One of my Must-See Christmas rewatches each year. Definitely a cut above the usual holiday rom/coms so prevalent now on TV. Sloan is an out of work puppeteer at loose ends until she takes a job selling Christmas trees with an old boyfriend from her hometown. He's still carrying a torch but she's pretty oblivious to the chemistry. From there, I'm sure you can gather where it's headed. Predictable? Maybe. Pleasurable? Oh yeah. Along the way there's a Santa treasure hunt and a chubby best friend who provides the requisite comic relief. The dialogue is never corny and always genuine. A real surprise for any Christmas fare these days. So is the comic timing by all those involved. No weak links in this capable cast. The real catch here, though, is Katlyn Carlson, who plays the frustrated but adorable Sloan Kelly. God, she's cute. Funny, too! A deadly combination in the right hands, and Katlyn is so accomplished in this role that I can't help but be puzzled at why I haven't seen her before or since this movie came out in 2018. What a waste. She's a perfect leading lady for any rom/com or serious role for that matter. Anyway, you can tell I'm a bit smitten by her charms. The story is first rate, too. An original storyline that hasn't been done to death by Hallmark, Lifetime, or Netflix. The snowy Maine locales lend the production some authenticity as well. No fake flakes needed here, my friends. The only problem is you might have trouble streaming it. I had to pull out my DVD copy from my ridiculously huge collection of Christmas movies but it was worth the effort. MovieTime, if you read this review I really think you'd enjoy this one! It features the coolest puppets throughout the movie. Needless to say, I was enchanted every step of the way. I had you at "Puppets"; right, mi amigo?✌

A clever twist on the Mrs. Doubtfire scenario done in by some seriously bad acting. Not so much by the leads but the afterthought casting surrounding them. I'm sorry but even child actors should be vetted before giving them speaking roles! It only takes one or two bad actors to totally upend even the best of movies. Remember Soffia Coppola? And believe me, she was a million times better than some of the tongue-tied performers this Netflix production sported. Cool premise though. ✌️

Aww, teen suicide! Remember the days when we could joke about shit like that without pissing off everybody? I love this movie. It's like the Airplane version of Teen Movies. So absurd it rivals even that wacky comedy classic. Take any of it seriously at your own peril and pleasure. My friends and I used to call up strangers on the phone and yell "I want my two dollars!" then hang up, leaving some poor slob confused on the other line. It has my main man Booger from the Nerd movies. Has anyone in the history of the world used his fifteen minutes of fame to better acclaim than Curtis Armstrong? The Nerd franchise, Better off Dead, and Risky Business. You go, Booger! John Cusack plays quintessential Teen-Movie-Guy, Lane Myers. Psychotically obsessed with a girl who throws him over for the next Flavor of the Month. In his spare time, he drag races his station wagon against an Asian mute and his Howard Cosell wannabe friend in the streets of some California mountain town. And somehow always ends up in a fender bender with the fat guy from Porky's! His little brother Badger has to be the inspiration behind Stewie from Family Guy. Building working ray guns and rocket ships from the giveaways on cereal boxes. Kim Darby of True Grit fame plays the kooky mom who boils green bacon and invents alien life forms in her kitchen. Dad, Ogden Stires of Mash fame, is probably the most normal person in the whole film, just trying to survive his crazy family and the psycho paperboy. Lane's best friend Charles offers free and feckless advice, as Lance contemplates whether to end it all or win his fickle girlfriend back by skiing down the dreaded K-12 mountain on the other side of town. Along the way we're treated to Lance's daydreams and hallucinations. Leaving you wondering, what kind of acid is this kid tripping on? Probably the same stuff that fried his mother's brain. Now, normally I don't review any movies in November or December that aren't Christmas related, but Better Off Dead does have a Christmas scene, so it squeaks by on a technicality. Besides, sometimes you gotta say, "What the fuck!" Wait a sec! Wrong movie. Damn you, Booger! ✌

🎶The grass does not grow where we stop and stand.🎶
-River Bottom Nightmare Band

Remember when art was visually arresting? Not just some impressive digital image that your mind glosses over like so much binary code. Could they remake Emmit Otter's Jug-Band Christmas with CGI to make the stars of this story more "life like"? That's debatable. Regardless of that debate, however, CGI couldn't possibly recreate the charm and whimsy which exudes from every single frame of this Jim Henson classic from my youth. Christmas came alive in the 60s and 70s. A Charlie Brown Christmas. How the Grinch Stole Christmas. Frosty the Snowman. The Little Drummer Boy. And that's not even including the great Christmas movies of those decades, including my favorite version of The Christmas Carol called Scrooge. But by the late seventies, the ideas began to dry up. Rankin/Bass ran out of fresh takes and kids were no longer tuning in to their Christmas specials like before. Something new was needed. Enter Jim Henson. After all, he already had a built-in audience with both the Muppet Show and Sesame Street, when CBS, I think, first aired Emmet Otter's Jug Band Christmas. It had everything a jaded teenager like myself was looking for: Gang Violence, with the roving band of rascals from the River Bottom Nightmare Gang. Drive by scarf theft and gregarious green frogs on bicycles. Most of all it had something that all those Christmas cartoons were lacking: Real, tactile creatures. Sure, we knew they were puppets. Even five-year-old children knew the Muppets were in reality puppets. But we allowed ourselves to suspend our belief for those all too brief moments when we were alone with those magnificent Muppets. They had personality and pizzazz! Even though Emmet's eyes were two flat marbles attached to his head, they shined with life and intelligence. Those mallards flying over the frozen river may have been connected to sticks and strings, but they were every bit as real to us watching as the parakeets we had for pets. Honestly, I think I started to take Emmet Otter and his friends for granted until I got older and started viewing them through the eyes of a seasoned senior citizen. This wasn't just entertainment, I realized, it was art! What Jim Henson and his goofy gang of puppeteers created was every bit an art form as the old men at Disney who pretty much single handedly perfected the art form of animation. Maybe some people think of CGI in the same way, but not I,says I. To me it's the ruination of Make Believe and Movies. I better stop before I go off on another rant about the digital revolution. They might have won that war but Christmas specials like Emmet Otter remind us, over and over again, each year in fact, that newer doesn't always mean better. Long live physical media. Long live the Muppets.✌

I don't know about you, but I think they should've skipped all those Home Alone sequels and focused their efforts on the Holiday Exploits of one Mitch Murphy. "How far is it to Orlando, Dad? Does it ever snow in Florida? What's the gas mileage on this mini van, Mom? Does Grandma still smell like pee? Do you think Mickey and Minnie will ever have kids? Why doesn't Donald Duck wear pants? Who farted? Was my sister adopted? Why isn't our house as nice as the McAllister's? Are we there yet? Did my dog Skippy really go live on a farm in Duluth? Did you tell Santa we're going to Orlando for Christmas? Do you think Kevin McAllister stole my Crunch Gators? Why aren't we going to Paris? Why is Buzz such a dick? Seriously, who farted?" And that's before they even left their driveway. Merry Christmas, you filthy animals. 🎅🌲✌

I love Ken Burns. If there is such a thing as a National Treasure, then that man is it. Before his Civil War series, I found most history boring. (Except for World War Two, but isn't that worldwide conflagration the Star Wars version of any and all wars?) Yet Ken Burns managed to bring to life a dusty old subject that bored me to tears in school. Without any film footage and using only old photographs, letters, diary entries, and renowned historians like Shelby Foote to such great effect, to bring about a truly entertaining and informative documentary that at times feels like a major motion picture. Throw in a heart-tugging violin piece, Ashokan Farewell, which seemed to perfectly encapsulate the entire war as its plaintive theme song, and you've got the most accomplished documentary ever made. So much so that Burns used the song again here in his long-awaited documentary about the American Revolution. Once more, Burns breathes life into a subject I still can't bring myself to care much about. It's not his fault he was unable this time to pique my interest further. Unlike his celebrated series on baseball, jazz, country music, prohibition, and World War Two on the American home front, there's simply too much hypocrisy to overcome on this subject for me to give a damn. America's fight for Life and Liberty while refusing the same inalienable rights to its own enslaved inhabitants is a petulant period of or history. Even they knew it back then. While Thomas Jefferson penned the words to the most beautiful and thoughtful document known to man: The Declaration of Independence, he was even then depriving over six-hundred human beings on his plantation in Monticello to even the merest of decencies. Kinda puts a damper on the whole subject, wouldn't you say? Does for me anyway. It's like listening to some rapist in jail, demanding justice for being cornholed in his cell. Who cares?!? Not I, says I. Sure, I'm glad we broke away from the British Empire. Colonization is one of the truly great evils of the human race. Ahem. Right behind actual slavery that is. Honestly, what we were bitching about back then didn't come close to what other nations had to put up with, regarding their British Overloads. India and Ireland for example. But if there's one thing the American People excel at over others is our capacity for indignant rage. Tea tax indeed! Now, if our nation had realized back then that what they were demanding had to first be addressed at home---by freeing all their slaves and extending equal rights among ALL its citizens---then we'd as a nation would have the right to truly feel proud of such a great accomplishment. Then and only then would I feel anything but shame at the hypocrisy of our so-called American Revolution. No, that's why Ken Burn's Civil War series is such a profound and proud experience. For thousands of good Americans and our own wise president paid the ultimate price for making our embattled country a truly free nation on earth. One finally deserving of such a grandiose document as the Declaration of Independence. But those wig wearing white wankers in the 1700's? Their argument was built on an intolerable foundation of sins, shame, and insincerity. A history that even the great Ken Burns is incapable of making palatable. That's not his fault, of course. As always, Burns never shys away from the truth. He continually pays heed to the elephant in the room. The same grotesque gargantuan which many historians of that age tend to ignore as irrelevant to the overall accomplishment of Independence. But like the ugly spectre of segregation in Major League Baseball, Burns refuses to celebrate a part of our history that only tarnishes us as a people. After all, WE didn't become "WE the People" until we acknowledged our sins and set about our salvation as a nation and people's. The American Revolution was not the beginning of our country. Just a first awkward step in the right direction. Hopefully, we'll again someday take up the journey.✌

Have a very merry self-entitled Christmas! Cause if you're watching this that's the frigging plot. Michelle Pfeiffer plays one of those "Everything has to be perfect for Christmas moms." At least that's how she views herself. Perfect in every way. Half an hour into the movie and that whole facade crumbles like a Gingerbread House not build to code. Her grown children talk to her but she doesn't listen. And when she does hear things she'd rather not she gets passive aggressive as hell. Not willing to wait in line like everyone else at the mall on Christmas eve, she steals her neighbor's present. A neighbor, by the way, she despises. Yet she's so determined to out-do the woman she's willing to take her daughter down with her as an accomplish to shoplifting. Laughing yet? I know I didn't. Not once. Hence my two star rating. And I tend to give almost ANY Christmas movie an automatic three stars just for getting into the holiday spirit! In fact, I'm not sure I've ever given any Christmas movie such a low rating before. No, not even one of those happy crappy Hallmark movies. The cast is to die for, too! All wasted on a plot and script that should've been thrown right into the trash heap on the far side of Mount Crumpit. Don't get me wrong, I've got no problem with cynical Christmas movies, but I just can't abide bad storytelling. Bad writing? Sure. But never bad storytelling. Nothing works here. Chloe Grace Moretz plays such a cruel and nasty bitch that I might not he able to ever give her characters in the future the benefit of the doubt. Jason Swartzman plays a needy nerd who just needs to not give a damn if his wife's family doesn't like him. Felicity Jones plays his non-caring wife and insecure daughter to the uptight mom in question. Both she and her husband need to grow at least one pair of balls between them. I could go down the list like that, but what's the point. The entire family is unlikable and I pray to God unrelatable to anyone watching. I mean, if Kevin McAllister's family were all like these people the poor kid would've been better off if their plane had crashed on its way to Paris! Too far? Yeah, that was too far. Sorry. Even if Buzz was an asshole, he doesn't deserve that kind of fate. Now Uncle Frank? He's a horse's ass of a different color. No one would've missed him if he had gotten sucked into the jet's engine on the tarmac. I feel the same way about the Oh. What. Fun. Family. Swooooop! Right into that 747's roaring hot intake. 😂 Oh what fun! 💥🙏✌

"No Santa Claus? Thank God he lives, and he lives forever! A thousand years from now, Virginia. Nay, ten times ten thousand years from now! He will continue to make glad the heart of childhood."
-Francis P. Church
The New York Sun, 1897

Definitely not my cup of eggnog but it is a needful reminder that not every family enjoys a Bing Crosby Christmas. Some prefer a Trailer Park Boys Christmas. In other words, if your favorite Christmas song is White Christmas, maybe skip this Holiday Hootenanny. However, if your favorite carol is Grandma Got Run Over by a Reindeer, this one's for you, bubba. Regardless of your persuasion, watching Robin Williams play Archie Bunker for an hour and a half is a joy to the friggin' world. Gee, I miss him. 🌲✌

Though I've grown old the bell still rings for me.
🎅✌

"What are we gonna do, boss? Are we talking 'noitin' for Christmas?"
-Worker elf, North Pole

So all of Santa's elves are from Brooklyn? Sointenly.

"If this catches on we can come up with a liquid version. Puce juice!"

