March 11 , 2010: It All Boils Down to Cabbage
Editor's Blog on Pink Floyd's nascent victory in the battle to preserve the integrity of a concept album in the world of digital downloads …
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March 8 , 2010: Oscar Night Wrap-Up
Editor's Blog on Sunday night's Oscar telecast, thoughts on the winners, and the veterans and pioners who have apparently become irrelevant…
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March 6 , 2010: 2010 Genie Award Nominees
Want to sample most of the 2010 Genie nominated films? Good, because most are already out on home video…
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March 4 , 2010: Bug-Eyed Nostalgia
Read the Editor's Blog and reviews of three films that evoke the good, the silly, and the awfulness of fifties and sixties bug-eyed monster and alien invasion films: Alien Trespass (2009), The Lost Skeleton of Cadavra (2001), and Matinee (1993)...
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March 3 , 2010: Some Funkafied Leverage
Read an interview with Joseph LoDuca, composer of TNT's hit caper series Leverage, plus a review of the show's newly released soundtrack CD, and Season 1 on DVD...
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February 26 , 2010: It All Comes Back To Caddyshack...
Soundtrack reviews of La-La Land's Caddyshack (1980) and Nate and Hayes (1983) soundtrack CDs, plus Tales of the Gold Monkey on DVD this June (no, really)…
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February 24 , 2010: 2009 BAFTA Winners
2009 BAFTA Award Winners, and comments regarding the spring DVD and Blu-ray release of James Cameron's Avatar…
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February 20 , 2010: The Carlton Cinemas' Resurrection
Magic Lantern Theatres (who also operate the Rainbow Cinemas) have their eye on a June 2010 target date to reopen the Carlton Cinemas, which they purchased from former owners Cineplex Odeon…
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February 18 , 2010: Postwar Berlin, Hollywood Style
Observations and reviews of Hollywood's postwar Berlin thrillers: Berlin Express (1948), and The Night People (1954)...
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February 15 , 2010: Doctor Zhivago Blu-ray and More Canadian Release Dates
Selected Canadian DVD and Blu-ray release dates for Alliance, Mongrel Media, and Warner Bros...
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February 12 , 2010: See the Film, Hear the Music - Panic in Year Zero! (1962)
Film review of Ray Milland's bleak Panic in Year Zero! (1962), as well as Les Baxter's soundtrack, newly released by La-La Land Records...
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February 11 , 2010: Re-birthing The Wolfman
An in-dept film review of Joe Johnston and Benicio Del Toro's The Wolfman…
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February 7 , 2010: Paging Doctor Grumpy
Reviews of Doc Martin, Seasons 1 thru 3…
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February 5 , 2010: Cosmatos on Blu-ray, and the Hobo Returns
Editor's Blog on Disney's announced release of Tombstone on Blu-ray, the return of Universal's flipper disc, and TV soundtrack music…
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February 3 , 2010: 2009 Oscar Nominated Short Films on Home Video
List of the 2009 Oscar nominated short documentary, live action short film, and short animated film with links to websites and viewing availability…
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February 3 , 2010: 2009 Oscar Nominated Music / Upcoming Score Notables
List of and linked Oscar nominated scores and songs, plus new and upcoming notable soundtrack releases…
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February 2 , 2010: 2009 Oscar Nominated Films on Home Video
Here are the nominated films currently available or announced for a home video release, with links to Amazon.com (and Region 2 releases where applicable)...
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February 2 , 2010: 2009 Oscar Nominations by Category
The nominees for the slender bald statue were announced this morning, and given this list is LONG (the total Best Picture nominees were doubled from 5 to 10 in an apparent move to win over more viewers), I've decided to post the nominees in two formats: by Category, and by Film...
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February 2 , 2010: Criterion Announces More OOP DVDs for March
23 DVDs spanning Criterion and Essential Art House will go out of print at the end of March. Great, the speculators and feeding frenzy begins again...
