watch it: “Is That Your Boy? Private William Hudson in Aliens”
Stop yer grinnin’ and drop yer linen…
Bill Paxton
watch it: “Martini Ranch – Reach – directed by James Cameron”
It’s like a pop culture perfect storm: In the late 1980s, James Cameron directed a music video — the only one he ever made — for Bill Paxton’s band (for the one album they made). It features, among many Cameron players of the time including Paul Reiser and Jenette Goldstein, his then-wife, Kathryn Bigelow, as … more…
trailer break: ‘The Hurt Locker’
Take a break from work: watch a trailer… I’m real excited about this one, for a couple of reasons. First: Kathryn Bigelow has demonstrated more than once that a chick can make a kickass action movie (Blue Steel, Strange Days, Near Dark) that is also smart and complicated and provocative and offers a new perspective … more…
Near Dark, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Once Bitten, Blacula, Love at First Bite, and Jesus Christ: Vampire Hunter (review)
Of course, most respected anthropologists and biologists recognize that the New World Vampire, or *vampirus americanus*, differs greatly from the European species, or *vampirus continentalus*, but few films have recognized that the wide-open spaces of the U.S. produce a vastly altered creature than Europe’s dense urban spaces or intimate, if remote, medieval villages. But years before John Carpenter and the team of Quentin Tarantino and Robert Rodriguez documented the vampires that dwell in the lonely stretches of the Americas, the criminally underappreciated ethnographer Kathryn Bigelow did it — spookily, grimly, hilariously, gloriously — with 1987’s *Near Dark,* in which a coven of nasty bloodsuckers roam the deserted American Southwest.
Frailty (review)
It sends a shiver up my spine just thinking about the movie now, even as I gaze out the window onto a gorgeous, happy, sunshiny day. It’ll be great when this one finally comes out on DVD, cuz then I’ll be able to curl up on the couch in the middle of the night wrapped in an old afghan for protection and give myself the wild heebie-jeebies watching it.
The Princess Bride (review)
To avoid the first Classic Blunder, you should: A. Never go up against a Sicilian when death is on the line; B. Never get involved in a land war in Asia; C. Never utter a line from The Princess Bride unless you want to be spouting quotes all day
Twister movie review: storm troopers
One of my very favorite movies, a superb example of the genus Popcorn Flick, unforgettable as it puts onscreen imagery we’ve never seen before. This is as close as I get to turning my brain off at the movies.
Apollo 13 (review)
Despite the fact that we all know how the story ends, director Ron Howard manages to make Apollo 13 not only riveting but suspenseful as well. Howard’s attention to detail goes above and beyond the call of duty.
Titanic (again again) (review)
A film of immense power and eerie beauty, James Cameron’s Titanic could only have been made now, not because of its technical requirements but because the cultural attitudes of the era in which it is set have come full circle to concern us again today.
A Simple Plan (review)
I’ve raved over Bill Paxton before, and I’m gonna do it again now. Paxton is one of American film’s finest and most underappreciated actors — a fact obscured by his own supremely subtle talent. A Simple Plan, an outstanding film and an instant classic, should finally bring him the recognition he deserves.