Strange that my ex-wife ever married me once she saw the Christmas-obsessed side of me back in 1985 when this movie was released. She always claimed I never learned how to grow up (she was right of course), and that day at the movie theater, as I waited giddily for the show to start, should've been enough of a red flag to keep her from walking down the ailse and saying, "I do." For both our sakes, I wish she hadn't. Sorry, there I go again. Digressing! Anyway, for some reason I can't recall, my theater wasn't able to get a print of Santa Claus: The Movie, so we drove across state lines into Savannah, Georgia to watch it on opening day. Me, taking a rare Friday off to see it. She, begging to see anything else but. There had been a lot of hype about the film after all. Drawing parallels between Superman and Santa Claus. I believe the tag line on the one sheet was even similar: "You'll believe reindeer can really fly!" I can tell you I was stoked at the time. I thought it high-time for a full-length feature film on the life and times of Kris Kringle. Alas, we've yet to get one of those, all these many years later. The finest attempt by far is the animated Klaus featured on Netflix, even though that's not the live action event I still long to see. The first half of Santa Claus is great. Santa getting a full blown production of his life. The meeting of Myth and Moment showing some real plausible results, too. How Santa came to be. The elves, known as Vendigum. Waiting for the Chosen One to appear. The invisible Kingdom on top of the North Pole. The first Seaons Greetings. How they make the toys and sleep and eat and play. The creation of Santa Claus's suit. That's my favorite part by the way. Make no mistake, this outfit wasn't done on the cheap, like some department store Santa with a big wide plastic belt. If you can name a more handsome Santa suit I'd love to hear it. This was a thing of beauty. With real fur (sorry Peta) trimming Santa head to foot. The casting is great, too. For the most part. With David Huddleston as Santa and Judy Cornwell as Mrs. Claus. Both nearly perfect in my estimation. Ironically, the two actors who get the most praise for their performances, Dudley Moore and John Lithgow, are part of the reason the movie falls apart in the second half. Not their fault of course! Just poor writing on top of faulty storytelling. They really are wonderful, the two of them. Especially John Lithgow. But the film is called Santa Claus: The Movie. Not the Patch and B.Z. Show. Unfortunately, that's what happens, as Santa's formerly favorite elf runs away from home to go to New York City. Wait a minute! Isn't that the plot to Elf? 🤔 Long story short, Santa saves the day. But by then the story's no longer about him. Disappointing, because I think they really had something in that first half. I think I understand the writers dilemma, though. Being Christmas Crazy since I was old enough to hang my own stocking, and a novelist to boot these days, I've tried my hand at the Santa myth on two occasions. Never getting a satisfying third act in either event. Then again, I didn't have millions of dollars at my disposal, like the creators of this movie. Surely they could've come up with a more plausible plot and ending than the preposterous one here. Magic lollipops indeed! If there ever is another attempt at creating a Santa Claus biopic that children and adults might both appreciate, I doubt they'd do it without CGI. That means no Muppet-like reindeer, like they used here to such great whimsical effect. Seriously, has CGI ever created anything whimsical? I'm not being sarcastic, I'd really like to know. But that's exactly what would be lost in recreating the Santa myth without practical effects and puppetry. I come back to this flawed attempt every year if for nothing else the first half. The Santa suit and that marvelous Kingdom atop the world. The Vendigum and the flying reindeer. The real-life twinkle in Santa and Mrs. Claus's eyes. And Seasons Greetings, as the polar snow falls from the midnight sky. Just remember, as soon as McDonald's and the Golden Arches make their abrupt appearance in the last half, raising the insidious heads of commercialization and consumer apathy at Christmas time, it's safe enough to switch the channel for something else on television. Nothing else to see here, folks. Move along. Move along. 🎅✌

Okay, so I was seven-years-old when this now Christmas Classic appeared on network TV for the very first time. Seven-years-old. That's an interesting year for a developing young child. Christmas is still all about ME, right? What am I getting for Christmas? What is Santa bringing ME under the tree? Children are notoriously selfish. Of course they are! It's only natural you know. Nature instills that instinct in us for self-preservation. We're too young at seven to help anyone but ourselves. That's why a baby will cry under the worst circumstances. Even in wartime situations, when complete silence is essential for their parents survival. I don't care! Change my diaper or feed me right now! How we ever survived as a species when we weren't on top of the food chain I'll never know. No, our ability to care for someone besides ourselves doesn't begin to develop until we can take care of ourselves. And even then I suspect it's based more on the pressing anxiety, "What will become of me now? Who will care for me?" To truly care for another without any feelings of selfishness whatsoever is something some of us never develop at all. We're all acquainted with this sort. The selfish and self entitled. The vain and venal. Those people are called narcissists. To watch your child cry or feel for another human being or animal with no attachment to themselves is a proud moment for a parent. Filled with the power of love and relief. Relief that your child won't grow up to hurt others for their own amusement or gain as they grow older. It's something to be nurtured and encouraged, I assure you. To cry unselfish tears is to be one step closer to God. Those who can't or won't are to be pitied and feared. I've given this a lot of thought as you can tell. At the age of seven I remember being confused and thoughtful with the depth of feeling I had for Frosty melting away in that poinsettia hothouse. Furious at the selfish magician willing to murder Frosty so he could get his greedy mitts on that magical hat. And at the endless tears flowing down my chubby wet cheeks at the sight of that oh, so, pitiful puddle on the floor. In effect, the first crime scene of my youth. Why was I so sad? Santa of course stemmed the tide of tears and and put a big smile back on my face when he brought Frosty back to life. A relieved smile, to be sure. Although, a bit trepidatious as well. Was it the SAME Frosty, or just a copy of the first? That newfound empathy again plauging my mind with doubts and suspicions. Like when a parent buys a new dog to replace the one that died. "It's not the same," our grieving minds tell us. Paired with a sense of guilt that we're somehow betraying our beloved friend by replacing them. That human empathy again setting us apart from the divorced children of God. Watching Frosty the Snowman tonight at the age of 63, my heart goes out to the confused little boy watching TV all alone that night in 1969. So sad was he. So confused. So absolutely gobsmacked. No one to comfort him in his time of need. Or share with him in his delight and relief in Frosty's miraculous resurrection! He was better for it, I now realize. Immersed as he was in solitude and reflection in that playroom basement. Coming to terms with that birth of empathy and humanity in his soul. I know I rejoice in that God-sent awakening. Maybe that's why I love Christmas so much to this day. That relief one feels at the knowledge of a greater Good in the universe. For to feel is to be loved. God bless you, Frosty. Wherever you might be. ⛄✌

Annual rewatch. Certainly the best characterization of Ebenezer Scrooge in cinematic history, it is still far from my favorite version of A Christmas Carol. After watching all these varied versions over the years, over and over again, it's the casting that most moves and annoys me in Charles Dickens most beloved tale told onscreen. As I said, Alister Sim is the best Scrooge. And yet the second most important part in the story is one who always gets the least amount of thought. Time after time, Tiny Tim is anything but Tiny. In this version, as so many others, he's practically the same height as his father, Bob Cratchit. The poor underfed man compelled to carry his Not So Tiny son on his shoulder throughout the cobbled streets of Ye Old London. Both having to duck their heads upon entering their home on the poorer side of town. Yet no one seems to notice or care how incongruous this is to the overall narrative. Even though without Tiny Tim there is no reclamation for our grasping, scraping, clutching, covetous old sinner Scrooge. Bah! Humbug, says I. Funny enough, the only adaptation that gets Tiny Tim exactly right is the Muppets Christmas Carol. Played by Robin the Frog, Kermit's sweet voiced nephew. Tiny as a felt covered tadpole, is he. When he coughs and shudders and looks sickly you can't help but believe this little frog's not long for the world. The next best Tiny Tim was nine-year-old Richard Beaumont from the 1970 musical Scrooge. Richard was small for his age and looked perfectly at ease with his tiny crutch and limp. So when Bob Cratchit hoists the small child on his shoulder it doesn't look ridiculous and back breaking. Does that poor casting choice ruin this version? By my five stars you can tell it doesn't for me anyhow. The story and Alister Sim's iconc portrayal is more than enough to compensate for the casting director's incompetence. Besides, it's Tiny Tim's most famous line that carries this tale over the finish line anyway. "God bless us everyone!" Indeed, Not so Tiny Tim. Indeed.✌

Too bad Jess Bradford didn't have an official Red Ryder bee bee gun with a compass in the stock. She could've shot the killer's eye out, then used the compass to find her way to the nearest police station. Oh, fudge. 😕

The charm here is in Max Fleischer's old school animation. I was such a fan of his Superman growing up that I recognized his unique style right away the first time I saw this as a kid. The Rankin/Bass stop-motion animation twenty-years later was a definite improvement but I still like to revisit this cartoon every year. It never fails to bring me back in front of our old 1965 floor model Zenith color TV. Sitting so close to the screen I could feel the hair on top of my head lifting up from my scalp. Bathing in the radiation rays emanating from the cathode ray tube humming ominously in the back cabinet. Awww, them was the days! Cancer and color in one heaping serving! 💥✌

You what's the cutest word in the whole wide world?
"Daddy," spoken by a wee British tyke.
Cheers✌

Tom Berenger. Joely Richardson. Saoirse Ronan. Top flight cast in an above average Christmas movie. Based on the children's book by the same name. A small boy is uprooted from the home he loves by the loss of his father during the Great War. He and his mother go to live with her widowed sister on a farm out in the country and the boy learns a new way of life while grappling with the loss of his father. Having lost the last link with his father at the train station, a carved nativity set that meant the world to him and his mother, they seek out the help of a local artisan, who is also grappling with his own loss and sorrow. Combined, the three of them learn to heal and love again while the new nativity is carved, piece by piece. Tom Berenger is quite good as "Gloomy Toomey", as is Joely Richardson, and the precocious boy who plays her son brings out a gentler side to Jonathan Toomey that is the basis of the Christmas miracle in question. Definitely a cut above your average holiday film. One, I try to watch every year. Highly recommended for those of us who love Christmas movies and happy endings. Best enjoyed with a hot cup of cocoa and a plate full of Christmas cookies. Then again, what isn't? ✌

I watch all kinds of Christmas movies. Even horrible ones like Santa Clause Conquers the Martians. And even though I tend to despise them, Christmas romances. From the first of November to December 25th I watch nothing but Christmas movies. Or those films with at least a Christmas setting somewhere in the picture. Football finds its way in there but nothing else I'm afraid. So it becomes necessary to find NEW Christmas movies to keep this ball of tinsel rolling along. Even the dreaded Christmas romance, of which "Champagne Problems" fits most spectacularly. No one was more surprised than me, the original Christmas Grouch, to discover this is one Christmas Romance that manages to break out of the Hallmark monotony and create something quite lovely and lasting. Formulaic? Sure. Champagne Problems has all the typical tropes you'd find in any overwrought Hallmark movie. A work obsessed woman sent to pillage a small time business for her money hungry boss. A handsome French foil (half-shaven of course) to help her see the folly of her ways. Just in time before the last flight out of Paris. Reading the plot on IMDB doesn't do the movie justice either. Proving great writing can take any typical cookie cutter Christmas story and make something special of it. Throw in some genuinely surprising camera work and French countryside and you begin to realize this isn't your mother's Hallmark movie. But we're not done yet! Some top notch casting and direction and we've got an honest to God Christmas classic! One, I'll revisit every year now. The title sucks of course. Its far too generic for such a well constructed film. Christmas in Paris works much better, but a rose by any other name, right? The real star here is Minka Kelly and the French settings. From the City of Lights to an authentic vineyard in the rolling hills of France. Where the citizens make even mundane sentences like, "My God! I think I just shat myself!" sound like declarations of love. I spent half the movie trying to remember where I knew the leading Lady. Usually I can place the face if not the name, but I had to cheat and look her up. Of course! The TV show Friday Night Lights! She played the sexy cheerleader (redundant, I know). But reading deeper into her bio, I was thunderstruck to learn what a hard life she's led. Looking at Minka you might assume she's led a typical Beverly Hills life of privilege and leisure. Not so. Her wisdom and wealth have been hard earned and henceforth I'll be sure to garner her the respect she so rightfully deserves. Really, she's quite good in the role and I hope it leads to better opportunities. The writing as I say is top notch for a romance picture with lines like, "Sometimes you can lead a whole life in one day. I had a great life today." Or this gem, "Everything I know about France I learned from Rattatoulie." Spoken by the right actors and in the right settings and you have lightning in a bottle. The real clincher for me was when the leading man, played by Mark Steven Johnson, explains why Le Petit Prince is his favorite book. In the words of of his smitten love interest, "I think its my favorite book now, too." The end is predictable but that's all right. The writing is enough to make up for any lack of imagination. In fact, it all works wonderfully. The pieces fitting perfectly. Like a moonlit stroll in Paris. I could not recommend it with more enthusiasm. Joyeux Noel, mes amis.✌

Nothing pairs with turkey as well as Planes, Trains, and Automobiles.
Except for maybe football
And even then, only when the Lions cover the spread.
Which they didn't today.
So I stand by my first statement.
Nothing pairs with turkey as well as Planes, Trains, and Automobiles.
Gobble! Gobble! 🦃

Every year this time I end up watching five different versions of A Christmas Carol. This one first of all, then the one with Allister Sim, considered to be the best but not my favorite. Then the one with Jim Carey as a most cadaverous looking Scrooge. One foot in the grave was that Ebenezer. Then on to the most lighthearted version of all, A Muppet Christmas Carol. Last but not least is my favorite version of all, Scrooge with Albert Finney. So, it's no surprise with so many visions of Ebenezer Scrooge dancing in my head that I might occasionally dream about these cast of characters. Sometimes with my own unique casting. I once had a dream with the Seinfeld crew leading the all-star production. Cosmo Kramer as Scrooge and the little person who sometimes played his friend on the show as a surly Tiny Tim. A Simpsons Christmas Carol. A South Park Christmas Carol. Once a very violent episode starring the cast of The Sopranos. In that one Scrooge didn't live to tell the tale. But the topper had to be the whopper of a dream i had last night. The Three Stooges in brilliant black and white. Moe as Scrooge, and Shemp as Marley. Curly as Tiny Tim of course. Larry as poor Bob Cratchit forced to carry Curly on his shoulder through the snowy streets of London. Whoop! Whoop! Whoop! Best dream ever! I woke myself up laughing, as Curly raised his flagon of mead and toasted a repentant Moe (Scrooge) and his crippled father (Larry). God bless us everyone! Nyuk! Nyuk! Nyuk! ✌

Well, now I just feel all kinds of guilty. So guilty I gave this movie an extra star I in no way feel it deserves. Every Christmas I grumble about all the formulaic holiday movies. Half shaven douchbags and starry eyed dames falling in love in time for Christmas. Lamenting the fact that there aren't more Christmas movies like "The Feast of the Seven Fishes". Have you seen that one? Best Christmas movie since..............You fill in the blank. That's what the makers of Christmas Eve In Miller's Point must've thought. Cause they wrote a screenplay that should have satisfied that need in me. Yet left me feeling bored and annoyed with the end results. Maybe it's the small house filled with about fifty relatives on Christmas Eve that horrified the introvert in me. Prodding me to go have fun with the other kids. Saying, Bryn, "Wassa matter, you? Always so quiet?" All there for the Annual All Night Family Christmas get-together. Parents, kids, uncles, aunts, cousins, and all the old folks, too. Smoking, drinking, cussing, laughing, yelling, eating, farting, singing, stinking up the bathroom, and altogether getting on each other's nerves. And I thought my family celebrations were bad! I got a headache just watching these folks all crammed together with their ugly Christmas sweaters and hats in a house that must've been over eighty degrees with all that body heat and hot air. As much as I love Christmas, if I had grown up with this nattering crew I would've ended up hating the holiday. Refusing to set foot in another Christmas party as long as I lived. The teenagers all make a break for it halfway through the plot and you think, "Now it should get interesting!" Alas, that's not the case. Their run for freedom is if anything less interesting than what's going on inside the still overcrowded house on Miller's Point. If anything, their bullshit is even more artificial than the grown ups they all profess to loathe. Michael Cera plays the most passive police officer I've ever seen onsreen. Not even unintentionally amusing is he. Sporting a mangy looking beard that no police department in the world would ever allow. So distracting I devoted two useless sentences in even mentioning it! I know I'm probably shitting on some writer's memories of growing up at Christmas time in New York, but I cannot emphasize just how irritating I found this movie. Maybe with a good bit of editing it could be salvaged but not in its current overblown narrative. The best thing about it is the cute little dog running around the house. I wanted to pick him up and rescue him from this never-ending Christmas party from hell. Now, that would've made a better movie. Run, run, Rudolph, cause I'm feeling like a merry-go-round! Away went Rudolph, whizzing like a shooting' star!✌

