What Are Movies?

You don’t have to be a machinist to know that a device cannot work properly if it’s cogs are clogged with gunk, or if a piston ain’t firing, or a thingamajig isn’t doing what it’s supposed to do. If one element is out of place, the contraption in question may run quite badly, or may not perform at all. Movies are machines. They are the combined efforts of actors, directors, writers, art

2009 Cannes Film Festival Winners

The results are in: PALME D'OR: The White Ribbon, Michael Haneke (Germany) GRAND PRIX: A Prophet, Jacques Audiard (France) SPECIAL PRIZE: Wild Grass, Alain Renais (France) ACTOR: Christoph Waltz, Inglourious Basterds (USA) ACTRESS: Charlotte Gainsbourg, Antichrist (Denmark)DIRECTOR: Brillante Mendoza, Kinatay (Phillipines) SCREENPLAY: Mei Feng, Spring Fever (China) CAMERA D'OR (best first film):

The 50 Most Overlooked Movies of the 1990s

I just posted my 25 Best Movies of the 1990s the other day, and although it cites forgotten films like Time Indefinite, The Rapture, and The Gods of Times Square, I felt it gave short shrift to a host of movies that deserve more eyes than they're possibly getting. So here are 50 truly under- appreciated movies from the decade, listed in order of their release year:STRANGERS IN GOOD COMPANY (

Film #129: Multiple SIDosis (R.I.P. Sid Laverents: 1908-2009)

In 2000, the National Library of Congress, in their yearly picks of 25 American films to be preserved by their National Film Registry, included a rarely-seen, amateur 16mm movie by Sid Laverents as one of their chosen few. Completed in 1970, Multiple SIDosis splashes as a simple idea on paper, but on celluloid, it's a whole other matter. Laverents--often the star of his movies--plays himself,

The 25 Best Movies of the 1990s

John Foote's recent posting on In Contention, looking at forgotten films of the 1990s, was so provocative, it compelled me to leave a comment that I thought I'd also appropriate for filmicability. So, quickly, for me, the 25 best movies of the 1990s:1) GOODFELLAS (Martin Scorsese, 90) (the decade's most influential movie, and its most essential, too) 2) BREAKING THE WAVES (Lars Von Trier, 96) (

Film #128: White Hunter Black Heart

White Hunter Black Heart may not be a movie that many people consider a classic, but I certainly do: in fact, it may be producer/ director/ actor Clint Eastwood's most overlooked film. Released in 1990, screenwriter Peter Viertel's kinetic adaptation of his roman a'clef novel chronicles his mercurial relationship with uber-macho director John Huston while on location in Africa filming (or not

Film #127: Marathon Man

After winning Oscars in 1969 for Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid and again in 1976 for All the President's Men, legendary screenwriter William Goldman scribbled down the novel Marathon Man as well as its corresponding screenplay. Produced in 1976, the movie is clearly flawed, yet still I count it as an enjoyable tension-fest from Midnight Cowboy director John Schlesinger. A long way from

Film #126: Hoosiers

In 1986's Hoosiers--by far the finest basketball film out there--Gene Hackman is the bearish, enigmatic new teacher/coach at the tiny 1950s-era high school that anchors the Indiana farm town of Hickory. With its small student body and a dwindling supply of basketball talents to match, the coach finds himself against the bleachers in shaping a winning team (even the well-cast townspeople, who're

Film #125: Broadway: The Golden Age

Even if you don't consider yourself a stage enthusiast (heck, I've only taken in five or six Broadway productions), you'll be overwhelmed by Rick McKay's joyful 2004 doc Broadway: The Golden Age. The charismatic McKay is a lifelong New York stage expert who, in narration, wealthily frames his movie with reminiscences of a now-unfathomably accessible time for Broadway (you could go see a play

FILMICABILITY lands 5 Lammy nominations!

Wow! Thanks to all my fellow Lambs who submitted my site for the five categories in which I was included (Most Ambitious, Most Likely to Get Paid, Most Prolific, the Brainiac Award and the biggest surprise, for me, was the inclusion of my 20 Favorite Actors piece in the Best Blogathon/Meme category)! I didn't get a nod for Best Blog, but I did land in the top five most-nominated sites, along

Film #124: Tess

I prefer watching my fiction to reading it (non-fiction tomes are my reading predilection), so it takes quite a movie to whallop me into reading the book upon which it's based. But when I first saw Roman Polanski's 1980 masterpiece Tess on the big screen upon its release, I rushed out to snap up Thomas Hardy's Tess of the D'ubervilles, published in 1891. It's a rush of a tale--downbeat and

I like how these two pics have their own feel :)
Done for Kelly.

Film #123: Bigger Than Life

Bigger Than Life, released in 1956, is Nicholas Ray's masterpiece starring James Mason as a milquetoast elementary school teacher named Ed Avery, struggling economically at home and at work, and newly diagnosed with a rare, dooming affliction. The cure is a hormone--cortisone--that the menacing doctors advise him to take indefinitely. Once he's out of harm's way, the physicians also warn him to

2009 Movie Diary (January-early May)

I have to clear my MOVIE DIARY sidebar, so I'm committing it to posterity as an entry into the body of my blog. I review each film in fifteen words or less (which is harder than one might think). This diary doesn't include individual episodes of such TV series as The Office (US), Lou Grant, The Bob Newhart Show, The Mary Tyler Moore Show, The Partridge Family, The Honeymooners, 30 Rock, and

A Little Self-Promotion

I'm frantically trying, right now, to visit absolutely every website listed in the Large Association of Movie Blogs (or the LAMB's) pantheon. It's really difficult to do, even in the space of a week. But, as the site's annual blogger awards, the LAMMIES, are fast approaching, I have to post this ad I concocted tubthumping my own achievements this year. In little over the space of one year, I've

Senior Show 2009

On the table: portfolio, postcards, business cards, and sketchbook.

The show pieces (except for Snake Girl) are for sale for $200 each.
They are about 2 x 3-3.5ft each, acrylic on canvas print. The hangers are included!

Bunbun and ducky

It's almost Graduation and I can't escape the sadness whenever I look at the piles of brown boxes in my room.
So I painted some baby animals to help cheer myself up.
I hope it'll cheer you up too!

Best of Ringling 09

I am very proud and honored that The Four Beauties was chosen to be included in the Best of Ringling Show 2009, among all the beautiful Illustration works selected by Shawn Barber.

Side Orders #11

Just to break up The 9 Years a bit, here's another edition of my film clip series SIDE ORDERS. We start with the first film ever made -- and no, it's not Women Leaving A Factory by the Lumiere Brothers. That was the first film over 30 seconds, and was made in 1895. This is Thomas Edison's Kinetoscopic Record of a Sneeze, filmed on Jan. 7, 1894. So that means we just passed the 115th