So I got a free pass to see a preview of the new film Forgetting Sarah Marshall and I went mostly because of my long-standing policy never to refuse a free movie, but partly because of my fandom of co-star Mila Kunis, the only reason I ever tuned in to That 70’s Show. What […]
As I stated in my original review, Mulan is a strong entry from Disney animation at a time when they were really blowing hot and cold. The story still has a lot of the formulaic problems that marked Disney films of the day, but it is at least executed very well, with good songs, […]
Pink Floyd The Wall is director Alan Parker’s fever-dream adaptation of the well-known rock opera/album. Now, Parker was (and is) no stranger to films with significant musical content, having directed Fame, Birdy, Evita and The Commitments, to name a few. With The Wall, however, he actually hit a wall named Roger Waters and […]
I am probably unduly fond of Graffiti Bridge, Prince’s 1990 sequel to his groundbreaking Purple Rain. On almost every level (except the music - mor on that later), Bridge is inferior to Rain. The story is more convoluted, the dialogue more stilted, the sets look more fake. But there’s something deep inside […]
The original, 1968 version of Mel Brook’s The Producers and its 2005 remake naturally have a lot in common. But there are almost as many differences. As I mentioned in my original review, the biggest change is the expansion of the storyline to include a love story for Leo.
These changes alter the dynamic […]
Pete’s Dragon is an odd film that marked the last time Disney had animation and live action interact onscreen. (There was, of course, Who Framed Roger Rabbit in 1988, but that was released as a Touchstone film.) It has a lot in common with the animated films of the day and less with […]
Melody Time is the next-to-the-last of Disney’s “package” films (The Adventures of Ichabod and Mr. Toad would end the era). It has a larger number of individual stories than most and, being music-based, it has more in common with Fantasia than the other package films.
First up is “Once Upon a Wintertime”, a short, unmemorable […]
The Adventures of Ichabod and Mr. Toad is the last of Disney’s classic “package” films. It, obviously, features two stories: Ichabod Crane’s from Washington Irving’s The Legend of Sleepy Hollow and Mr. Toad’s from Kenneth Grahame’s The Wind in the Willows. The connection between the two is the stated desire to show one […]
The Great Mouse Detective is a highlight of the “dark days” of Disney Animation - those years between the death of Walt Disney and the renaissance brought about by the production of The Little Mermaid.
It is an adaptation of the Paul Galdone novel Basil of Baker Street and tells the story of Basil, a mouse […]
After a long, strange journey from stage to screen, Evita finally reached theaters in 1996, twenty years after the original concept album was released.
I think things really started going with the selection of director Alan Parker. With a strong background in musical films that are not really musicals (Pink Floyd: The Wall, Birdy, The […]
The suits over at Disney must have been feeling pretty good about themselves when they released Aladdin. They had just come off the enormously successful Beauty and the Beast (the only animated film ever nominated for an Academy Award for Best Picture) and seemed to be on a roll. With much of the […]
The Lion King is the perfect culmination of all that had been ocurring at Disney Animation since the renaissance begun with The Little Mermaid. With each project, the visuals had become more lush and the stories had become more universal and more widely appealing. But it took the masterstroke (conceived by lyricist Tim […]
Alright, I know ther are some people who hate Ishtar with a burning passion. I am convinced, however, that these are people who’ve never actually seen the movie. Sure, it is an aggressively silly movie. Sure, it cost wa-a-a-a-ay too much money to make. But if taken as it is (a […]
The Little Mermaid is another film that I could go on about for days if given the opportunity. The main thing that sets it apart from the Disney animated films that preceded it was the focus on music. This is not surprising, as lyricist Howard Ashman also served as a producer on the […]
Tenacious D in The Pick of Destiny is a perfect example of how a very funny premise from very funny people can utterly fail to expand to meet the demands of a feature film. While Tenacious D worked very well as a TV series or as an album, the film version is simply […]
“If you go to only one concert this year… the Prince movie is the one!” said the posters for Sign “O” the Times. And it certainly does give the viewer a sense of what it was like to attend a Prince concert in those days, when he was, perhaps, at the height of his […]
Modesty Blaise as high-camp musical comedy? If you’ve ever read a Modety Blaise novel*, you’ll understand why fans of the comic and novel series thoroughly dislike this film. It flies in the face of the generally serious tone of Peter O’Donnell’s creation. And, yes, I usually back the side of purity when […]
There are three main events that launched the Beatles into the world-wide sensations that they were in the 1960s. First, was their arrival in America. The shock of their unparalleled reception made all of America aware of them. Next, their appearance on The Ed Sullivan Show let the country (and eventually the […]
Under the Cherry Moon
*singing*
How can i stand 2 sit through this stuff?