Acting, as far as a profession goes, can bring about wisdom. And if you've done it long enough, like Paul Newman did, then it shows in the characters you play. Especially later in life. Case in point, Sully Sullivan. Newman's last great role. On the surface, Sully seems like he's lived a life unfulfilled. His landlady and dear friend, played by Jessica Tandy in her last role, thinks so. So does half the town. Despite that there are many who depend on Sully in so many ways. His best friend and employee Rub sure does. Not just for the occasional buck or odd job Sully throws his way. There's is a relationship based on a male camaraderie that only men can ever truly understand. Then there's his landlady who depends on Sully for repairs around the house and to keep her from being a lonely old lady. Sully also keeps a one legged lawyer on his payroll even though the man has never won a case in his life. Then there's his estranged son and grandson newly entered into his life. A relationship to repair and one to build on. Sully helps those around him in a million small and subtle ways. The kind of man you don't realise is essential until he's no longer around. Then who's going to buy Rub his jelly donut in the morning? Who's going to fix his landlady's porch railing? Who's going to set his boss straight? Truth be told I like to think of myself as somewhat like Sully. Full of wisdom and bullshit all at the same time. Fearless and flawed. Unafraid and scared to death. But I'm probably just kidding myself. It's something to aspire to anyway. To live a life of usefulness without reminding everyone around you just how important you think you are. My kind of guy, Sully. Paul Newman, too. That wisdom I was talking about in some actors? Newman reeked of the stuff. Like my old man with the Old Spice. His words held weight, know what I mean? By the time he was seventy he looked like the guy in the poster. I mean, check out that one sheet for a second. The one at my theater back in '94 had the caption: "Worn to Perfection". That was Paul Newman in his old age. Worn to perfection. A rugged and handsome man, inside and out. His accumulated wisdom on full display in what I believe was his greatest role. About a man going nowhere and yet needed by everyone around him. Proving even the smallest lives can have abundant meaning and purpose. Too bad there aren't more Sullys and Newmans in the world.✌

Putting aside the fact that I usually abhor remakes of beloved classics, I feel it necessary to give credit where credit is due. In this case, there's not a lot to speak for here; yet despite a script that should've been tossed right in the can, I do believe the casting was pretty spot on. Better than the original? Let's not get crazy! But seven-year-old Mara Wilson gives Natalie Wood a run for her money in my book. The role of Susan Walker, as we know in Miracle on 34th Street, is every bit as important as Kris Kringle and she nails it. Like Natalie, Mara was an old soul. With her chipmunk cheeks and twinkling eyes I defy you to not be taken in by her cherubic charms. Intelligent and witty without being a precocious little snot. That's why her career as a child actress in the nineties was absolutely meteoric. Just as she did in Mrs. Doubtfire, Mara steals the show from some pretty accomplished actors. They're just along for the ride as far as I'm concerned. If not for her, there's no way I even finish this unnecessary remake. Being a credible child actor is hard work and not for the faint of heart. Her unaffected performances in Doubtfire, Miracle, and Matilda rank her right up there with Natalie Wood and Tatum O'Neal. Wherever she is these days I hope she's happy and well. Successful, too. Unharmed by the Hollywood machine that chewed up and spit out so many young actors like herself over the years. Hopefully she brings this movie out every Christmas to show her own kids she was once even cuter than they. Hopefully, they believe in Santa Clause, too. I know still do. 🎅

"I ain't going anywhere."
-Ree Dolly

I do believe this is my third review of Winter's Bone. I hold this movie and Jennifer Lawrence's performance in such high esteem I consider it the greatest ever for an actress in a lead role. And this was her first lead in a motion picture! The strength and resolve her character shows in this crime drama set in the hills of Arkansas always sets me back on my heels. Like Uma Thurman in Kill Bill, only without all the bullshit and body doubles. I watch it every year this time, It's just a pre-Thanksgiving tradition for me. Later on I'll watch Paul Newman in my favorite role of his in Nobody's Fool, for the same reason. If you've never seen either, please do so at your earliest convenience. You can thank me later.✌

Yep, it's official. The folks over in Europe make a better Christmas movie these days. Here in America, we trot out the same formulaic holiday film, one after the other. Some frazzled or heartbroken dame falls in love with some douche with a day old beard and broad big shoulders. They hate each other at first and then the magic of Christmas brings them together, where they share the chastest of kisses as the snow falls all about them. Bleech! Those with diabetes watch at your own peril. Hallmark and Lifetime have made a mint making these romantic Christmas films for sad and lonely women. Some married ones, too. But it wasn't always this way. Network television used to make great Christmas movies that had little or nothing to do with two dummies getting together at the holidays. The House Without a Christmas Tree. The Homecoming: A Christmas Story. Emmit Otter's Jugband Christmas. The Gathering. A Christmas to Remember. Christmas Lilies of the Field. A Dream for Christmas. J.T. These are but a few of the Christmas movies I remember from the 70s! There's many more from the 80s and 90s. After that, Hallmark took over and the era of great television Christmas movies came to an end. No more stories about little boys and B.B. guns. Or fathers missing on Christmas eve. Or otters singing Joy to the World on frozen rivers. No, the American Christmas movie is nothing more these days but a Harliquin romance novel set during Christmas. If I've offended those who happen to love these movies, I honestly don't care. You're part of the problem! Cut it out already, you lot! Tuning in to these Christmas Rom/Coms all the year long. Imagination and high production values are completely unnecessary with you wankers. Put a fecking red bow on a door and add some fake snow to the picture and you've got yourself a Christmas movie. Oh! Don't forget Lacy Chabert! She's made, what? About a million of these bloody things. Shame on her! And shame on you for encouraging her to make more of the same auld shite. I say "shite" because I just finished a halfway decent Christmas movie made over in Ireland of all places. In fact, the last three NEW Christmas movies I happened to enjoy were made over in Europe somewhere. One had a romantic twist but it was hardly the bulk of the story. Here, we have a Christmas heist gone wrong. Santa robs a bank and hides out in the forest, where a nere-do- well twelve-year-old boy tries to blackmail him for a cut of the loot. Add in his little Santa believing brother, a crazy old duffer who thinks he really is Santa, an overworked single mother who can't even afford to turn on the heat, and you've got yourself a smashing Christmas movie. Belfast style! Oi! The accents alone make it worth watching. Best of all, there's not a half-shaven douchbag or sad, lonely biddy to be found in the plot. Tis a Christmas miracle, says I! The end is a bit daft and nonsensical but I'll take it any day over what we have to show for ourselves this side of the pond. Besides, in the end, the wee Santa believer gets his bike after all. Jest like wee Ralphie Parker and his Red Rider BB gun. Aye, isn't life grand?

Considering this is sacred ground for many people who grew up watching this version of the Dr. Seuss classic, I promise to tread lightly. In fact, I give it three stars even though I've never once been able to sit through the entire thing. Tonight I came closest. Right up to the part where the Grinch's heart grew three sizes that day, Jim Carey showing all the symptoms of a man having a full-on cardiac arrest. I tried, I really did. But none of this overblown production comes close to the whimsical charm of the 1966 classic, narrated by the one and only Boris Karloff. Not for me, it doesn't. The crisp and cheerful color palette of Chuck Jones and his host of animators from the Looney Tunes studio. And all under 30 minutes mind you! Nothing in Ron Howard's version works for me. The theme? Sure, the over commercialism of Christmas. But truth be told, Charlie Brown and his buddy Linus did a better job of getting that message across. So did Dr. Seuss. By the time Carey's Grinch realizes the truth I had a headache from being pounded over the head with the whole idea. That said, if you grew up with THIS Grinch, I get it. Truly, I do. My mother always preferred the Christmas Carol version from 1951. Me, I prefer the one from 1970. The first version I recall ever watching. We're like baby ducks that way, you and I. Imprinting on the first thing we see as children. Can you believe some people still prefer the Mr. Magoo version? Why? Cause they grew up watching it. Of course they do! It brings back memories of your childhood, doesn't it? And nothing binds so fastly to our hearts and imaginations as those moments from our youth. That's why some people will always insist that Die Hard is a Christmas movie! Cause watching it at Christmas time has always been a tradition for those folks. Some folks feel the same way about Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory, even though there's not a single Christmas scene in the whole movie. So enjoy Jim Carey's madcap version, all you Whos down in Whoville, and I'll stick to Boris and Chuck's more sedate take. While he, HE HIMSELF, the Grinch carves the roast beast for one and all. I'll take a leg please!🍗

"What we have here is a failure to accumulate."
-Ernest P. Worrall

Aww, Jim Varney! The 80's very own version of Jerry Lewis. "Heyyy, Laddddy!" You have to be either a child or a lover of the absurd to fully appreciate the comic stylings of Jim Varney. You hate the Three Stooges? Don't even waste your time with my man Ernest. He's not your type, skippy. Thank God he still makes me laugh though! (That "Pieson" bit leaves me in stitches every time 😂) You're not alone if you hate Ernest, though. Ebenezer Scrooge would've loathed the guy. Same with Hitler and Stalin. Probably the only thing they would've agreed on. Osama bin Laden is said to have despised the man. Vladimir Putin put price on his head. That pudgy guy in North Korea? He throws darts at Ernest's face pinned to the back of a peasant. Ted Bundy, John Wayne Gacy, and Jeffery Dahmer are all in agreement with you Varney Haters. "Fry him instead!" they all cried on their way to the Hot Seat. Trump called Ernest a no talent hack and tried to have him fired. So you're in good company there, my curmudgeonly friends. But hey, did you ever stop to consider you're not the audience Ernest P. Worrell was looking for anyway? It's like hating on Barney the purple Whatever! I mean, do you hear your ten-year-old kid tell you that Breaking Bad sucks? "That Walter White guy can kiss my ass, Dad!" Nah, just leave the room and come back when its safe to turn the channel to HBO or Skinimax. Your kid won't judge you and neither will I. Know what I mean, Vern? ✌

No way I finish this off-brand Home Alone-family style-wannabe, if my girl Megyn Price wasn't in it. Remember her? Megyn Price played Audrey Bingham on CBS's Rules of Engagement. Starring Patrick Warburton as her husband Jeff. David Spade was also on the show and it just might be the most underrated TV sitcom ever made. Funny as hell and wildly relatable to anyone who's ever been in a relationship before, much less having been married. Besides, like I said, Megyn Price was my girl. No, not really. But I sure did enjoy seeing her once a week on my television when it was on the air! But as I so often do on this platform, I digress. This review isn't for Rules of Engagement, although, now that I think about it, it's a much better name for this silly excuse for a Christmas movie, "3 Day Test". AKA, "3 Day Christmas" if you insist on torturing yourself. Even grading on the generous Made-for-TV Christmas Movie Scale, this rates no more than one star for me. Despite the charming efforts of Megyn Price and a really decent cast, including George Newburn and Corbin Benson, this homemade looking loser is shockingly bad. Maybe the worst Christmas movie I've ever seen before. And yes, that includes "Santa Clause Conquers The Martians". 🎅👽🌲

Santa slips a naughty little girl some LSD in her stocking and she proceeds to trip balls. 😳 Nah, just kidding! But wouldn't that make a great Pixar movie?

Down south we've got a saying: The only thing worse than poor white trash, is rich white trash. Case in point, the Mudaugh's of Hampton County, South Carolina. Not too far from my old stomping grounds in Beaufort County. All I knew about the Murdaughs growing up was you didn't want to cross one of those redheaded bastards. Dixie Mafia and all that southern grits shit. Only these sons of bitches were the law themselves! Anyway, the day Alex Murdaugh got convicted for killing his wife and wild-child-son was a huge surprise to me. Not because I thought the man was innocent, hell no, but because rich white trash almost always gets away with any wrongdoings in this country. Especially down Dixie Land! Now, if only we could convict the rich white trash currently residing in the White House, maybe then I'll finally believe that no one in this country, no matter how rich and powerful they might be, is above the law. Now, wouldn't that be something? ✌

This review may contain spoilers.

