“When a man's jawbone drops off it's time to reassess the situation.” Gear up with us for the Halloween season with Peter Jackson’s 1996 Hollywood studio debut The Frighteners. When unhappy architect Frank Bannister blacks out drunk at the wheel, only to awake after his wife has died in violent, suspicious circumstances, he wastes away... Continue Reading →
“EVERYBODY HAPPY!” Dig out your Moby CDs, log onto My Excite, and check your electronic mail for Danny Boyle’s divisive, turn-of-the-millennium hippy-dippy paradise existential Leonardo DiCaprio vehicle The Beach. Did its comedy conquer the world, or was it an ASSH*LE suggestion? Did it stand a chicken’s chance in Thailand? Was it a lot of dope,... Continue Reading →
"Hey, Elliot, where's your goblin?" Our sporadic Steven Spielberg season returns with the film that launched a thousand suburban-kids-on-bikes knockoffs, 1982's megahit E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial. When an intergalactic flight makes an emergency departure from Earth for fear of discovery, the alien visitors leave behind one of their own - a stumpy, long-necked, wide-eyed, curious explorer... Continue Reading →
“One, two, three! And I don't even miss her, two, three! One, two, three! And I don't even miss her, two, three...!” 1970s comedians’ comedian Albert Brooks co-writes and directs his acerbic 1981 relationship comedy-drama sophomore feature Modern Romance. Self-sabotaging film editor Robert (Brooks) arranges a hasty breakup, seemingly the latest of many, from frustrated... Continue Reading →
F*ck-a-doodle-doo. As spring turns to summer, so the nuptial season is upon us, and we’re celebrating with the breakthrough 1994 Brit romcom classic Four Weddings and a Funeral. Charmingly dishevelled serial monogamist bachelor Charles (Hugh Grant) meets mysterious and beautiful American Carrie (Andie McDowell) at a wedding for which he is the best man. Over... Continue Reading →
“Stupid is as stupid does.” We're lacing up our Nikes and just… feel like running with the multi-OSCAR-winning 1994 Robert Zemeckis megahit Forrest Gump. The titular Forrest, Forrest Gump (Tom Hanks), born the simple son of a single mother in the Jim Crow South, guilelessly glides through the second half of the American Century in... Continue Reading →
Our second foray into the greatest detective series ever made continues with an episode from the final year of the show's original NBC run - 1977's Try & Catch Me, starring Ruth Gordon as a mystery novelist in a very different vein from Jack Cassidy's smug charlatan in Murder By The Book. Bringing the likeable... Continue Reading →
“You'll never get anywhere treating your helmet like a lunchbox son.” We’re getting into our three-point stance on the mini gridiron for the 1994 family sports comedy Little Giants. Local legend Kevin O’Shea (Ed O’Neill), a Heisman Trophy-winning football hero, is running tryouts for his Pee-Wee football team, where he mercilessly discards the ‘misfit’ kids.... Continue Reading →
Introduced by Devlin Gali may not have introduced me to Columbo as such - I'd watched it before and enjoyed it, I'm sure - but he was certainly the person who anchored it as a regular viewing habit. Back when we were housemates in the Hyde Park area of Leeds, we would commandeer the living... Continue Reading →
“I'd like to report a truck driver who's been endangering my life!” Our Steven Spielberg Series continues with a detour back to where it all started - 1971’s TV movie-turned-theatrical debut DUEL. Mild mannered travelling salesman David Mann (Dennis Weaver) finds himself the unexplained target of escalating threats from a mysterious, smoke-belching truck’s largely unseen... Continue Reading →