Must be a big fan, to watch all this fluff
Why does it fail in so many ways?
Prince could have made any film he could choose,
So why did he make Under the Cherry Moon?
It’s not like he can’t write with style or flair
He could’ve done […]
Hercules is an interesting entry in the Walt Disney Feature Animation canon. Directed by Ron Clements and John Musker (previously of The Great Mouse Detective, The Little Mermaid and Aladdin) and with music by Alan Menken, it reunited much of the creative team behind two of the greatest films in Disney’s “Renaissance”. After […]
In 1996, wroter/director/actor Christopher Guest revisited a film form that he had last visited in This is Spinal Tap as a writer/performer: the mockumentary. In Waiting for Guffman, he presents a very similarly styled tale, one of relative incompetance and failure to live up to even meager expectations.
Guffman, is much more of an […]
Fantasia and Fantasia 2000 are two of Disney’s more interesting releases. Originally envisioned by Walt Disney as an “event” (one that you would dress up for, as if going to a real concert), Fantasia was a financial disaster for the company, almost bringing them to ruin.
And it wasn’t all that warmly received critically, either. […]
Now, I’ve been a big fan of Bob Hope since the days of my youth, when the local independant station used to show his movies every saturday or Sunday morning. (This is also the cause of my love for Godzilla and Blondie movies.) But ever since then, my favorite has been Son of […]
Purple Rain is the film and album that truly put Prince on the map. Oh, he had had success before, particularly with 1999 and the song “Little Red Corvette”. But it was nothing like the full assault that was Purple Rain in the summer of 1984. And it’s easy to see why. […]
For a complete change of pace, I next watched what I consider to be one of the best (if not THE best) documentary of a music group, The Filth and the Fury. Filth tells of the rise and fall of The Sex Pistols, with the approval and involvement of the band. Much of […]
I was in the mood for something easy to watch, so I next chose This is Spinal Tap , since I’ve seen it so many times that I don’t need to focus in too hard on it anymore. Tap is an all-time classic, with phrases like “goes to eleven” becoming commonplace in popular culture. […]
Viewed December 20, 2006
Naughty Marietta marked the beginning of one of the most successful film pairings in history, that of Jeanette MacDonald and Nelson Eddy. MacDonald was already a popular film star when seh was paired with Eddy, who was a well-known (but not super-famous) singer. All that changed after this film and […]
Viewed December 12, 2006
The Road to El Dorado is another one of those films I have no excuse for not having seen. After all, I’ve owned the soundtrack since it came out, since the songs are performed by Elton John with lyrics by Tim Rice (of whom I’m a big fan). In fact, […]
Viewed November 30, 2006
Like many, the first notice I gave Gumnaam was when I saw it’s opening dance number included in the film Ghost World. But far from the wacky 60’s romp that the number seems to indicate, Gumnaam turns out to be a somewhat altered re-telling of Agatha Christie’s Ten Little Indians (uncredited, […]
Viewed November 25, 2006
The Cheetah Girls 2 is the second Disney Channel Original Movie in a series based on books by Deborah Gregory that chronicle the trials and tribulations of a girl singing group in-the-making. Having faced difficulties finding their common voice in the first film, in CG2, they travel to Barcelona, Spain to […]
Viewed November 24, 2006
Oliver & Company is the 27th “Disney Animated Classic” and found Disney at a crossroads. Since the death of Walt, they had released fewer animated features and of arguably decreasing quality. When Michael Eisner took over Disney in 1984, one of the goals set out for his new management team […]
Viewed November 5, 2006
One of the biggest hurdles that most Disney straight-to-video sequels have to clear is maintaining the tone of the original film. Some fail spectacularly (The Lion King 2), while others are surprisingly strong (Alladin and the King of Thieves, Bambi II). Of course, some ignore the original tone completely and […]
Viewed November 3, 2006
Okay, so what the heck is the big deal about High School Musical? What should have been just a typical Disney Channel Original Movie burst onto the scene as a minor cultural phenomenon. The CD is the best-selling album of the year. The DVD sold like hotcakes (and there’s […]
Viewed October 15, 2006
La Carrera Panamericana follows the 1991 running of the automobile race of the same name. The race was first held in the 1950s to commemorate the recent completion of the Mexican strecth of the Panamerican Highway. It was discontinued in 1954 because of too many deaths and other injuries. […]
Viewed September 20, 2006
Tim Burton’s Corpse Bride wants desperately to be The Nightmare Before Christmas. But it isn’t, not by a long shot. The story is less engaging and the songs are forgettable, a pale shadow of the ones in Nightmare.