The sad and tragic case of Eloa Pimental. A fifteen-year-old girl brave enough to break off a relationship with a 21 year paedophile in a culture where machismo is the true measure of a man. Think me harsh? They started dating when she was 12. Yeah, the guy was a scumbag. Anyone with an IQ of 80 should've known this wasn't going to end well. Yet the girl's parents didn't think he would ever do anything to harm their daughter. Hello?!? Anyone home in Dumbass Land? That ship sailed the minute you allowed him to think of your child as his girlfriend! Long story short, he kidnaps the girl and threatens to kill her and himself. The police, media, and throngs of onlookers set-up their Three Ring Circus around the apartment building where Eloa is being held hostage, and the good folks of Brazil have their very own reality show! The consensus between the media and the lookie-loos is that Lindemberg Alves, the kidnapper, is a "Good Guy." Hardworking and nice to puppy dogs and kittens. Just a misunderstood fellow who had his heart broken by a callous fifteen-year old-girl and the policia should go easy on him. Tsk! Tsk! Tsk! Pobrecito! In one mind-blowing instance a host on some Brazilian "Live with Regis and Kathy Lee" type show actually states he hopes the two lovebirds might get married someday! Seriously, you can't make this shit up. The policia, realizing which way the wind was blowing, become trepidatious and resist taking any sort of shot that might end the crisis with this asshole's brains on the wall. Can you blame them for reading the room and thinking, "Let's just wait this one out"? They should've taken the shot. Cause Lidemberg certainly took his shot. The one he had been saying he would take all along. Sparing himself of course. He didn't want to disappoint his fans after all. Plenty of blame to go around here. Lidemberg Alves, a pathetic excuse for a man. Big man with a gun. A punk without it. The parents for being morons. The media, for only wanting a good story and not giving a shit about who got hurt in the process. The policia, for acting like amateurs. And the citizens of Brazil who were brought up to believe a man has a right to think of a woman as his rightful possession. Maybe them most of all. Rest in peace, darling Eloa. There are no scumbags in heaven. ✌

Okay, so I'm sitting in my recliner after a hard night at work. Too tired to move a muscle, at least any more than the ones in my hand holding the remote. I'm surfing the different channels and movies when suddenly my batteries die on "Love Story". Yikes, what's a tired, lazy man supposed to do? I'm super comfortable underneath the weight of my favorite quilt, and the new AAA batteries are clear across the room! So I just lay there in a semi stupor, watching what is perhaps the biggest chick flick of all time. At least it starred Ali McGraw, one of the prettiest actresses of her generation. And Ryan O'Neil? He wasn't half bad either. The story is pure sentimental hokum. A woman's idea of a great romantic movie. Where someone dies before the relationship turns to shit. My sisters back in the 70s ate this stuff up. They each had that iconic poster in their bedrooms, saying "Love means never having to say you're sorry." What? Are you kidding me? As a senior citizen whose had his share of love gone wrong over the years, I can say with complete certainty that's the farthest thing from the truth. Love definitely means saying you're sorry! Over and over and over again, whenever necessary. Fail to do so even once, my friend, and you better make that doghouse in the backyard as comfortable as possible. Cause, brother, you'll be out there until you do say you're sorry. But let's get back to the whole "dying bit," shall we. Why on earth is this such a popular concept for the ladies? The younger ones especially. Over the years I've watched countless of these tearjerkers pull in that particular generation's female audience. The Fault in our Stars. A Walk to Remember. Remember Me. The Notebook. The Man in the Moon. Let's not forget the biggest of them all, Titanic! And of course the greatest love story of all time, Romeo and Juliet. In that one they both die at the end. A twofer! So this isn't just a fluke, this "Love Story", is it? It's obviously what women want. Preferably when the dude does the dying, but they'll cry just as hard for one of their own. To some degree, this seems to apply to a few gay men as well, if you consider the success of "Brokeback Mountain" any kind of barometer. Either way, I gotta believe that the people who prefer these types of romantic movies to more upbeat classics, like "When Harry Met Sally", "Sleepless in Seattle", and "Notting Hill", have got their relationship priorities all wrong. If a character dying off is the only way you can appreciate the relationship taking place onscreen, then I pray to God you never talk your other half into getting some life insurance. Can you say "Red Flag"? I knew you could. Of all those movies I mentioned, though, "Love Story" is the most ickiest. Pretentious at times and wrongheaded in so many ways. Not that it ends up mattering, but Ryan O'Neal's character, Oliver Barrett, talks his lady love, Ally McGaw as Jenny Caliveri, a music major, into ditching her lifelong dreams of going to Paris to study music abroad, into marrying him instead. Now, if Jenny was one of those girls who go to college in hopes of marrying a law graduate, then so what? It tracks. But Jenny Caliverie is the exact opposite of that kind of woman in every way! She doesn't take shit or prisoners. And yet she marries the sexist preppie anyway, and you probably know the rest of the love story, don't you? She gets sick and the next thing you know she's saying preposterous things, like "Love means never having to say you're sorry," on her deathbed. You know, I really should've gotten my lazy ass out of that chair and replaced the batteries in my remote. I ended up having to get up anyway for some Tylenol, for the headache this love story induced. Maybe Jenny gave me a tumor, that bitch. 🤔 Just kidding, ladies. I was rooting for Oliver to die. Really, I was.✌

For a movie that gets so much hate I end up liking it a little bit more each holiday season. Another ten years and I'll probably give it five full stars! Cause you know what? I like this movie. I really do. It's a mess but I don't care. So is Christmas when you get right down to it. I mean, the way we end up emphasizing all the wrong things during the holidays. The incredible stress we put ourselves under to get everything just right and the family get-togethers that usually end up with someone storming out of the house, swearing they'll never set foot in there again. A mess, right? Just like us. Christmas is often ugly, grumpy, greedy, self-entitled, and altogether wonderful. Sad, too. Sure. The way some people enforce loneliness upon themselves, when no man or woman is ever alone if they're in touch with their own spirituality. My oldest sister used to ask me, "Bryn, why do you love Christmas so much when you live alone? Why do you even put a tree or even decorate?" She wasn't alone in her incredulity. To my family, I'm often an enigma. A mystery they've never quite been able to comprehend. How can I be so content and cheerful when I have so little? To their credit they no longer asks those insulting questions anymore. They understand at least my love and devotion to this holy holiday. "Long lay the world in sin and error pining. Till He appeared and the soul felt its worth." Peace on earth, good will to men. A little baby boy born in the barest of poverty, surrounded by others just as unfortunate as He in that dirty little manger. And yet savior to all who welcome Him into their hearts! The poor, first and foremost. Fill your soul with that knowledge, my friend, and it'll leave little room in your heart for self pity or sorrow. Linus, he knew it, too. Imparted that wisdom to Good 'ol Charlie Brown, didn't he? "Love the Coopers" is short on any spiritually, I might add. In fact, some of the characters even to seem to scoff at the idea. But don't let their cynicism dissuade you from enjoying the movie. Christmas is many things to many people, after all. Jesus wouldn't mind, I don't think, if others used his birthday as a means to come together as a family and love each other. In fact, I'm pretty sure that's the "Good Will" the bible refers to on the night of His holy birth. The very same Good Will that keeps me cheerful and content during the holidays and encourages me to give unto others. To forgive others their trespasses, as I pray they might forgive me my own. So to you my dubious friend, I ask that you look past the many flaws and missteps of "Love the Coopers" and realize their journey together onscreen might actually resemble your own messy Christmas in many ways. And to the late Diane Keaton and Alan Arkin, who made this "mess" so much fun to watch every year, I say God bless and Goodnight. ✌

While I despise the politics of John Wayne, I will always consider him the last great movie star. His presence filled the silver screen like no other man, before or since. Clint Eastwood comes mighty close, but the Duke owned whatever part came his way. Especially as Rooster Cogburn, the one-eyed fat man with true grit. He was born to play that part. Did you know when he did that legendary scene, riding full-gallop at Ned Pepper and his gang, reigns in his clenched teeth, sitting astride his horse Dollor, a hundred miles above the cold hard ground, the man only had one lung? Cancer taking him one piece at a time. You can hate John Wayne and what he sometimes stood for, but you've got to respect that man's indomitable grit. When I heard the Cohen brothers were taking a run at this tried and true classic, I said, "Good luck finding someone who can fill the Duke's boots." Jeff Bridges does a great job here, but the role still belongs to Wayne, eye-patch and all. Bridges played it smart, making the role his own. But when the lights come up and the credits start to roll, you've got to ask yourself was it really worth it? Remaking a movie that needed no remake. I think not. I did enjoy it nonetheless and tip my hat to the Cohens for having enough sand to put their own spin on the story. Jeff Bridges, too. He has nothing to be ashamed of here. But f you ask me, the real star of the movie was the great, big, bearded dude, dressed up like a bear! A dentist, no less! His slow and deliberate delivery and rolling eye had me cracking up. If you've never seen either version of "True Grit" I recommend you watch the John Wayne version first. But be warned, friend, there is no one in that film half as amusing as the Bear Dentist. Adios.✌

A family of burglars decide to rip off an entire street for Christmas. Sounds familiar, right? No, these aren't the Wet Bandits facing off against that McAllister kid again. Kevin!!! This is the British version of Home Alone + One. A blind ONE at that. Two bickering neighbors vs a family of felons. And while it doesn't come close to the Chris Columbus classic, it beats all to hell most American Christmas movies these days. Here in the States, we only make exhausting Christmas romance movies anyway. Holiday movies like "Home Alone" and "A Christmas Story" aren't good enough for the lkes of us anymore. No, we need half-shaven douchebags and sad single moms to make our Christmas Consumers happy. For crying out loud, how many of those Cookie Cutter Capers do we need before going back to tried and true classics like "It's a Wonderful Life" or "National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation"? The makers of this copy cat cutie have the right idea, even if it's not that original. The Brits make Christmas better anyhow. Throw in some of their charming slang and customs and it feels original to this Christmas junkie. With my mother passing away this week it was good to have a giggle or two before we lay her to rest on Thursday. Aye, me mum would've liked this one. 🙂✌🌲

My mother and I shared a complicated relationship. She was born in the old South, where prejudice was something passed down from generation to generation. My old man (who I've mentioned on occasion was an alcoholic) let slip one boozy night that both of my grandfathers belonged in the KKK, so that's how deep that ornery bullshit goes. But I have to give mom credit. I never heard her once use the "N" word growing up. Nor did she waste her time disparaging any ethnic community. No, she saved that for anyone who didn't share her religious views. And that's where she and I really saw the world different. Her idea of God was always fire and brimstone. A deity Who'd rather Smite than Save. She left no room for argument or difference of opinion either. It was either see the world as she saw it, or go straight to hell. Then there was our difference in politics. If you've read any number of my reviews you know where I stand on that subject. I'm actually getting tired of adding to all the noise lately, but suffice it to say, I'll be voting a straight Democrat ticket in the coming elections. The fact that she and I almost let Donald Trump destroy our relationship was a source of shame for both of us. So what does any of this have to do with this movie, pray tell? Please forgive the family history but I promise it bears some fruit. "The Homecoming" was one of those movies she and I got together to watch every year around Thanksgiving. That was when I'd take a week off from work and drive down to Beaufort, SC and see my family for the holidays. Mom and I spent a great deal of that time together watching Christmas movies. It was our neutral and safe place. Where Fox News and CNN were banned for the entirety of my trip. Religion was also set aside, except for the grace said before every meal. That, too, is something we could always agree on. This will be the first year since I don't know when that we won't see this movie together. You see, my mother passed away this morning at the weary old age of 90. She was born the same year as Elvis, 1935, and that's the coolest thing I can say about my momma. Mom loved old movies. The ones she grew up with, anyway. As did I, so together we plumbed the depths of Turner Classic Movies, searching for something that might maintain that fragile peace between us. No one on earth loved me as unconditionally as she. When I'd call she'd laugh with joy at the sound of my voice. It would always rock me back on my feet, hearing that love and utter happiness in her voice. For me, I'd sometimes wonder? What was so special about me? Seriously, it was as if I was Ed McMahon, calling to tell her she'd won a million dollars on the Family Sweepstakes! Today I watched "The Homecoming" in her honor. Just me and my memories of mom. The endless flood of tears kept me from enjoying much of it, but by the time I got to the end, when the Walton family says goodnight to one another, all nine of them, I felt her very near my side. The joy she felt in my presence filled my heart to overflowing and I now understand the source of that unconditional love. She's no longer suffering, either, and that's something I'm very grateful for; but good Lord I miss her already. The sound of her voice and laughter. I can't wait to hear it again someday. So goodnight, Momma. Rest easy old girl and I'll see you before you know it. I love you.

"Are those pee stains?"

Hubie Halloween is this generation's Ghost and Mr. Chicken. Or Earnest Scared Stupid, if that pumps your pumpkin faster. A feel good romp through Mr. Dubois's Salem neighborhood that's both silly and satisfying. Kinda like Trick or Treat. So if you're a hater of any of these films you're officially a Halloween Hum Bug. That's right, Mr. Scrooge! You're just like the grumpy old man on the block who turns the sprinklers on trick or treaters. Then hangs out on his porch all night waiting for anyone strolling by with a roll of toilet paper so he can turn the hose on him. In my neighborhood, that was old man Richards. Or Mr. Dick, as we called him. If that old bastard was still alive I bet he would hate this movie. Don't be a Mr. Dick! Give Hubie Halloween the respect he deserves or else! The Great Pumpkin demands it. 🎃

Tonight my friend from work and I watched "Back to the Future". Our last movie together, for what's been going on some 15 years now. I hired Tom in 2010, I think it was. As a projectionist for our theater in Tennessee. Every Thursday night since, we've previewed a newly released movie together after we closed for the night. Tonight it was one of his all time favorites, "Back to the Future". The 40th Anniversary of its first release, back n 1985. I don't think Tom was even born then, but I was 23, doing the same job I'm doing now, only not as a projectionist anymore. Tom came in on the tail end of that job as an occupation. Over the years I've worked with many a friend like Tom. They come into my life and occupy that space for so long that it's a shock to my system when they tell me, "It's time for me to move on, Bryn." Tomorrow, I'll go to work and there'll be a great big hole in the place. Something and someone will be missing. Already we're training his replacement but it'll never be the same. I've said these exact same words before, of course. People, they come in and out of your life, don't they? I have what I think are total strangers come up to me in Wal-Mart and say, "Hey, Bryn! How you been? How's things at the theater?" I feign recognition but the truth is I'm terrible with names. Faces, I recall. Names, no sir and no ma'am. Later it'll come to me, and I'll slap myself on the forehead and go, "D'oh!" So many things I would've liked to have said had I remembered. So many questions unasked. But back to Tom's favorite movie. From now on when I see Back to the Future I'll think of him. Not George McFly, who happens to be my favorite character in the movie. (Crispin Glover makes BTTF in my opinion.) Anyway, movies are like songs that way. We often recall them for what was happening to us in our lives when we saw or heard them. Like a baby duck imprinting on the first thing he sees when he opens his eyes. Doesn't have to be the first time either. It could be the tenth or twelfth, like Back to the Future was for me tonight. Movies are time machines like that. I can't watch Airplane without flashing back to the first movie theater I ever worked at. The smell of popcorn soup, thick in the air. By the way, that's the odor of popcorn floating in a pool of soda pop at the bottom of a theater trashcan. The ones our customers dump their un-eaten popcorn and half finished sodas into on the way out the theater, where it combines to create a malingering odor that is both nostalgic and nauseating. Popcorn soup. That particular one-screen theater had that awful aroma baked into the very air, whether the trashcans were washed clean or incubating gallons of popcorn soup for the garbage men to inhale the very next morning. The movie Airplane brings those memories and aromas back every time I watch it. I hope "Back to the Future" helps me to remember the good times with Tom. The late night previews and parties. The long talks afterwards in the office. About life, love, family and movies. We crammed in a lot of memories in those fifteen years. Seems like twice that number. No one stays forever in this business, though. Someday it'll be my turn to leave, but the movies and memories I've made here will take me back as if I never left the place. I hope it's the same for my friend. So long, Tom. I'll see you in the movies, brother. ✌