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January 30, 2010: BBC World News: Be a Newscaster (but be better than cabbage)
The BBC’s World News service is offering anyone with a camera to paint a portrait of their world, and submit their one minute effort as part of the My World, My Minute contest...
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Editor's Blog and blather on the failings of Bruce Willis' latest film, Surrogates (2009), plus a review of the film, the score, and an interview with composer Richard Marvin...
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January 25, 2010: Damn Fine Music
Just added: soundtrack review of John Frizzell's wonderful music for the stretchee-bendee theological thriller Legion, as well as an interview with composer Winifred Phillips...
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January 23, 2010: 2009 BAFTA Award Nominations
Yes, I’m late on this tally, but it’s been a busy week. On January 21st, nominees for Britain’s equivalent of the Oscar Awards – the BAFTAs – were announced, and as per the custom, I’ve hyperlinked titles I’ve reviewed, as well as those available on DVD or soon to be available on DVD, including those in Region 2 land, where noted...
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January 22, 2010: K.I.S.S. (Keep It Simple, Stupid)
The confusions within Christian Alvart's Pandorum, a relatively bloodless Whiteout, and Jerry Goldsmith's Innerspace...
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January 13, 2010: Where the Day Takes You
Luise Rainer celebrates 100, Eric Rohmer passes away at 89, and the work of the late Marc Rocco gets the spotlight after a long absence on home video...
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January 8, 2010: John Woo's Redemption
After languishing in Hollywood for several years, John Woo’s finally redeemed himself by tackling an expansive historical epic in Chinese. In Asia, Red Cliff was released in two parts – the first in 2009, the second a year later – and then on DVD and Blu-ray, while the rest of the world was apparently offered a shorter cut fashioned by the producers (including Woo) to keep the length and ‘all that unfamiliar cultural material’ to a minimum, and leaving the big battle scenes as highlights...
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January 4, 2010: The Horror, the Horror
Coming out tomorrow is the latest Final Destination sequel from Warner Bros., who’ve oddly retained the New Line shingle in spite of shuttering the company’s ability to produce and release product...
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January 1, 2010: And so begins another year
Rather than dole out a best-of list of this and that, I thought I’d use the holiday time to finish up a number of reviews that should’ve been done with ages ago, and start work on some peripheral projects that have been in the planning stages for some time...
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December 18, 2009: 2009 Screen Actors Guild Award Nominees
Also announced this week are the 2009 TFCA (Toronto Film Critics Association) award winners. One can faithfully assume the Golden Globe winners will be safe and populist, which makes the TFCA winners and runners-up more intriguing because they embrace some rebels, newcomers, egotists, and indie filmmakers whose works are in fact/will be out on DVD, and should be sought out after you’ve gone through the safer crème de la crème of studio fodder...
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December 17, 2009: 2009 Toronto Film Critics Association Award Winners
Also announced this week are the 2009 TFCA (Toronto Film Critics Association) award winners. One can faithfully assume the Golden Globe winners will be safe and populist, which makes the TFCA winners and runners-up more intriguing because they embrace some rebels, newcomers, egotists, and indie filmmakers whose works are in fact/will be out on DVD, and should be sought out after you’ve gone through the safer crème de la crème of studio fodder...
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December 16, 2009: Golden Globe Awards Nominees
Nominees for the precursor to the Oscars – The Golden Globe Awards – were earlier this week, and while the organization with the murky history and credibility still mushes together Best Performances for actors and actresses from TV and film in singular categories (see end), this high-profile wave of titles will probably help boost the profiles of known, missed, and unknown films for consumers...
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This past Sunday Dec. 6th marked the last day of operation of Toronto's Carlton Cinemas, a modest Cineplex multiplex built in 1981, and known for showing indie and foreign films prior to their widespread availability on home video and specialty channels...
