On Melanie
There’s news every other week of another movie legend leaving us; the further we get from those industry-shaping years of the first part of last century, the fewer of them there are still with us. When that news does break, I find myself – like everyone else – surprised and saddened. My next thought is usually that I wish I knew more about that person’s work, and wish I’d taken the time to appreciate them while they were still with us. Case in point: actress Olivia de Havilland turns 100 years old today. The last surviving actor from the principal cast of Gone With The Wind and Hollywood’s golden age, she’s lived her…
SXSW: the Good, the Bad, the BBQ
In 2009, I was working full-time at a tech company building some serious client-facing experience and learning the digital marketing ropes while I toiled away at the Indy Film Fest on nights and weekends. Sometime late that year, it occurred to me that I could take advantage of the company’s conference policy – employees on my team could attend one career-centered conference a year – while bolstering my film festival cred at the same time. The magic event? That grown-up Spring Break that descends on Austin each March, SXSW. So it was that I attended my first SX (read: South By) in 2010, dedicating the first part of my week to…
The pull of GRAVITY, part one
In order to fully process all the awesome of Gravity, this post most assuredly contains spoilers. If you ever (even maybe) plan on seeing the film, I’d encourage you to skip this. If you’ve seen it, though – read on, and lemme know what you think, too! Several weeks ago, I saw a trailer for Gravity. Like everyone else who watched it, I was instantly intrigued. A few weeks ago, when the film made its premiere and the unqualified positive reviews hit, I was sold. I can’t remember the last film of this caliber that’s been so resoundingly praised – not Avatar, not Lincoln, nothing comes to mind that is in the…
Giving you fair (cinematic) warning.
Over the years, wherever I happen to be blogging at the moment, I tend to take time in the Fall to share my excitement about the coming movie season. Because Fall and into the Winter is a veritable candy store of the best films of the year. If you happen to be a kid who loves movies like most kids love candy. With the Oscars (and every other major awards) hitting in the beginning of the new year, studios release their heaviest hitters at the end of the year (so Academy voters remember them come voting time). Besides, with rare exception in the likes of special effects categories, no one…
Spielberg, Scorsese and Lucas walk into a bar…
This incredible piece of television history was making the rounds online last week. Of course I have all the thoughts about it. For one, I was 8 when this aired. While I was already watching At the Movies at that age, I hadn’t yet honed in on the masterful work of “The Three Great American Directors” Siskel & Ebert interview in this gem. Arguably, George Lucas, Steven Spielberg and Martin Scorsese are still the Three Greats, all these twenty-odd years later, each still making films that at least make headlines if not history. There are so many amazing things about this forty-eight minute video (seriously, worth every one), not the…