Have you ever discovered a book before everyone else started raving about it? It makes you feel a bit superior and smug, I can tell you. 😂 For me, it was Thomas Harris's first book in the Hannibal Lecter series, Red Dragon. One day in 1981 I found myself in this tiny, tucked-away bookstore on Hilton Head with ridiculously overpriced books. What do you expect from a resort area with sky-high rents? Anyway, I was in-between books, and for someone like me, that's like a junkie in-between his next fix. In other words, I was jonesing enough to pay double for a suitable book. Only nothing was calling my name. The only book that seemed like it might have some potential was a new novel by a relatively unknown author at the time. Thomas Harris. I knew him by his excellent thriller Black Sunday. Remember that one? About a terrorist fixing to blow up thousands of people and the two finest NFL teams in the Super Bowl? Real nail-biting stuff. This one didn't sound quite as interesting. A semi-retired FBI agent by the name of Will Grahame with a particular set of skills that made him the ideal bloodhound for serial killers. In this case, a nasty individual the press had dubbed the Tooth Fairy. The back of the dust jacket mentioned an ancillary character named Hannibal "The Cannibal" Lecter, but I barely took notice at the time. With great reluctance, I took the book up front and paid the exorbitant price for my next fiction fix. Little did I know that book would be responsible for the biggest high of my book reading life! Add the subsequent sequels and my ADHD has never been calmer and more focused. So, when the word got out about this incredible novel and the movie adaptation called "Manhunter," directed by Michael Mann, I was way ahead of the learning curve. "Oh, you mean Red Dragon, by Thomas Harris? Of course, excellent book. I read it two years ago. Quite right. Quite right." If I had been any smugger, I would've given Faye Dunaway a run for her money. Since Red Dragon was first published I've read every Hannibal Lecter sequel in the same fashion. Buying the hardback as soon it came out. Unable to wait until it dropped as a cheaper paperback. My favorite in the series, though, is Hannibal. Even though, Silence of the Lambs is a superior novel AND movie, I prefer this one instead. Point of fact, I prefer Julianne Moore as the dogged FBI agent Clarice Starling! I know I'm in the minority there, but I think she's far more believable in the role. Sorry, Jody. The plot is absolutely mesmerizing as well. Far more layered than Silence of the Lambs. Finally, a book about Hannibal Lecter! Not some other serial killer that the FBI can't catch without Lecter's help. He and Clarice are the sole focus. And that makes all the difference in my opinion. Sure, we have plenty of ancillary characters and storylines, but they all revolve around Hannibal the Cannibal. If you're only familiar with the movies I can't urge you enough to dive into the books as well. Start off with Hannibal Rising, a prequel that predates everything else to come. Then Red Dragon, Silence of the Lambs, and last but not least Hannibal. I must warn you, though, the end of Hannibal the book is quite different from the more upbeat one in the movie! I prefer the book's ending, but it cries out for one last sequel. One in which Lecter's first arch enemy, Will Grahame, comes out of retirement to not only put an end to this smug serial killer, but possibly to save the series darling, Clarice Starling. Not just from Hannibal Lecter's clutches, but herself. Oh, how I long for that book! From my lips to Thomas Harris's ears. 🙏

This review may contain spoilers.

By far the scariest movie you'll see this Halloween. Basically an adaptation of Annie Jacobsen's book, "Nuclear War: A Scenario". Not nearly as powerful or accurate as the best selling non-fiction book, but I believe it's Must See TV. Better yet, read the book. I mentioned this previously in my review for another Netflix show, "Turning point: The Bomb and the Cold War". That, too, is Must See TV. There's nothing we can do to prevent a nuclear war, short of electing a level-headed president who's wise enough to understand that no one wins at this game. But you can stay informed. Knowing what could happen in the event of the unthinkable. No, the movie won't do that for you either. It's meant to be pulse pounding and emotional. This generation's "The Day After". With no clear cut answers or even ending. The book however is far more informative. Gruesome, even. Guaranteed to give you sleepless nights. Seriously, if you're already depressed, don't read it. And don't watch the movie either. Neither will help your disposition. If for nothing else, though, read it so you too can finally understand that there's absolutely nothing you can do to survive an all-out nuclear war. Nor should you want to. What awaits the survivors is a life not worth living. The movie has nothing to add on that subject, but the book sure does. What happens after the bomb. It's a future that doesn't include offspring and future generations. So it really doesn't matter if we launch at our adversaries or not, unless revenge is a motivation you can still get behind. The innocent people we'd annihilate probably wouldn't include the one's responsible for attacking us in the first place. They'll be safely ensconced just like our president and all the handpicked people who were selected to rebuild civilization. Let those bastards fight it out for themselves. And no, they aren't the lucky ones! That would be the one's who go in the blink of an eye. Without knowledge or pain. The movie here as I stated has no ending. The president's choice of targets is left to our fevered imagination. Those on the Right will deride it as Obama fan fiction. Those on the Left will point to the current occupant of the White House and say, "Is THAT who you want making those decisions?" Me, I didn't view this as entertainment whatsoever. Nor political fodder. Same with the book. Neither has any hope for you to cling to, brother. Just cold, hard facts. So, if you're picking this film apart because of the writing, acting, or the choices the director made then you are seriously missing the fucking point. Hence my review has no rating. No Like or Dislike. It's a scenario, my friends. See it any other way at your own peril. Good night and good luck.✌

I live in my past. I truly do. So when I come upon something new, trying to outdo the past, I tend to be cynical as hell. Case in point this 1978 remake of one of the greatest horror films of all time. Stephen King counts the 1956 version as his favorite horror film. It's in my top five, that's for certain. It's understandable then that I've never seen this remake up until tonight. The fact that my FAVORITE horror film, 1981's The Thing, happens to be a remake as well made me realize the fallacy in my thinking. I went into that one too, cynical as hell. I wanted to hate Carpenter's take on the 1951 classic, but he just made that impossible. Same case here, only I still prefer the 1956 version better. The stark black and white photography just works better for such a paranoid storyline. It's shorter run time works better, too. This one drags at time. I do love the dog with his master's face however! The end might work better, too. I'm still on the fence about that, but not the fact that's it's a worthy remake. Now as far as the 2007 version, I have no plans to give it the same benefit of the doubt. Leave well enough alone, says I. ✌

Ok, so now we know that Jason Vorhees has balls. Cause Amy Steele kicked them in the final reel, and Jason did the classic, "Oh, my fucking balls!" pose before clutching them and going down. Somehow this seems important in the development of the character. And make no mistake, Jason does evolve here. Gone is the WORST killer in a slasher movie ever. His weird mommy. Now Jason's in the Big Leagues! He's taken on the mantle as Friday the 13th's killer, here on out. Right up there with Michael Myers and Freddy Kruger. Still looking for his identity, though. Oddly enough, Jason passes up the chance to use the full-on Old Man mask that the comically skinny camp counselor wore while pretending to be Vorhees at the marshmallow cook out. Why? Beats me. It looks just like the Grandpa in Texas Chainsaw Massacre! Instead, he puts a potato sack over his head with only one eyehole. What's that about? Did he have trouble with the scissors like Charlie Brown? And yet it still beats out the dumb hockey mask he finds in F13#3 and uses from then on out. I always hated that mask. Felt no fear from it. (What's up with the mask, Jason? Trying out for the Mighty Ducks?) No surprise then that the franchise never regains the same footing as number Two. It's all downhill from there, getting sillier as the entries and years go by. Like Michael, Jason devolves into a super villain and neither character recovers from that absurdity. Sadly, that's the curse of all slasher films that end up requiring sequels. That said, as slasher films go, "Friday the 13th Part Two" is one of my favorites. Far superior to number One, and vastly superior to every other sequel that came along after. The kills are violent and varied. The Splatter King, Tom Savini, is back to helm the special effects department and let's face it, HE'S the real star here. The reason I keep returning to this movie every Halloween. The only slasher movie I feel is truly worthy of five stars is Carpenter's "Halloween". But part two of Friday the 13th earns four full stars in my opinion. Same as the first installment, but in that case only because of its enormous importance to the genre. Number Two stands alone, however, as the best entry in this franchise. The only other one earning so much praise is the original "My Bloody Valentine", released the same year as this gory gem from 1981. Making it arguably, the best year of the slasher genre. ✌

I've got a question for you. One that's been posed to me on multiple occasions, and yet my answer always seems to surprise. Which do you prefer most, Disney shorts or Loony Tunes? Me, I've never once hesitated when asked. It's Disney, for sure. Especially if it's a Mickey, Donald, and Goofy short! "Oh, boy!" as Mickey would say. Alone, those three guys are missing something. Mickey Mouse is just too decent for his own good. Too nice to be really funny. Donald Duck on the other hand, complete opposite to his friend Mickey. Easily flustered, with a penchant for pranks. I mean, despite being hilarious, how do you root for the guy? Much less trust him, without any friggin pants on. He's too one dimensional in my opinion to carry the show. Goofy? He alone is funny and multifaceted enough to hold your attention over the course of a cartoon short. His "How To" instructional shorts are a hoot! Still, his Goofiness is still lacking a bit something, isn't he? A bit unreliable, perhaps? Only when these three diverse characters get together do the laughs really begin to rock and roll. Mickey, the leader. Earnest and brave. Donald, the tempestuous one. All too eager to argue or fight. Goofy, the lazy one. Good natured and always ready to join in on his friends' adventures. Not since the Three Stooges have three personalities merged and melded so cohesively together. Their shorts together number too many to list here, but here's a few of my favorites: Mickey's Service Station. Mickey's Fire Brigade. Moving Day. Clock Cleaners. Mickey's Trailer. Boat Builders. And this hilarious one from 1937, Lonesome Ghosts. The original Ghostbusters! You don't see that kind of teamwork going on in a Looney Tunes short, do you? Bugs, Daffy, Porky, those three guys all have their own agendas. Too ego driven to work together as a team. They're much better suited as solo artists. Each one, as one-dimensional as Mickey Mouse or Donald Duck. Looney Tunes has the better sight gags and one liners, I'll give you that. But there's a reason why Walt Disney won far more Academy Awards for Best Animated short than those guys over at Warner Brothers. Nobody, and I mean nobody, could touch Disney's artwork. Even a ten-year-old kid, high on Lucky Charms on Saturday morning, can tell you that Disney cartoons just "Look better." The backgrounds and character art, far superior to the shortcut work being done at the Warner Brothers studio. Just look at the average list of artists working on a single short at Disney and compare that with the number of artists doing the same at WB and that'll speak volumes to my point. The quality of work, too! The finer detail in the things that don't matter to the plot. Objects laying around and such. You can see Walt's perfectionism in each handdrawn cell, can't you? But still, most people prefer Looney Tunes to the Disney shorts. I get it. They tend to be funnier and more relatable. At the time they were created, more current as well. Jokes that only the adults could understand. That's their real secret at Looney Tunes. Yet I still insist Disney did it better! Shorts like Lonesome Ghost and Mickey's Trailer are beautiful to look at, too. And put the three biggest stars at Disney together, and their stuff combined is arguably as funny as anything Looney Tunes put out at the same time. I always preferred my Mickey without the whites in his eyes, though. Once they started drawing a home for Mickey's pupils, that mouse was never the same. He became all- too human then. I always watch Lonesome Ghosts and Disney's Ichabod Crane this time of year. They have a Halloween flavor that is uniquely Disney. Like the Haunted Mansion in Disney's parks. I defy you to name a better setting for All Hallows Eve than the Haunted Mansion! Too bad I'm not made of money or I'd make a pilgrimage there every October 31st. Happy Halloween, y'all. 👻🎃✌

When I was monster crazy kid, I had five obsessions that ruled my every waking thought. A magazine called Famous Monsters of Filmland. Horror movies (or Monster Movies, as I called 'em), baseball, baseball cards, and comic books. In pretty much that order, too. I used to bike twelve miles to get my copy of FMOF once a month at a newstand that was in the shadow of the State House in Columbia, SC. Then ride the same distance home through some poor neighborhoods that didn't look too kindly on white boys racing by on their brand new Huffy bikes. My mint copy of FMOF tucked safely away in my backpack, with several issues of Marvel and DC to give it company. Plenty of reading material to get me through until my next hair-raising trip to the Statehouse Newstand. To this day I remember the cover of FMOF with Ron Cobb's artwork. Frankenstein's monster throwing a punch to the Wolfman's hairy jaw. It was so cool I had to stop a few times on the way home, pulling over in safer neighborhoods so I could look it over once again. This particular one sheet for the movie is reminiscent of that cover. FMOF had built this movie up to such a degree in my mind that for years I combed every week's issue of TV Guide to see if it was playing on a channel we received. Now, this was back in the late 60s and all of the 70s, and most of us lived in a three channel limbo those days. ABC, CBS, and NBC affilates. Throw in the PBS stagion if you were still into Mr. Rodgers or Sesame Street. Not much to choose from, so it was a long time before I actually got to see this movie. I was already familiar with both of the James Whale classics, "Frankenstein" and "Bride of Frankenstein". So Roy William Neill's "Frankenstein Meets the Wolfman" looked familiar indeed. At least as far the set pieces went. And some of the looming, shadow-filled scenes as well. In fact, the work BEHIND the camera is far more notable here than what went on in FRONT of it. Lon Chaney Jr reprises his Wolfman role and he does an adequate enough job I guess. But let's call a spade a spade, shall we? The son of Lon Chaney Sr only got the role for the familiarity movie fans back then accorded the name with his father. Known as The Man of a Thousand faces, Senior Chaney was synonymous with horror movies. Phantom of the Opera. The Hunchback of Notre Dame. London After Midnight. The Monster. But his son never came close to filling his sizable shoes. His acting here is testament to that cold, hard, fact. He's clumsy and wooden throughout. Like in all his movies. And yet, Chaney practically shines next to Bela Lugosi's hammy interpretation of the Frankenstein monster. It's no secret that Bela Lugosi resented Boris Karloff's success after his groundbreaking role as the creature. He always felt he was the superior actor. His performance here as the "monster that Karloff created" is proof positive that's simply not true. He waves his arms around like a blind, drunkard, reaching out like some kid's goofy idea of what a sleepwalker looks like. Grunting and growling like an old man with hemorrhoids. Was he trying to one-up Boris or simply show his contempt for the part by mocking it? Back in those days I wasn't all that hard to impress. Every horror film I saw seemed better than the last. Like I said, I was goofy for this shit. But even then I knew this was a pale imitation of the first two Creature Features. Boris Karloff is simply untouchable in his interpretation, and filmmakers should stop trying to top what is already the Mount Everest of this literary creation. Even so, "Frankenstein Meets the Wolfman" is great fun. It has all the spooky elements of a Universal Monster Movie. Crisp and clean black and white photography. Great big looming shadows and spectacular set pieces. A heart-thumping score that continues to double-down on the tension until the penultimate scene, where it crashes against the shore like a great big frothy wave. For me, though, it's the artwork on the old movie one sheets that end up drawing my eye the most. The movie itself fails to live up to the drama on the poster. Same with that legendary cover to Famous Monsters of Filmland. Gee, I wish I still had it. The same one from my youth, I mean. Not the one I bought off eBay for nearly a hundred times the price I paid in the late sixties! That mint copy has none of my personal history. No, the one I rode my bike 24-round-trip-miles to get my hands on, that's the one I want. Risking life and limb and the Huffy bike I got for Christmas that year. Boy, could that thing go! I was chased by boys and dogs alike. Had rocks and Coke bottles heaved at my head. If my mother knew what I put myself through to get my grubby little hands on that magazine each month, she would've given my bike away. Thankfully she never did. And no, those angry kids never caught up with me either, although a pissed-off German Shepherd took a chunk out of my pants leg one scary afternoon. Alas, none of those battle-won magazines made it into my adulthood. One summer while I was away visiting my old man, my mother discovered my horde of monster magazines and comic books, and the rest I'm sure you know. The story is oft repeated by others like myself through the ages. Oblivious mothers throwing away what amounted to untold fortunes. My copy of Amazing Spiderman #1. Yes, that one. Same with the X-Men. Five foot stacks of The Incredible Hulk and Fantastic Four, worth thousands of dollars. The entire run of FMOF up to that point. Even some old EC Comics from my father's youth. Priceless stuff. All gone. Baseball cards, too. Out with the trash the very next day. My relationship with my mom took years to recover. One day, in a fit of pique, I showed my mother some of the prices then going for some of those relics of my youth. She was flabbergasted and way too remorseful, I regret to say. I wish I hadn't done that, and I'll never bring it up again in her company, that's for sure. My hope is that our garbage man had a kid at home that was into that stuff and he rescued the lot for him. Shoot, maybe one of those kids who used to chase me on my Huffy bike! I hope he saved and took care of them. Maybe they provided for him and his children in his old age. If that's the case, I can accept their loss. Otherwise, the outcome is too terrible to contemplate. Oh, the horror. The horror. ✌