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December 9, 2009: The Carlton's Blinky-Blinky Lights Go Dark
This past Sunday Dec. 6th marked the last day of operation of Toronto's Carlton Cinemas, a modest Cineplex multiplex built in 1981, and known for showing indie and foreign films prior to their widespread availability on home video and specialty channels...
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December 8, 2009: Canada's Top Ten on DVD (sort of)
Whenever a list of nominated or winning titles in a best-of or industry awards tally is revealed, there’s a curiosity among some (me) as to what’s currently out or will be out on DVD...
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Today marks two tragic anniversaries in Canada: the collision of a French munitions ship with a Norwegian vessel in 1917 that essentially flattened a whole swathe of the city of Halifax, and killed a thousand, and maimed nine thousand more; and the tenth anniversary of the Ecole Polytechnique massacre, where nutbar Marc Lepine set out to kill women at Montreal’s Ecole Polytechnique because he blamed women for all of his woes...
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December 4, 2009: Soundtrack Reviews (B)
Uploaded Friday are soundtrack reviews for a pair of MovieScore Media releases, the Swedish label that’s managed to build up what’s arguably the most diverse international roster of composers around...
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December 3, 2009: Soundtrack Reviews (A) & Film Music News
With the YoYo bug now gone from the system, I’ll be uploading batches of reviews each day, along with some blogs originally slated for earlier uploads. First off is a pair of reviews. Jerry Goldsmith’s short scores for I.Q. (1994) and Seconds (1966) get their premiere releases on one disc from La-La Land Records, as well as a remastered and expanded CD of Joe Renzetti’s Child’s Play score from 1988...
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November 21, 2009: (First) Horror Efforts
Although Robbie Bryan had written and starred in The Stand-In (1999), iMurders marks his feature directorial debut, as well as his first effort in the horror – a genre that many filmmakers use to make a commercial mark as well as learn the ropes of feature filmmaking before moving on to more personal or riskier projects...
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November 12, 2009: Soundtrack News
I’ll have another set of soundtrack reviews out shortly, but available shortly on CD and MP3 are the following soundtracks from the usual mail order shops...
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November 11, 2009: Arrabal, Jodorowsky, Makavejev... and Brass?
Before his decadent switch to sexploitation and erotica, Tinto Brass made a pair of films wherein he experimented with sophisticated editing concepts (visually and aurally) to create narratives from loosely drawn concepts, as well as inject some commentary on the political and social turmoil of the times...
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November 4, 2009: Soundtrack Updates
Uploaded late last week is an interview with composer Richard Marvin, a successful composer – hugely successful, actually - in TV (Six Feet Under, In Treatment) as well as feature films. A longtime associate of director Jonathan Mostow, Marvin’s latest score for the film Surrogates *finally* gets a release date of November 10th...
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October 28, 2009: Killer Kiddies
As it happens, over the past two weeks a quartet of killer kiddie films came out on DVD, some possessing variable levels of good, weak, or downright awful qualities...
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October 24, 2009: Berlin's Cold War Heat
Back in September, I posted reviews of Robert Siodmak’s Escape from East Berlin (1962) and the documentary/travel video Mauerflug (‘flight over the Berlin Wall’) as the first in a series tied to the giant reverse-chastity belt that was designed to prevent East Germans from penetrating the west...
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October 20, 2009: The Spectre of Royalty
With 2009 marking the 20th anniversary of the Iranian Revolution that ousted the Shah and replaced the monarchy with a theocratic regime, it’s fitting Mongrel Media released The Queen and I this month, Nahid Persson Sarvestani’s 2008 documentary on Empress Farah, Iran’s exiled Queen, now living in Paris, France...
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October 16, 2009: Flowing Through Nostalgic Horror
I’ve been sick with a wretched head cold for the past few days, hence the delay, but the time in bed (and dizzy spells) allowed me to gather a handful of films for this update which collectively illustrate the levels of originality, imitation, and nostalgia in contemporary horror...
- MRH
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