Style over substance. That is the plaint of many a critic when they come across a film or book or any work of art they simply do not like, but which has undeniable merit, at least technically, if not in a few other measures, as well. But, the fact is that my opening words have…
The opening shot of a Boston ferry emerging from an impenetrable veil of fog as it makes it way toward a hostile, gothic-looking island proves to be an apt visual metaphor for what transpires in Shutter Island. From the moment the ferry appears and we hear the first strains of music, the audience is cued…
Pitch to Hollywood studio stooge: “You see, I’ve got this idea to do a film about a real life event, except the film will only feature about ten minutes of the real life event, as a sort of ‘in’ to get the suckers to come and drop ten bucks. Meanwhile, what we’ll do is make…
Via my forced high school readings of a novel or two and landing on a movie during a bored late night channel surf, I’m not surprised I remember very little of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s creation Sherlock Holmes. Literally, the only things that come to mind are: He was a condescending bastard who smoked a…
Credit, in some form, has to be given to Terry Gilliam for actually getting his much anticipated The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus completed. Anticipated, not necessarily because the world needed another Time Bandits or The Adventures of Baron Munchausen type movie but because Heath Ledger, the film’s lead died halfway through filming. I’m not sure…
Somebody up there likes me, and so I light a candle at the altar of the movie gods in thanks for delivering to this scare-starved horror buff a horror film worthy of the name. Written, produced, and directed by Oren Peli on a micro budget of $15,000, Paranormal Activity reinforces what The Blair Witch Project…
The already darkening skies encompassing the world of Harry Potter have darkened further in Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, the sixth installment of the wildly popular movie franchise. Long gone is the baby-faced innocence our would-be wizards once had when they first entered Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. There is now deep-seeded resentment…