"What the fuck?!?"
-Josh Brolin, Weapons.

What he said.
Honestly, I was gonna leave it at that but the movie doesn't deserve that level of glibness. I'm still processing what I saw, but right off the bat this really isn't my favorite form of horror. It's a bit too esoteric for my taste. I prefer my movie monsters with both feet on the ground. Not some ancient form of deviltry that was probably hobnobbing with Pennywise up in Derry, Maine, a century or two ago. She certainly got some makeup tips from that wigged out clown didn't she? The end is great. No argument there. A perfect wrap-up to an extremely long-winded sermon. Remember the comic strip Family Circle? Most of you are probably too young, but there was this hyperactive kid in the strip called Jeffery. Every now and then the artist, Bill Keane, would draw a single panel strip with these dotted lines following Jeffery as he went out to get the mail or something. A long, meandering trip that had him going all over the neighborhood before he ended up in front of his mailbox. That's "Weapons" in a nutshell. A long, meandering journey to a destination that should have been reached in less than half the time. Not that there weren't some nice sights along the way! The crackhead with an affinity for the movie "Willow". That was cool. So was the nice principal bashing in his partner's face with his forehead. (With no CGI!) But then again, I'll never look at "Field of Dreams" again the same way, so that sucks, Amy. And just how in the hell can a little old white lady outrun a dozen young kids for three blocks before they catch her? Ahhh, but when they do! Like I said, to call the ending satisfying is like Farmer Hogget saying "That'll do, Pig. That'll do," at the end of "Babe". Perfection! That said, I'm not sure there's enough here for me to rewatch it again in the future. Like "The Sixth Sense", once you've seen it, what's the point of sitting through Weapons again? I'm sure most people would disagree with me, but that's okay. I'm glad that you loved the movie! But doggone it, Jeffery should've been back with the mail hours ago! I bet he's watching Willow again with that crackhead. What the fuck, Jeff?!? ✌

"From the town of Lincoln, Nebraska,
With a sawed off .410 on my lap
Through the badlands of Wyoming
I killed everything in my path..."
-Bruce Springsteen, Nebraska album

I have this favorite t-shirt I like to where around the kids at work sometimes. To remind them I wasn't always the age of their grandpa or Disneyworld.
🎸"I Might Be Old But at Least I Got to See All the Great Bands!"🎸
I came of age at the height of Rock and Roll music. Schools still had money for band class and most kids back then learned to play an instrument of some sort. For Gods sake it was part of your grade! So naturally some of the more musically gifted students drifted together and formed bands of their own. Every class had one or two. Some good enough to make a living at it. Some, great enough to be famous at it. I never knew any of the latter, although I'm familiar with plenty of the former. Myself, the only instrument I ever came close to perfecting was my voice, and I did a lot of musical theater as a consequence. Music, therefore, has always been a big part of my life. I started out, as you might imagine growing up in the 60s and 70s, cutting my teeth on the music of Elvis Presley. His heyday had since passed him by, but he was still hugely relevant up through the early 70s. From there I graduated to the Beatles and then the Rolling Stones. Bands like Queen, Pink Floyd, The Eagles, Doobie Brothers, Led Zepplin, ELO, Supertramp, and Fleetwood Mac filled my vinyl collection. But then I started gravitating towards the mostly male vocalists of the time. Bob Dylan, Elton John, Marvin Gaye, Jackson Browne, Eric Clapton, Jim Croce, Ray Charles, James Brown, and Otis Redding. But I finally found the voices I most related to by the time I was in the 11th grade. About 16 or 17. And that would be Billy Joel and Bruce Springsteen. My black friend Reedy called it white boy music, but one day I found "The Stranger" and "Nebraska" 8- track tapes in his car, so I know he liked them, too (even though he claimed they were just guilty pleasures). Funny though how he knew the words to the Boss's "Atlantic City" better than I did! Suddenly I was more concerned with lyrics than the beat. And with the exception of Bob Dylan during that period, nobody was a better lyricist than Bruce Springsteen. Nebraska was and still is my favorite Springsteen album, so tonight while I was previewing "Deliver Me From Nowhere", I was beside myself with joy to discover that's the main thrust of this movie! The making of Nebraska. Now generally speaking I'm not usually interested in any Behind-the-Scenes-Secrets. I don't want to know how the magician pulls the rabbit out of his empty hat. But when it comes to musical icons like Elvis, the Beatles, Queen, or Bruce Springsteen, sign me up. Most people seemed to hate "Bohemian Rhapsody", but I loved learning how those songs were composed and produced. Who hasn't heard and loved the story of Elvis and Sun Records? Johnny Cash's brother's tragic death or how Ray Charles came to be blind? So I was entranced this evening, learning how Bruce laid down these now iconic tracks for Nebraska in a bedroom of a rented house in New Jersey. How personal and deep each song was. How the darkness that led him to discover those lyrics took a toil on his mental health. How at the same time he was writing music for this legendary album he was also coming up with the more mainstream stuff that made up his most financially successful album, "Born in the USA"! Dude, that's like The Beatles recording both "Abbey Road" and "Rubber Soul" at the same time! Honestly, I would love to give this movie five stars because that's how much I enjoyed it. Yet I don't believe it's for everyone. Any lover of Rock and Roll should dig it, even those who don't count themselves as Springsteen fans. The behind the scenes stuff alone in that regard make it interesting. But for those who neither care for his music or Rock and Roll, maybe think twice about seeing it. I think you'll end up bored, even though Bruce's life growing up makes for good drama. Jeremy Allen White nails the voice, the look, and the mannerisms that make up the Boss. I can't think of anyone offhand who could've done a better job and I hope he gets nominated for the role. His dad, who plays such an integral role in Bruce's life, is played by everyman actor Stephen Graham, and the maker's of the film should thank their lucky stars for getting possibly the best actor of this generation to play the part. He too deserves a nomination this year. Paul W. Hauser is awesome, too, as a guitar tech, I believe. Integral to the recording sessions taking place in the bedroom. As usual, he makes the most out of every small part. But make no mistake, the movie is about the album Nebraska, Bruce, and his dad. Throw in the depression angle and you've got yourself a motion picture. Not the best music biopic I've ever seen, but one of the most informative for sure. Dude, if you're a fan of the Boss, don't hesitate. Buy those fucking tickets tomorrow! If you can take or leave him, maybe you'll end up a lifelong fan. That's what happened to me watching "Love and Mercy". Now I love the Beach Boys! But if you simply loathe Bruce Springsteen, then why in the hell are you even reading my review anyway! Go watch "Ray" or "Walk the Line" Instead. Maybe the "Buddy Holly Story" if you're real old school. But do me a favor, huh? Don't disrespect the Boss. I might just have to unfollow you. ✌

Way back in the early eighties I started hearing about this crazy film called "Roar". No, not my life story, although that really would be crazy. Roar was called the most dangerous movie ever made. And believe me you, brother, that ain't hyperbole. Something like a hundred crew and cast members were injured in the making of the movie. Some grievously by the untrained lions, tigers, panthers, jaguars, and leopards running loose on the set. To call this production irresponsible and insane is like calling Timothy Treadwell a naive individual. Remember that kook? The Grizzly Man? Thought he was Dr. Doolittle to the bears. Took his girlfriend to manga with the beasts and the two of them ended up dinner instead. "Hey, boo boo! Look what I found in this pick-a-nick basket!" I hate to speak ill of the dead, cause Treadwell did have some good intentions, but the man was an idiot. Worse, he inspired others to be one with the bear, too. Anthropomorphizing animals and treating them like grumpy relatives at the dinner table. Giving them cuddly names, as if that would keep the bears from eating them. The maker of Roar was cut from the same moronic mold. Noel Marshall and his wife Tippi Hedren (yep, THAT Tippy) happened to drive by a house in Africa one day, taken over by a large pride of lions. Lounging on the porch, windowsills and roof. It gave them the bright idea to make this movie. About a naturalist named Hank who lives on a compound in Africa with more lions than common sense. All the other big cats, too. They share his every living space. Even watch him take a shit in the bathroom. Into this insanity he invites his estranged wife Madeline (played by his real life wife, Tippi Hedren) and his grown kids. One of whom just happens to be a very young and very pretty Melanie Griffith. I won't bore you too much with the plot details, just a well-intentioned idiot who wishes to save all these big cats from hunters and poachers alike. Anyway, the family gets their signals mixed and while Hank is off looking for his clan at the local airport, they've made their way to his Compound of Carnage. ROOOAAAR!!! I suppose the next few minutes, as family and lions just narrowly keep missing each other in every room they enter, are supposed to be funny, but I was cringing too much to laugh. I mean, these are some BIG and scary looking animals. Untrained, too, I remind you. None of them family pets. How all those injuries didn't end up into a feeding frenzy I'll never know. Marshall and Hedren roughhouse with the big cats as if they're playing with a five- pound tabby, not a five-hundred-pound lion. Scaring the hell out of any unwitting guests or visitors. It doesn't take a psychiatrist to realize its all bullshit bravado to impress others with their fearlessness. Same with Treadwell. People like this get off on it. I knew this kid in elementary school. Used to shove his bare hand into fire ant hills, showing off how incredibly brave he was. Daring you to dare him...

"You dare me to? Ill do it, you know! You dare me?"
"No, Billy. I don't dare you. That's stupid...What the hell, Billy!?! "
Five seconds later, Billy's hand looks like it has a bad case of the measles.

That's the mentality of people like Noel Marshall and Tim Treadwell. Morons who end up putting other peoples lives in danger. In Treadwell's case, his girlfriend paid the ultimate price. But not before having to listen to Tim's horrifying screams as he was eaten alive. Your turn next, Missy! Don't go too far! As for Tippy, she didn't escape unscathed either. A lion bit her on the head. That's right, her head! Literally scraping his six-inch incisors across her bare skull. Her idiot husband almost lost his torn open leg to gangrene. The mouth of a lion? Crazy filthy. He deserved it. Maybe Tippy did, too. So the next time you watch "The Birds" and watch her get nearly pecked to death, maybe don't feel so bad for her. She certainly learned nothing from the experience. As for the movie Roar? Besides some gorgeous photography of the African countryside and young Melanie Griffith there's nothing here to recommend. The acting is shit and the plot is preposterous. "Good intentions are often a highway to hell," is the quote that keeps coming to mind. But most of all, it's like what we used to say about Billy in the third grade. "Don't encourage him and maybe he won't hurt himself this time." Leave this cult classic on the shelf where it belongs. Nothing good will come of it. 🦁🐯✌

Heavy on the exposition, light on the execution, please. Hold the mayo. You know what? Cancel the order altogether. I think I'll get something else.

This review may contain spoilers.

Much better than I thought it would be. Definitely one of the more clever slasher films. If it's a high kill count you want, though, rewatch Terrifer instead. But Dangerous Animals is a cut above the usual fare in this genre. Same with the prodution values. Nice cast, too. Attractive, yet not dumb. What I appreciated most was the director's choice to show less at times, rather than satisfy the audiences bloodlust with some graphic but flavorless CGI. Digital effects would've only hurt the movie in that regard. Not saying there's no CGI, just not as much as I'd feared. But the most pleasant surprise here is the screenplay allows for a happy ending. I don't need for the pretty girl to survive every slasher film, but this trend of killing off everyone in the end has gotten boring. Don't see how there could be a sequel, but I'd climb aboard for the next 3 hour tour. Just leave Gilligan on the dock this time. ✌

1. The Big Lebowski
2. Fargo
3. O Brother, Where Art Thou?
4. Raising Arizona
5. When Harry Met Sally...
6. Notting Hill
7. Marty
8. Planes, Trains and Automobiles
9. Caddyshack
10. Waking Ned Devine

...plus 7 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.

This is a work in progress. Still culling through my favorites. Not sure some of these, like Napoleon Dynamite and Ferris Beuler truly belong in this category. Don't pay too much attention to the rankings. After the top ten it was pretty much stream of concious.

