Although I know I’ve enjoyed watching movies pretty much since I can remember, I have few specific memories from childhood. It always amazes me when people have a clear recollection of “the first movie I ever saw” … I know I went to see movies fairly regularly as a child, British B-movies, Carry On films […]
One of the “advantages” of having a tedious day job which requires a certain amount of concentration but very little thought is that I can spend my shifts listening to my iPod. I’ve recently been addicted to old-time radio shows – among them The Shadow, Gang Busters, Escape, Inner Sanctum, Nero Wolfe, even an excellent […]
I recently picked up a copy of Raising Hell: Ken Russell and the Unmaking of The Devils by Richard Crouse (ECW Press, 2012). It’s a breezy read recounting the production history and subsequent fate of Russell’s 1971 masterpiece (perhaps a little too breezy: Rouse confuses Russell’s Isadora Duncan, the Biggest Dancer in the World [1966], […]
When Stanley Kubrick’s movies were released on Blu-ray back in 2011, I decided it was time to watch them all again in chronological order. In part to remind myself of just why he’d been important to my sense of film for over forty years, and in part to see what patterns I could discern in […]
A few days ago, a co-worker asked me whether, “as a film buff”, I watch the Oscars, and had I seen all the nominated movies? The answer to both questions is no. Way back in the ’70s I used to watch the Academy Awards shows with a degree of excitement, hoping that something or someone […]
Being an old fogey, I haven’t really taken to social media … I still try to communicate through email, though that means I’ve actually lost touch with several people over the past few years as they’ve switched to other methods. But I guess I’ll have to start moving with the times. Since starting this blog, […]
A few days ago I spent the evening with four friends at our annual get-together to discuss what we had seen during the past year. Back when I was first invited to join the group years ago, there would often be heated arguments about the particular merits of this or that movie, but we’ve all […]
Quentin Tarantino has formidable filmmaking skills, rooted in his deep knowledge of movies famously acquired during his years as a video store clerk. His ability to create images, to build fluid visual progressions and elaborate displays of action, is complemented by a savant’s dazzling knack for exhilaratingly wordy dialogue rich in non-narrative tangents and the […]
Like most people who grew up with them, books mean more to me than simply the words they contain. I bought a Kindle last year, and I have dozens of books on it, but mostly it sits untouched on a shelf. I’ve only really used it on my trips to Beijing last year and England […]
If it’s possible to feel exhilarated and anti-climactic at the same time, that’s how I feel this evening. It’s been just over a year since I shot Going: Remembering Winnipeg Movie Theatres, my documentary about the experience of going to the movies back when there were real theatres instead of multi-screen bunkers, and the process […]