𝔽𝕠𝕝𝕝𝕠𝕨𝕚𝕟𝕘 𝔽𝕚𝕝𝕞𝕤

I was invited to be guest on a recent episode of War Machine Vs. War Horse. In this episode we discuss The Zero Theorem, Ikiru and I Heart Huckabees

I guess it was only a matter of time but Netflix is getting into the movie making business. The streaming service known primarily for television series bad Wesley Snipes direct to video releases and 9/11 truther documentaries announced this week that it would team with Weinstein Co. to give a day-and-date release to  Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon: The Green Legend , the sequel to  Ang Lee ‘s 2000 film. The movie will hit Netflix and IMAX simultaneously in summer 2015. Right out of the gate I have mixed feelings about this. I love my Netflix subscription and I feel same day releases for VOD and theaters is a positive thing. With that being said I think certain types of films should be seen theatrically. I'm the father of a four year so getting out to the movies is much harder these days. This purely for my own selfish reasons but I'm going to ask film distributors and exhibitors to stop making it so damn easy for me to avoid the multi-plex.  I miss going to the theater

At Your Convenience from Raymond C. Lai on Vimeo .

Beautiful slow motion, black and white, underwater, photography and a pretty damn good song PASSING CARS - SECRET SUN (OFFICIAL MUSIC VIDEO) from Hervé Baillargeon on Vimeo .

If you thought Bill & Ted were dead... In a recent interview promoting Grand Piano Alex Winter discussed the future of the Bill & Ted franchise.   if you want more Alex Winter you can read the full story on Yahoo here   or check out his recent appearance on the Kevin Pollak Chat Show  here

Jersey Girl is in no way a bad film in fact I will go as far as to say it’s a great film. The movie was released in 2004 at the height of “Bennifer” a time when most of us were sick of hearing about the couple. I’m not somebody who reads EW, Perez Hilton or any other publications that concentrate on celebrity gossip and yet even I had become inundated with this couples story. If you’re lucky enough to not know what “Bennifer” means; first of all I’m envious of you, second it was a nickname given to Ben Affleck and Jennifer Lopez when they were dating. I shouldn't know that Jennifer Lopez didn't approve of Afflecks muscle cars and made him purchased a more refined and status appropriate vehicle. I shouldn't know that. I don’t remember the periodic table and yet I know that. Combine the complete media obsession with anything “Bennifer” and a director who has his fair share of detractors and you end up with a film that was fighting an uphill battle to be judged on its own

The Films of David Fincher from Daniel Silva on Vimeo .

Sandro Miller is currently showing her collection of photographs featuring John Malkovich at the Catherine Edelman galery.  About the exhibition: At the age of sixteen, upon seeing the work of Irving Penn, Sandro Miller knew he wanted to become a photographer. Mostly self-taught, Sandro relied on books published by many of the great artists canonized in photographic history.  Through their pictures, he learned the art of composition, lighting and portraiture. More than 30 years later, with clients ranging from Forbes, GQ and Esquire, to American Express, Coca-Cola and BMW, Sandro has secured his place as one of the top advertising photographers worldwide.  His success in the commercial world allows him to continue his personal projects, which has included working in Cuba, photographing American blues musicians, various dance troupes, and extended endeavors with John Malkovich, his long time friend and collaborator. Sandro first met Malkovich in

you can purchase these prints and more here . 

Kevin Smith has made something truly unique with Tusk. This is a film that requires over 200 hours of preparation to fully appreciate and possibly enjoy. The film was spawned from a conversation on Smith's hugely popular podcast and is filled with nods and references to that show. As someone who has listened to every episode of the podcast I enjoyed those nods and felt like this was a film made for a very specific group of people, a group that I am proudly a part of. I have no doubt in my mind that this is the exact film Smith wanted to make, this one didn't get any studio notes. The film is based on an apparent hoax that was posted... I'll just show you instead of describing it. Scott Mosier (Smiths long time producer and fellow podcaster) and Smith were captured by the post and began riffing on what a movie of this walrus man would be like. The conversation was great, just two guys riffing and about halfway through the show it became clear they were on to somet

Steven Soderbergh wants you to watch Raiders of the lost Ark in black and white with an alternative soundtrack. The following is the post about his experiment  Raiders SEP 22, 2014 (Note: This posting is for educational purposes only.) I’m assuming the phrase “staging” came out of the theatre world, but it’s equally at home (and useful) in the movie world, since the term (roughly defined) refers to how all the various elements of a given scene or piece are aligned, arranged, and coordinated. In movies the role of editing adds something unique: the opportunity to extend and/or expand a visual (or narrative) idea to the limits of one’s imagination—a crazy idea that works today is tomorrow’s normal. I value the ability to stage something well because when it’s done well its pleasures are huge, and most people don’t do it well, which indicates it must not be easy to master (it’s frightening how many opportunities there are to do something wrong in a seque