And that’s probably the biggest problem with Corpse Bride. The songs in […]
Viewed September 11, 2006
Classic Albums: Pink Floyd - The Making of ‘The Dark Side of the Moon’ does a fine job of digging into Pink Floyd’s creative process, while displaying how connected to their work the members of the band have remained over the years.
There is plenty of the classic music of Dark Side of […]
Viewed July 26, 2006
Wild Man Blues documents Woody Allen’s 1996 European tour playing with his New Orleans Jazz band. Done on a whim, Allen soon found himself the center of a media frenzy as excitement over his rare performances outside his native New York City brought much more attention to the “tour” than Allen […]
Viewed July 21, 2006
In the 1940s RCM Productions began making a series of very short films for projection in jukebox-like machines. These short films were called “soundies” and were, basically, music videos. They would often have a modest storyline, but the main focus was always on whatever song was being performed throughout the […]
Viewed June 29, 2006
Poor, maligned Josie and the Pussycats. A parody of mega-merchandising knocked by critics for being too commercial, Josie (based on the Archie comics and Hanna-Barbera cartoon show of the same name) may be the most mis-understood comic book movie ever.
Now, I’m a big fan of Josie and the Pussycats. Or, […]
Viewed June 20, 2006
It’s always difficult to make a sequel to a beloved film. It’s even harder when a significant period of time has passed. Witness The Two Jakes to see it done well and Slap Shot 2 to see it done poorly. The Rutles 2: Can’t Buy Me Lunch falls […]
Viewed June 14, 2006
Phil Collins: Face Value is one of the series of “Classic Albums” documentaries, designed to explore the creation of music albums that have stood the test of time. This one, naturally, covers Collins’ debut solo album from 1981.
It goes into quite a bit of depth concerning the artistic decisions made with […]
Viewed June 9, 2006
Ahh, what the heck. If I can’t watch an extra movie now and then, what’s the point? So…One Man Band.
This short, released theatrically alongside Cars, is (as far as I’m concerned) a return to form for Pixar. The last two shorts, Boundin’ and Jack-Jack Attack, I found to be […]
Viewed June 4, 2006
Boundin’ is a lightweight cartoon as Pixar shorts go. Created by veteran animator Bud Luckey, it tells the story of a sheep who is very proud of his wool, only to have it shorn off to his humiliation. A fortuitous encounter with a legendary jackalope helps him come to terms […]
Viewed March 21, 2006
Pink Floyd: Live at Pompeii, which documents a no-audience performance by Pink Floyd at a Pompeii auditorium, comes in two distinct flavors: the original 1972 version, that features only performance footage and the 2002 “Director’s Cut”, which features contemporary interviews with the band, as well as visuals augmented by computer generated images […]
Viewed March 17, 2006
The debate rages on as to whether Disney devalues its films by releasing straight-to-video sequels like The Little Mermaid II: Return to the Sea (2000) and Cinderella II: Dreams Come True (2002). Often, these films lack the spark that made the original so beloved. There are usually several key cast […]
Viewed March 3, 2006
At the time that Chicken Little was made and originally released, it seemed unlikely that Disney and Pixar would be working together ever again and Disney needed to show they could at least compete in the arena of CGI films. Since then, of course, Disney has agreed to buy Pixar, but […]
Viewed February 28, 2006
I had so completely prepared myself to be disappointed by The Producers that I was shocked by how much I liked it. Whoever was in charge of marketing this film should be fired. I watched it with a modest-sized audience in a discount theater and they never stopped laughing. […]
Viewed January 19, 2006
Apparently, playing Bobby Darin on screen was a long-standing dream of Kevin Spacey’s. He finally realized this ambition with his turn as actor/director/co-scripter on Beyond The Sea. I must admit that my love of Darin’s music combined with a relative malaise concerning Spacey’s recent work made me more than a […]