Cult of the Week: Volume 5 Quentin Tarantino is every video store clerk’s idol, and every film critic’s nightmare. Venerated by midnight movie buffs and Blockbuster cashiers for his unadulterated love of cult cinema, Tarantino has proved that a film school education is no match for passion, creativity, and kinetic energy. Unfortunately for film critics, …
Body Count: Volume 1 Horror. The much maligned, hard partying, estranged uncle of cinema. Being the reasonably presentable professional that I am by day, it often shocks people that I, a man in his thirties of above-average intelligence devotes such a large portion of his free time mentally cataloguing some of the worst movies ever …
On a dark and rainy night a few years ago I attended an 11pm screening of Eraserhead at Cinema du Parc, my favorite source for late night cult classics. Afterwards I popped into the bathroom with a full bladder and made my way into one of the stalls. Two guys walked in while I was …
Adventureland 2009, USA Directed by: Greg Mottola Written by: Greg Mottola Starring: Jesse Eisenberg, Kirstin Stewart, Bill Hader, Kirstin Wiig, Martin Starr, Michael Zegen Based on his own real life experience working summers at an amusement park in Long Island, NY, Greg Mottola’s follow up to last summer’s sleeper hit Superbad is a poignant and …
Cult Cinema: Volume 4 David Lynch films are a litmus test of intelligence. You don’t have to like them to prove that your cinematic IQ is above the level of a mouth-breather with a Vin Diesel DVD collection. But you do have to realize the films’ artistic merit. And then give lengthy interpretations of their …
My Bloody Valentine 3D, released in early January of this year, was just the first of a parade of 3D films to be released in 2009. The remake of the 1981 cult classic with a budget of $15 million went on to gross over $67 million at the box office. Although the film received mixed …
Cult Cinema: Volume 3 In the 1950s, a group of French writers revolutionized film criticism with the magazine Cahiers du cinéma. By re-evaluating the films of Alfred Hitchcock, Howard Hawks, and John Hughes, among others, the critics gave birth to a grand unified ‘auteur theory,’ which positions the director as the ultimate creative force behind …
5 – The Ring (2002) Considering I didn’t find the original scary, it’s impressive that I was thoroughly creeped out by the nearly shot-for-shot remake. There is always something a little more interesting in the exploration of the unknown, so if your senses have been dulled by the formulaic slasher film, then its quieter take …
Cult Cinema: Volume 2 In terms of cult cinema, anime, which encompasses a wide variety of genres within the blanket term of Japanese animation, can be difficult to categorize. Thankfully, its fans are not, because they all adopt the same high-pitched tone of indignation whenever you point out that jerking off to 14-year olds covered …
There are questions to be asked about films like The Last House on the Left, which ostensibly comments on society’s approach to violence. Can graphic gore be discussed without being glorified? Is it possible to portray a vigilante in a way that won’t inspire at least part of the audience to stock up on balaclavas …
The definition of a slasher film varies depending on who you ask, but in general, it contains several specific traits that feed into the genre’s formula. Every slasher has a killer whose identity is often concealed (or at least his face in cases of characters such as Michael Myer and Jason Voorhees) and for no …
Cult Cinema : Volume 1 Religion is a beautiful thing. Provided you’re a Paleolithic savage who needs fairy tales and a lumpy fertility idol in the shape of a BBW centerfold to explain where babies come from. Anyone else still believing in magic and wizards should read a book that wasn’t written before humanity invented …
One of the most audacious studio blockbusters in modern Hollywood history, Watchmen succeeds in spite, not because of, its widely recognized pedigree. Alan Moore’s sharp, detailed writing and Dave Gibbons’ iconic illustrations helped to make it the most celebrated superhero comic of all time. Fans, many of them diehard purists to whom alterations to the …
Annoyed by the ubiquity of the Apatow brand? Understandable – but imagine for a moment that the hands-on producer and director’s previous hits (from 40-Year Old Virgin to Pineapple Express) were all handled by the anonymous hacks that usually pilfer out studio comedies. One might reasonably reply that it wouldn’t make a difference if the …
Dear Zachary Directed by Kurt Kuenne Dear Zachary, at various points throughout its 93-minute runtime, acts as home movie, eulogy, horror film, crime procedural, and a naked call for activism. Ultimately, however, it emerges as an emotional atom bomb, a film tightly constructed to provide a series of sharp, painful shocks, carefully doled out at …
Despite its apparent complexity, 3D is actually a deceptively simple process. Two images are filmed, one offset from the other by a same measurement that separates your two eyes, and then one is projected in red, the other in blue. The glasses that are handed out in the cinema, or in a copy of TV …
The Curious Case of Benjamin Button 2008, USA Directed by David Fincher Written by Eric Roth (screenplay and screen story), Robin Swicord (screen story), F. Scott Fitzgerald (short story) Produced by Cean Chaffin, Kathleen Kennedy, Frank Marshall Starring: Cate Blanchett, Brad Pitt, Julia Ormond, Taraji P. Henson In the Oxford English dictionary, the definition of …
The International 2009, USA Directed by: Tom Tykwer Written by: Eric Singer Produced by: Lloyd Philips, Charles Roven, Richard Suckle Starring: Clive Owen, Naomi Watts, Armin Mueller-Stahl, Ulrich Thomsen Filmed all over Europe and the US, The International aims to be a slick action thriller in the vein of the Bourne films, with a bit …
Burn After Reading 2008, USA Directed by Ethan Coen, Joel Coen Written by Joel Coen & Ethan Coen Produced by Tim Bevan, Ethan Coen, Joel Coen, Eric Fellner Starring: George Clooney, Frances McDormand, John Malkovitch, Tilda Swinton, Brad Pitt There’s a fine line between cynical black comedy and sociopathy. On one side of it, you …
Taken Directed by Pierre Morel Written by Robert Mark Kamen and Luc Besson 2008, USA With the arrival of the Obama age, filmgoers will now render their verdict on what remains of the spy thriller, a genre that found itself massively retooled during the Bush era. In the age of extraordinary rendition and “enhanced” interrogation …
Don`t forget to come back and check out episode 91 of Sound On Sight when we start our look back at the history of the Academy Awards. For now here is a look back at the previous winners of best picture. Best Picture 1928-1938 Best Picture 1939-1949 Best Picture 1950-1959 Best Picture 1960-1969 Best Picture …
Over the last thirty years, moviegoers have endured countless films that carry the tag “slasher” – nearly all of them being direct descendants of two classic horror films, Bob Clark’s “Black Christmas” (1974) and John Carpenter’s “Halloween.” Since then, they’ve become an efficient source for studios to make quick cash, as they’re inexpensive to make …
1- The Wrestler 2- Let The Right One In 3- Hunger 4- Wall-E 5- The Dark Knight 6- Milk 7- Paranoid Park 8- In Bruges 9- Happy Go Lucky 10- My Winnipeg 11- Rachel Getting Married 12- Man On Wire 13- A Christmas Tale 14- Waltz with Bashir 15- Forgetting Sarah Marshall 16- Synecdoche New …