Thanks to  Dave  for turning me on to this great little film  

Check back here on Sept 18th at 11:45 pm EST for the live ABC's of Death 2 Q&A following the world premier at this years Fantastic Fest

2004 Directed by David O Russell  Starring Jason Schwartzman, Jude Law, Naomi Watts, Mark Wahlberg, Dustin Hoffman and Lily Tomlin It had been ten years since I'd seen Huckabees and while the film hasn't changed my reaction to it certainly has. When I first saw the film I loved it. I loved how the message of the film was fairly simple but all the distracting double speak and psycho-babble made the film feel aloof and unapproachable. I was in my mid-twenties and I guess I was attracted to aloof and unapproachable. Now those same qualities in this particular context are somewhat annoying and feel pretentious for the sake of being pretentious. Not that this is bad movie by any stretch of the imagination but rather a movie made for a younger man by a younger man. Albert (Schwartzman) is having an existential crisis and hires a pair of existential detectives (Hoffman and Tomlin) to solve a coincidence. The detectives decide to pair up Albert with his "other"

1952 Directed by Akira Kurosawa Starring Takashi Shimura Ikiru (to live) is a film about a dying man struggling to find the meaning of his life. We are introduced to Kanji Wantanabe (Shimura) with a narrator telling us he has terminal stomach cancer as we see an X-Ray of his illness. The narrator tells us that Watanabe has wasted his life and never truly lived. We are told of his cancer before he is. Wanatnabe is so painfully unaware of his life that we the audience know more about him than he knows about himself, and this is within the opening frames of the film. He is a low level bureaucrat who spends his days moving paper from one side of his desk to the other, mindlessly stamping his days away. Watanabe finds out that he has cancer in the doctors office waiting room. Its not a doctor that tells him but a patient in the waiting room. The stranger tells him what the doctor will say and how he will cover up the severity of his condition. When the doctor tells Wantanabe

If you scratched your head at the idea of Tom Hiddleston playing Hank Williams this should put some of those worries at ease.

2013 Directed by Terry Gilliam  Starring Christoph Waltz, Lucas Hedges and Melanie Thierry  Qohen Leth (Waltz) is a reclusive computer programmer working on the zero theorem, a theory that all existence is meaningless and nothing is connected. This film fits in perfectly with Gilliam's other future films Brazil and 12 Monkeys and   I can comfortably say this is Gilliam's finest film since 1985s aforementioned Brazil . While the film is dealing with the meaning of life and existence its never heavy handed and is often quite funny. Familiar themes from other Gilliam films like big brother, government and madness are all explored but he clearly was thinking about technology with this outing. During the opening sequence Qohen is bombarded by advertising while walking to work. A moving video billboard mentions a promotion called "Occupy Mall Street" and while this is clearly satire its sadly not that far off from our current reality. Most of the satire in

V/H/S: Viral will be available on VOD on Oct. 23rd just in time for Halloween

2014 Directed by Leigh Janiak Starring Rose Leslie and Harry Treadaway  A honeymoon is in many ways a transformation, the melding of two lives. For some it can mean the loss of individuality to gain to deeper sense of connection to another, for others it simply means a time of hope and promise. The honeymoon phase is a time of deep passion and optimism, our eyes are wide and the world is full of possibilities. Director/Writer Leigh Janiak with her film  Honeymoon  has taken this time of unlimited potential and driven a spike through its still beating heart. The film follows Paul (Harry Treadaway) and Bea (Rose Leslie) as they honeymoon at a remote cabin next to a picturesque lake. Soon into the couples stay Paul discovers Bea in the woods, wandering and alone with no recollection of how she got there. After that night Bea starts to display peculiar behavior and it becomes increasingly clear that something terrible happened to her that night. Paul Treadaway ( Control )

31  Devil 2010 Directed by John Erick Dowdle  A group of people are trapped in an elevator and the Devil is mysteriously amongst them. Not a great movie by any stretch of the imagination but it has a few scares and is surprisingly fun. 30  Monsters  2010  Directed by Gareth Edwards Six years after Earth has suffered an alien invasion a cynical journalist agrees to escort a shaken American tourist through an infected zone in Mexico to the safety of the US border. 29  Lovely Molly 2011 Directed by Eduardo Sanchez   Newlywed Molly moves into her deceased father's house in the countryside, where painful memories soon begin to haunt her. Almost a great movie. 28  Red State 2011 Directed by Kevin Smith Set in Middle America, a group of teens receive an online invitation for sex, though they soon encounter fundamentalists with a much more sinister agenda. Not really sure this qualifies as a horror movie but it certai