1. Stand by Me
2. Breaking Away
3. Summer of '42
4. The Outsiders
5. Hope and Glory
6. Little Fugitive
7. American Graffiti
8. Brighton Beach Memoirs
9. The Breakfast Club
10. Brooklyn

...plus 42 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.

• Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ
• The Razor's Edge
• My Name Is Pauli Murray
• Mass
• Beginning
• Servants
• Europe '51
• Saint Maud
• Corpus Christi
• Brother Sun, Sister Moon

...plus 68 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.

Horror is too subjective to ever really say The Greatest Horror Movies ever made. No, it's nothing more than opinion. Here's my list though. I hate CGI, so nothing too modern makes my cut. Once I got near fifty, I was scraping the bottom of the barrel. The horror genre has fewer excellent movies than any other in film. Lots of fun but mediocre fare once you get past that number. It all depends on your point of view of course. My top five I feel are pretty solid though.

1. The Exorcist
2. The Thing
3. The Shining
4. Halloween
5. Alien
6. Night of the Living Dead
7. Invasion of the Body Snatchers
8. Jaws
9. The Blair Witch Project
10. Psycho

...plus 40 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.

As Jean Shepherd wrote in A Christmas Story, "Christmas! The one day of the year in which the whole Kid Year revolves!"
58 years later and it still is the one day in which this kid's year revolves. These are my favorite Christmas films ranked, though by no means my only Christmas movies. Just the ones I HAVE to watch before the Big Day arrives.

• A Christmas Story
• It's a Wonderful Life
• Scrooge
• Home Alone
• National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation
• The Homecoming: A Christmas Story
• Love Actually
• The Nativity Story
• The Bishop's Wife
• Miracle on 34th Street

...plus 25 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.

I was fortunate enough to grow up during the greatest decade of film. The studios were willing to experiment like never before or since. Corporate was still a dirty wood in Hollywood, and directors were the new stars. Except for disco, the music was better than ever and so were the soundtracks. Cars had not yet lost their sense of style either. Comic books cost less than a quarter. Baseball card packs even less. And if you were smart enough to take care of both of them? Well, lets just say, a week's allowance back then could have made you a future millionaire. But hey, you didn't need to know the future to know that Godfather (One AND Two!), Apocalypse Now, Star Wars, Taxi Driver, Halloween, and Alien were still going to be some of the greatest movies ever made a hundred years from now! For those of us who came of age back then, it's been a sad and discouraging trip ever since. Except for the clothes, the 70s were arguably the best decade ever. But as far as film goes? Sorry, fellow cinephiles. No argument whatsoever will be entertained by those of us who grew up back then. Compiled off the top of my head, so please don't judge the placement. Some at the bottom deserve better. No doubt I'm forgetting so many more that should've made my list. Thanks for looking.

• The Godfather
• The Godfather Part II
• Star Wars
• Apocalypse Now
• Taxi Driver
• Alien
• Chinatown
• One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest
• Annie Hall
• The French Connection

...plus 65 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.

Kudos to Stephen M. who gave me the idea for movies from the year I was born. The tag line of course is from American Graffiti. Only listed films I've seen and enjoyed, although some I haven't gotten round to reviewing just yet. In no particular order and excluding way more than I'd like...

• Lawrence of Arabia
• To Kill a Mockingbird
• Cape Fear
• Days of Wine and Roses
• Gigot
• The Longest Day
• Lolita
• The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance
• Lonely Are the Brave
• Requiem for a Heavyweight

...plus 20 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.

My list is meant more for the investigative side of journalism. Hence the absence of journalistic movies like Citizen Kane, Network, and Broadcast News. I love movies like Spotlight, where the heroes are newspaper men and women. Digging the truth out of the dirt no matter how painful it is to hear. My mind tends to wander in most movies, but never in this genre. I find this stuff fascinating. Most of these are probably pretty well known by most members of Letterboxd, except perhaps "Shattered Glass." If you haven't seen it yet I urge you to do so. If I could add the last season of The Wire, I'd do so, when the storyline revolved around the inner workings of a Baltimore newspaper on its last legs.

• Spotlight
• All the President's Men
• Shattered Glass
• The Post
• Capote
• Ace in the Hole
• Good Night, and Good Luck.
• The Paper
• Absence of Malice
• Veronica Guerin

Some good, some truly awful. All disturbing and not for the eyes and ears of anyone under the age of seventeen, much less ten years old!

• Cannibal Holocaust
• The Texas Chain Saw Massacre
• The Exorcist
• I Spit on Your Grave
• The Last House on the Left
• The Blair Witch Project
• Last Tango in Paris
• Faces of Death
• A Clockwork Orange
• Audition

My favorite 007 movies. I clearly prefer Sean Connery, but the only other actors worth a damn in this role are Roger Moore and Daniel Craig. My ratings don't necessarily reflect my rankings. It's no surprise the series ran out of steam when they ran out of original James Bond stories, written by the spymaster himself, Ian Fleming.

1. Goldfinger
2. Thunderball
3. You Only Live Twice
4. On Her Majesty's Secret Service
5. Dr. No
6. From Russia with Love
7. Casino Royale
8. Live and Let Die
9. The Spy Who Loved Me
10. For Your Eyes Only

...plus 1 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.

As someone who'd rather read a good book than go to a good movie, this list for me was longer than I anticipated. Some might disagree with me, especially on Shawshank Redemption, but while I don't think many of these films are necessarily BETTER than the book, I do believe many of them are just as good. Both Godfather and Jaws in my opinion are better movies than books, hands down. Several movies on the list had other titles as books, again like Shawshank, while others started out as short stories. Feel free to disagree with any of my choices or include your own;)

• The Godfather
• Jaws
• Schindler's List
• Fantastic Mr. Fox
• No Country for Old Men
• Forrest Gump
• Psycho
• The Shawshank Redemption
• The Thing
• Jackie Brown

...plus 22 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.

If you don't like these fright films then you and I have nothing to say to each other when it comes to the horror genre. In no particular order. Note, no films with CGI can be found on this list. At least I don't think so. Many great films like Rosemary's Baby and Texas Chainsaw Massacre don't make my cut, but not because they're not favorite horror films for me. They are, but I understand why many people dislike them. But as far as a Litmus test goes, that shows if our taste in the macabre is the same, these particular movies are not up for debate with me.

• The Thing
• Frankenstein
• Bride of Frankenstein
• The Shining
• The Exorcist
• Jaws
• Alien
• Let the Right One In
• Night of the Living Dead
• Dawn of the Dead

...plus 10 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.

In no particular order, here is my list of what I consider the greatest acting performances of all time. At least those that I've seen. The movies themselves are secondary in this regard. List is currently in progress...

• Sling Blade

  Billy Bob Thornton disappears and Karl Childers takes over every facet of his body and personality. With little to no makeup, Thornton transforms completely into another man. Its almost scary to watch. In my opinion the greatest acting performance of all time.

• Raging Bull

  Robert DeNiro earned this Best Actor nomination and win by putting his body through hell to play the actual raging bull, Jake LaMotta.

• In Cold Blood

  Robert Blake bore an eerie resemblance to the killer Perry Smith in Truman Capote's In Cold Blood. But even without that advantage he had this guy down cold. Blake's own life bore the same hardships and heartaches of Richard Perry's. Clearly Blake understood this man better the killer's own mother.

• One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest

  Seriously, could any actor have pulled off R.P. McMurphy like the great Jack Nicholson? No, I think not. Jack IS R.P. McMurphy!

• Midnight Cowboy

  A Dustin Hoffman performance that inspired a Muppet Character. Ever wonder where they got the idea for Rizzo the Rat? That's Ratzo Rizzo from Midnight Cowboy. Hoffman plays a street person who guides newcomer Joe Buck to the NYC scene. Teaching him in the ins and outs of being homeless in the biggest city on earth. One of my favorite acting performances. Hard to see Hoffman as anyone else once you witness his performance.

• Monster

  Not a big fan of this movie, but Charlize Theron gives one of the greatest performances of all time, portraying real life serial killer, Aileen Wournos. With very little makeup they transform one of the most beautiful women on earth into the Blair Fucking Witch. Wow.

• The Silence of the Lambs

  Anthony Hopkins as Hannibal the Cannibal Lector. Say no more.

• The Godfather

  Marlon Brando gives the greatest performance of his already illustrious career, playing Mafia don, Vito Corleone. Truly one of the greatest performances of all time. The fact that he was still a young man when he auditioned for this part astounds me.

• The Godfather Part II

  Al Pacino takes up where Brando left off, making The Godfather Saga the best actors movie of all time. His performance as reluctant head of the Corleone family, Michael Corleone, should have garnered him Best Actor that year, but he was robbed once again.

• Sophie's Choice

  Meryl Streep shows why she is the greatest female actor Hollywood ever produced. Her performance as tragic Sophie, A Holocaust survivor, who was forced to make an impossible decision, remains one of the most heart wrenching displays of acting I've ever seen.

...plus 30 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.

These are the four movies I look to to determine if a fellow cinephile has anything in common with me. My litmus test so to speak. While "The Godfather" is my favorite movie, I realize not everyone likes gangster melodramas. Many movies are like this. They belong to a genre that might not be for every film lover. But THESE movies on my list should in fact be loved by every so called cinephile. And if you don't, we simply can't be friends:(

• The Apartment
• Marty
• 12 Angry Men
• Fargo

I love sports themed movies. Baseball and boxing being my go to movies in this genre. So many great ones to choose from. Not so with golf. It just doesn't translate as well to film. None rank up there with movies like Rocky, Raging Bull, The Natural or Field of Dreams. But if you're into the sport as much as I am, then they're very enjoyable.

• Caddyshack

  Not long on actual golf, but still the best of the lot.

• The Greatest Game Ever Played

  Based on the best sports book ever written, in my opinion. Movie doesn't quite live up to the actual feat by Francis Ouimet, but probably the most rewatchable of the lot. Shia Lobeof does a great job.

• Tin Cup

  Kevin Costner kills as hardheaded Roy McAvoy. Still, no golfer worth his salt would EVER give up a US Open by not taking a damn drop!

• Happy Gilmore

  Stupid silly, but funny as shit. The actual golf is some of the dumbest potrayed in any golf movie.

• The Legend of Bagger Vance

  Terrible casting. This movie cries out for Morgan Freeman. In fairness, Will Smith is great, but just too young to really pull it off. He aint nearly as bad as Matt Damon is though. Worst swing ever for a golf movie. Great golf overall though. A true golf movie.

• Bobby Jones: Stroke of Genius

  Only a golf fan would enjoy this movie about one of the greatest golf legends. Good golf sequences. Jim Caviesel has a good swing. Very much like Bobby himself.

• Follow the Sun

  Glenn Ford as the great Ben Hogan. Servicable golf. Not very accurate though.

• A Gentleman's Game

  Coming of age on a golf course. The book is much better.

• Tommy's Honour

  Again, only golf fans need apply. I loved it.

• The Caddy

  Best thing about this movie is the real golf pros starring at the time. Ben Hogan, Byron Nelson are in the movie. A real treat for die hards. Surprisingly, Dean and Jerry have two of the best golf swings from movie stars. Funny movie, too.

In no particular order

• Miss Potter
• My Left Foot: The Story of Christy Brown
• Lust for Life
• An American in Paris
• Mona Lisa Smile
• The Elephant Man
• Chaplin
• American Splendor
• Ghost World
• An Angel at My Table

I tried to keep my list to a top ten but it was impossible. Not really ranked either. Just off the top of my head.

• Chinatown
• L.A. Confidential
• La La Land
• Sunset Boulevard
• The Big Lebowski
• Swingers
• The Player
• Jackie Brown
• Heat
• Fast Times at Ridgemont High

...plus 10 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.

1. 12 Angry Men
2. The Grapes of Wrath
3. The Ox-Bow Incident
4. Fail Safe
5. Mister Roberts
6. Once Upon a Time in the West
7. My Darling Clementine
8. On Golden Pond
9. Young Mr. Lincoln
10. The Wrong Man

Not ranked; just off the top of my head. If it was ranked I'd have to put "Asphalt Jungle" in the top five.

• The Killing
• Reservoir Dogs
• The Sting
• Jackie Brown
• Rififi
• The Usual Suspects
• Heat
• Thief
• Dog Day Afternoon
• The Town

...plus 20 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.

Im pretty sure Alien had some cgi but my main reason for putting it on my list, at number one no less, is the Alien itself. Nothing CGI about it. CGI is the kiss of death to any horror movie aspiring to be anything more than a future bargain bin movie at Walmart. CGI effects might fool the brain better than practical effects, but viscerouly they have no emotional impact.

• Alien
• The Thing
• King Kong
• Frankenstein
• An American Werewolf in London
• The Incredible Shrinking Man
• Jaws
• Dawn of the Dead
• Nosferatu
• Forbidden Planet

1. Rocky
2. Rudy
3. The Karate Kid
4. Seabiscuit
5. Hoosiers
6. Breaking Away
7. Cinderella Man
8. The Bad News Bears
9. Moneyball
10. The Set-Up

When compiling my list I ranked those directors I tend to watch the most. Usually the ones with the most films I love under their belts. Only those with at least two favorite movies of mine made the cut. While Tarantino is my favorite director, I believe Steven Speilberg is the greatest filmmaker of all time. Ozu is hands down my favorite foriegn director.

1. Pulp Fiction

   I actually enjoy QT's Kill Bill franchise the most, but Pulp is definitely his masterpiece. I remember when it opened at my theatre on Hilton Head, and how at first I didn't know what to make of it. It was the first film I'd ever seen where the director was the star of the show. Now I can't get enough of QT's films. I love each and every one.
   #2-Kill Bill 1 and 2
   #3-Reservoir Dogs
   #4-Inglorious Basterds
   #5-Django
   #6-Once Upon a Time in Hollywood
   #7-Jackie Brown
   #8-Death Proof
   #9-The Hateful Eight

2. Schindler's List

   Arguably the greatest director of all time. And this is his finest film.
   #2-Raiders of the Lost Ark
   #3-Jaws
   #4-Saving Private Ryan
   #5-ET
   #6-Close Encounters of the Third Kind
   #7-Sugarland Express
   #8-Catch Me if You Can
   #9-Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom
   #10-Empire of the Sun
   #11-Duel
   #12-Lincoln

3. The Big Lebowski

   The Cohen brothers definately have the kind of sense of humor I find the most funny. Also wonderful, "Fargo", "O' Brother Where art Thou?" , and "Raising Arizona." Outside of the comedy genre, No Country for Old Men, Miller's Crossing.

