Director Kathryn Bigelow took Best Director Oscar honors for 2009’s low-budget war drama “The Hurt Locker”. That film was released in the summer, got a small amount of early buzz but was the talk of Hollywood by awards season. Now, with “Zero Dark Thirty” Bigelow proves that she’s one of the best directors working today. […]
Tom Hooper won the Best Director Academy Award two years ago for Best Picture winner “The King’s Speech”. His style of directing is distinct: using shots that don’t always place his subjects in the middle of the frame and shooting characters tight so you can really see their facial expressions. And this style is front […]
Good Evening. Alfred Hitchcock is “Notorious” for his classic suspense and horror films and, as we’ve found out this year in the HBO film “The Girl”, his obsession with his leading ladies. But it turns-out the real leading lady in Hitchcock’s life was his wife Alma. And that, and much more, is explored in-depth in […]
“The name’s Bond…James Bond”. A classic movie catchphrase that’s lasted 50 years and now 23 films. “Skyfall” is the third Bond film starring Daniel Craig, and the first in four years. Why so long? MGM’s troubles threatened “Skyfall” from getting made. But 007 fans found out last summer that the finished product was well worth […]
“Side by Side” is the true story of the current cinematic showdown between film and digital movie-making. It’s director vs. director, cinematographer vs. cinematographer, actor vs. actor with Keanu Reeves as narrator and interviewer. This documentary provides more information and expert opinion on the battle between traditional filmmaking and modern technical advances than you could […]
When I was four years old, my mother took me to see “Finding Nemo”. It was my first animated film on the big screen. And…I cried and laughed and cheered. Even at a very young age, “Nemo” made an impression on me, as did the very talented people at Pixar. And I’ve admired the studio […]
Directors Chris Butler and Sam Fell believe that “ParaNorman” is the most ambitious stop-motion animated film ever made. That’s a pretty big statement. But you know what? – They’re right. And this team and the thousands of others who worked for years on this movie pull it off in style. “ParaNorman” is a fantastic accomplishment. The […]
Pixar’s track record for great animated movies has been close to perfect. I wasn’t a huge fan of “Wall-E”, though many think it’s the studio’s best. I liked last year’s “Cars 2” a lot, though it didn’t get the overall critical reaction it deserved. The studio’s 13th feature, “Brave”, is their first with a female […]
“Snow White & the Huntsman” is a much darker adaptation of the classic story than “Mirror Mirror”, the Julia Roberts family comedy that came out in March. It’s also a much, much better film. This version is set in medieval times. It begins with Snow White as a young princess. Her mother, the Queen, has […]
Aardman Animation is best known for their stop-motion, claymation films and shorts, many of them involving the characters Wallace and Gromit, and most of them award-winning. On the big screen Aardman has given us 2000’s “Chicken Run” and 2005’s “Wallace & Gromit: The Curse of the Were-Rabbit” and, more recently, the studio provided character development […]