021) Swim team contender Roy (Benjamin Mascolo) secretly pines …
May 12, 2022
The Many Dirty Harrys
This week: Clint Eastwood’s “Magnum” opuses. The Many Dirty Harrys In Coogan’s Bluff, Don Siegel jerked the sheriff out of Dodge, relocating the lawman amidst the contemporary urban sprawl, horse and all. It was the …
May 5, 2022
Inland Empire revisited
The best film of 2006 held its local premiere in my living room. Inland Empire (2006) It wasn’t my first viewing: a journey up the 5 to Los Angeles had already been undertaken, seeing how …
April 28, 2022
The delightfully nasty habit of Gilbert Gottfried
There’s a name for people who knew Gilbert Gottfried solely on the basis of the numerous animated birds he voiced: parents. Dig A Hole: Gilbert Gottfried Fans of his numerous appearances on Howard Stern’s radio …
April 21, 2022
Robert De Niro’s less-than-stellar offerings
It’s unclear at what point it became my sacred duty to collect the complete works of Robert De Niro on DVD, but the alignment of these three less-than-stellar middle period offerings — shelved side-by-side in …
April 14, 2022
The latest from two Film Movement auteurs
Two titles, new-to-DVD from Film Movement, are ready to grace your home theater’s screen. The Whaler Boy (2020) Our story of a broken heart begins with a Detroit sex worker (Kristina Asmus) flossing her thong …
April 10, 2022
It’s a wrap with 3 Ring Circus
As sure as a clown car comes to a stop, so does our March Madness tribute to big top movies, with Martin and Lewis in 3 Ring Circus. 3 Ring Circus (1954) We open more …
March 31, 2022
Ring of Fear: the first psycho circus film noir cloaked in clownface and gumshoes
This week’s circus of thrills was released two years after The Greatest Show on Earth and decades before genre mashups began clotting multiplex screens. By my calculations, Ring of Fear was the first psycho circus …
March 24, 2022
The Greatest Show on Earth: Cecil B. DeMille’s penultimate film
Circus month continues! Those quick to peg Cecil B. DeMille’s The Greatest Show on Earth as the least deserving winner of a Best Picture Oscar must have been sick the week Chariots of Fire, Crash, …
March 17, 2022
The Circus Clown: run away with Joe E. Brown
It’s a circus of reviews this week, starting with Joe E. Brown as the rube roustabout who follows elephants with a shovel with the same fervor as he does the comely cross-dressing equestrian toying with …
March 10, 2022
Lockdown thriller
Reviews of two absolutely dreadful home video releases this week; but first, a word from Popeye. Popeye the Sailor Man It’s been my privilege to introduce Reader-mate Matthew Lickona’s extended brood to the world of …
March 3, 2022
Room for One More: catching a stray
Personal identification was never the turnkey that unlatched my door to cinematic understanding, but this one was unusual. Room for One More (1952) It was sunny in the Valley, but not hot enough to require …
February 24, 2022
My unhealthy preoccupation with Bob Hope
This should have been my first post when I began working at The Reader over a decade ago. The facts were made known to me by the brilliant Jennifer DeSplinter, a former student who, after …
February 18, 2022
Three more from the The San Diego Jewish Film Festival
The San Diego Jewish Film Festival continues through February 20. For screening information, visit the Festival website: Ronnie’s (2020) Ronnie Scott was a British saxophonist who, in 1959, at the height of his popularity, chose …
February 10, 2022
Three from this year’s Jewish film festival
Of special note from this year’s Jewish film festival: a trio of uniquely personal biodocs. The festival runs February 9-20. Visit the SDJFF website for more information. Eddy’s World (2020) What a joy! We open …
February 3, 2022
A romantic triptych
This week finds two new home video releases from Film Movement, and yours truly still stinging from the loss of a funny broad. Joy Womack: the White Swan (2021) Accepted to Russia’s esteemed Bolshoi Ballet …
January 27, 2022
Targets: The Bogdanovich-Corman connection
It was a marriage made in single-screen heaven, the night Peter Bogdanovich made the acquaintance of Roger Corman in a Los Angeles movie theater. Bogdanovich was quick to pick the low-budget producer-director out of the …
January 20, 2022
Change of Habit : Elvis’ nadiral farewell to cinema
It has been a year since Erich von Stroheim’s Greed entered the public domain and still the Gods of Cinema remain sound asleep at the switch. More than two-thirds of the legendary 9+ hour epic …
January 13, 2022
Watch family pug Doug play De Niro to Katie’s Scorsese
My first entry for 2022 was originally intended for another trio of last year’s leftovers. But my steed blew a flat before making it to the finish line of The Green Knight. One can only …
January 6, 2022