4. GoodFellas

   Martin Scorsece. Ranked for me would be Goodfellas, Raging Bull, Casino, Taxi Driver, Departed, The Irishman, and Mean Streets

5. The Apartment

   Billy Wilder is my favorite old school director. He excelled in any genre but comedy was his forte.
   #2-Sunset Boulevard
   #3-Some Like it Hot
   #4-Stalag 17
   #5-The Seven Year Itch
   #6-Ace in the Hole

6. Rear Window

   It's Hitchcock, baby. Nuff said.
   #2-Psycho
   #3-The birds
   #4-Vertigo
   #5-Strangers on a Train
   #6-North by Northwest

7. Modern Times

   Charlie Chaplin was a true genius and is one of the only directors of the silent era whose work remains relevant and funny as hell.
   #2-City Lights
   #3-Modern Times
   #4-The Great Dictator
   #5-Limelight
   #6-The Circus
   #7-Gold Rush
   #8-The Kid

8. Tokyo Story

   Yazujiro Ozu is without a doubt my favorite foreign film director. His movies remind me of the British kitchen sink dramas of the 50s and 60s. Movies about what happens within the walls of ones on home. Simple dramas that on the face of it sound quite dull but are anything but.
   #2-Tokyo Twilight
   #3-Good Morning
   #4-I was Born, but...
   #5-Good Morning
   #6-Record of a Tenement Gentleman

9. The Searchers

   John Ford. The Spielberg of his day. So many great movies. My other favorites of his are "The Quiet Man", "Mr Roberts" and "The Man Who Killed Liberty Valance."

10. The Godfather

    My favorite movie, period. Other Coppola movies ranked...
    #2-Godfather Part Two
    #3-Apocolypse Now
    #4-The Conversation

...plus 90 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.

Like most film fans, I tend to watch those documentaries that focus on a subject I already find interesting. Thus, famous docs like "March of the Penguins" and "An Inconvienant Truth" don't even make my cut, although I do plan to see them someday. I also steer clear of documentarians that have an axe to grind. Like Michael Moore and that dispicable Dinesh D'Souza. They cannot be trusted to tell the Truth. Last on my list is Lionel Rogosin's "On The Bowery", which isn't a true documentary. Otherwise it would be further up my list. "Cocaine Cowboys" is my favorite doc, but Ken Burns Civil War series is the cream of the crop here.

1. Cocaine Cowboys

   The most fascinating documentary I've ever seen. Watched it dozens of times. The one I end up recommening the most. Love the show Narcos on Netflix? Then this is right up your alley.

2. The Civil War

   Before this doc I never had any real interest in the Civil War, but Ken Burns brings the whole thing alive without the benifit of any actual film footage! I think its the greatest documerntary of all time.

3. The War

   I've been a history buff on WW2 snce I was a little kid and started playing with my GI Joes. One of those few times in history when the line between Good and Evil was so clearly defined. This time we were the good guys. This is my favorite of the WW2 docs.

4. The World at War

   The most detailed of any WW2 doc. A bit dry at times but it shines when discussing the Russian campaign.

5. Hearts and Minds
6. The Vietnam War

   Wow. Everything you need to know about the Vietnam War is here. Like his Civil War doc, Ken Burns leaves no stone unturned.

7. Won't You Be My Neighbor?

   What a wonderful human being. If everyone could be more like Fred Rogers the world would be a paradise.

8. Shoah

   Hard to watch. But a film everyone should see just so we never forget it could all (and does) happen again.

9. Harlan County U.S.A.

   A great documentarian can make any subject fascinating. And this one does, showing the drama played out in a coal mining community in Harlan County Kentucky during a coal miners strike. He makes you care what happens to these people very few of us have anything in common with.

10. Baseball

    Not Ken Burns best but anyone who loves the sport of Baseball will also love this highly indepth history of the game.

...plus 20 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.

Forever Adapting List. Some movies are more well known than others. "Marty" and "The Apartment" might be familiar to most movie buffs but maybe not so to the younger generations. Will be constantly adding to this list as the mood or memory strikes me.

• Breaking Away
• Little Fugitive
• Hope and Glory
• Shadowlands
• Tyrannosaur
• The Last Picture Show
• Paper Moon
• Fanboys
• Bernie
• Waiting for Guffman

...plus 137 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.

• Rocky

I first discovered this British genre after I'd already seen a few great examples on TCM over the years (God bless John Osborne). I didnt know there was a name for this genre (British dramas focusing on the mundane problems of blue collar Brits. In other words, dramas that tend to take place around the kitchen sink), all I knew was I enjoyed watching life play itself out around ordinary people with ordinary problems. The fact they were British gave them a bit more flavoring. Tony Richardson was the king of this Genre.

1. Saturday Night and Sunday Morning
2. A Taste of Honey
3. The Loneliness of the Long Distance Runner
4. Look Back in Anger
5. The L-Shaped Room
6. Kes
7. This Sporting Life
8. Alfie
9. The Entertainer
10. Georgy Girl

...plus 1 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.

Movies so BAD, they're good.

1. Plan 9 from Outer Space
2. The Room
3. Dolemite
4. Robot Monster
5. Jaws 3-D
6. The Terror of Tiny Town
7. Mommie Dearest
8. Jack and Jill
9. Santa Claus Conquers the Martians
10. Bride of the Monster

...plus 6 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.

I enjoy a good cry better than most guys and these are the ones that always leave me red-eyed and emotionally exhausted. Thought I'd have trouble thinking of fifty films in this genre but it was easy in fact. Left quite a few good ones off. Almost embarrased to put The Notebook on here but damnit, it belongs on any Tearjerker List. My top 14 are the hardest on my Kleenex box though. Top four and I'm useless the next day.

1. Shadowlands
2. Schindler's List
3. Million Dollar Baby
4. The Green Mile
5. The Yearling
6. Old Yeller
7. Philadelphia
8. Grave of the Fireflies
9. Umberto D.
10. The Passion of the Christ

...plus 40 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.

Not usually one of my favorite genres, thus I had to work harder than most of my lists. But the ones I do like tend to be some of my favorite movies period. If I had to choose two actors above all the rest in this genre it would be Tom Hanks and Meg Ryan.

1. Annie Hall
2. Sleepless in Seattle
3. When Harry Met Sally...
4. You've Got Mail
5. The Big Sick
6. Say Anything...
7. Notting Hill
8. Marty
9. The Apartment
10. Bringing Up Baby

...plus 20 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.

My favorite genre these days. Sooo many great films I'm sure I left many of them off my list. I didn't rank them but the top ten are a etty close bet. Others near the bottom should be further up the list.

1. The Godfather
2. The Godfather Part II
3. GoodFellas
4. Pulp Fiction
5. Reservoir Dogs
6. Once Upon a Time... in Hollywood
7. L.A. Confidential
8. Road to Perdition
9. The Departed
10. Heat

...plus 90 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.

What a hard list to compile! Comedy is such a relative genre. What one guy finds funny, so many others may not. First twenty are pretty solid for me but it soon falls apart after that. That's why I didn't rank them. Just an impossible task. Tried to keep it to 100 so I left a ton off. Next to horror the hardest genre to get right for a film maker. There are a lot of great funny movies, but suprisingly few which would be considered critically acclaimed. Its a difficult task juggling the need to be funny while telling a complete story. My list contains my favorites, not neccesarily the greatest comedies though. The king of comedy directors, though, has to be the Cohen Brothers with six movies on my list. I left off the great Charlie Chaplin, who would have dominated this list. He deserves his own list later on.

1. Planes, Trains and Automobiles
2. The Big Lebowski
3. Fargo
4. O Brother, Where Art Thou?
5. Napoleon Dynamite
6. Office Space
7. The Graduate
8. Jojo Rabbit
9. Young Frankenstein
10. The Apartment

...plus 91 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.

So much I haven't seen but these are my favorite thus far.

1. Cinema Paradiso
2. Tokyo Story
3. Parasite
4. Bicycle Thieves
5. Elevator to the Gallows
6. Rififi
7. Shoplifters
8. Diabolique
9. Rashomon
10. Seven Samurai

...plus 40 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.

Not neccessarily in order of greatness, just my personal favorites. Left off most of the Holocaust movies, which I feel is a genre unto itself now. But there's no way I can make a greatest war films list without Schindler's List at #1. So many more war films I would love to see, like "The Human Condition" trilogy set in Japan during WW2.

1. Schindler's List
2. Saving Private Ryan
3. Inglourious Basterds
4. Apocalypse Now
5. 1917
6. The Enemy Below
7. Das Boot
8. The Dirty Dozen
9. Paths of Glory
10. The Longest Day

...plus 50 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.

Film noir is a hard category for me to quantify. While there is a standard definition for Noir movies, bleak urban landscapes populated mostly with greedy, corrupt individuals; high doses of cynicism and a fatalistic mindset throughout, shot with deep shadows and usually in black & white, I've always thought of the genre as more of a "gut feeling." For most film fans, "Vertigo" is one of the greatest examples of this genre, but not for me. Just a gut feeling it doesn't truly there. Here are my favorite examples of the genre ranked. Billy Wilder and Hitchcock are my favored directors here. My ratings for the movies themselves aren't always reflective of my choices.

1. The Asphalt Jungle
2. Nightmare Alley
3. The Killing
4. Kiss Me Deadly
5. The Night of the Hunter
6. Sunset Boulevard
7. Double Indemnity
8. Chinatown
9. Out of the Past
10. The Naked City

...plus 15 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.

Growing up, horror movies, westerns, war movies, and the occasional Disney film were all I gave a crap about. But horror movies reigned supreme for me! And though I still love the occasional horror movie today at the ripe old age of 58, they tend to be the worst kind of drek. In my opinion, Horror is the hardest genre to get right. At least 90% of all horror movies are just plain awful. No imagination on the filmmaker's part, and no respect for their audience either. You can't just throw around some blood and call it a day. Way down on my list is Texas Chainsaw Massacre. Not because I think its the worst of the lot. But because it represents the kind of horror movie lazy film-makers tend to make in this genre nowadays. Movies lacking in imagination and any sense of right and wrong. Just shock and awe.

1. The Exorcist

   The only truly scarey movie on my list. At least for me. Can't watch it alone.

2. The Thing

   This is the movie I point to when pointing out, at least in the horror genre, that practical effects are far superior tp CGI. One of those rare remakes that are better than the original. Gets better with each viewing.

3. Night of the Living Dead

   Romero made a movie that utilized the first elements of the horror genre. The Living Dead. Whether you're talking about Nosferatu, Frankenstein, or Dracula, they were all Living Dead. But Romero revived this precept and made it his own.

4. Invasion of the Body Snatchers

   Not a movie about the Red Scare, as some would have you believe. But a truly original idea in a genre usually lacking in that. One of the real classics.

5. Jaws

   Yes, it's Horror. Eaten alive? That's Horror in its purest sense.

6. Alien

   Some would argue that Alien is science fiction, but they're wrong.

7. The Shining

   Another great score. Maybe the best ever for a horror movie. I love the book much more than the movie, but Kubrick got three things right with his film version. One, the score, of course. Two, the locales. The Overlook really does feel isolated and on top of the world almost. Three, the maze. A better plot device than Stephen King's roque court, which Kubrick removed entirely from the movie. Unfortunately, the one thing Kubrick got wrong was the love Jack Torrance felt for his family. Especially his son. The most frightening element in The Shining is the way the hotel possesses Jack and drives him to murder his loved ones! Kubrick went straight for the throat and made Jack insane almost from the very begining. A shame, otherwise a great movie.

8. The Silence of the Lambs

   Is it truly horror? Debateable. But if its going to make any list it needs to be in the top twenty at least.

9. Halloween

   Like Jaws, Halloween proves how important the right score is to a movie. Especially to a horror movie.

10. Frankenstein

    Its impact isn't the same as in 1931, or even when I was a kid in the sixties and seventies, but cinematically it's THE most important horror movie ever made. The genisis of the genre itself.

...plus 94 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.

My current top 25 for the time being. Like my most cinephiles my picks are conatantly changing or swapping slots. Except for the first two. Those have stayed the same for me since I first saw them back in the seventies.

1. The Godfather
2. The Godfather Part II
3. The Shawshank Redemption
4. Schindler's List
5. Rocky
6. Jaws
7. Cinema Paradiso
8. Raiders of the Lost Ark
9. Pulp Fiction
10. GoodFellas

...plus 15 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.

My early love of comedy started off with the Three Stooges, which led to further slapstick with the great Jerry Lewis. As I grew older I outgrew Jerry but have recently begun to rediscover his genius. I have to admit, the French were right about him. His earlier works with Dean Martin are still my favorites but his later solo works show how his genius had grown. Unfortunatly, the truth every comediane must learn is Funny has an expiration date for everyone, and as time went on Jerry's antics no longer seemed funny, only desperate. Comedy is for the young. But that's why film is important! We can always revisit young Jerry and see what was so damn funny back then.

1. The Nutty Professor
2. Artists and Models
3. The Bellboy
4. The Stooge
5. Sailor Beware
6. That's My Boy
7. Scared Stiff
8. The Ladies Man
9. The Disorderly Orderly
10. The Caddy

...plus 15 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.

Billy Wilder is my favorite old school director. The man was fluent in so many genres. Drama. Comedy. Crime Noir. War. Romance. Whatever he tried his hand at. I added "Sabrina" and "Private Life of Sherlock Holmes" even though I havent seen them yet. I have no doubt Ill love them when I do.

1. The Apartment
2. Some Like It Hot
3. Sunset Boulevard
4. Stalag 17
5. The Seven Year Itch
6. The Lost Weekend
7. Double Indemnity
8. Ace in the Hole
9. Witness for the Prosecution
10. The Fortune Cookie

...plus 5 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.

I grew up on Disney animation and that will always be good enough for me. Every animated movie or cartoon short today owes everything to Walt Disney. The man, not the company.

1. Pinocchio
2. Toy Story
3. Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs
4. Peter Pan
5. Dumbo
6. Fantasia
7. One Hundred and One Dalmatians
8. Lady and the Tramp
9. The Sword in the Stone
10. Up

...plus 10 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.

As a kid and even as a teenager, back in the sixties and seventies, these low budget horror films were my favorite in the genre. Didn't have to think too hard about the plot or meaning. Just plain fun. As I've gotten older its harder for me to be so forgiving. But we all have to start from somewhere, right? Not necessarily from first to worst, here's my list of B horror movies. The ones that DIDN'T make the cut to my favorite list anyway!

1. The Little Shop of Horrors
2. Them!
3. The Blob
4. The Wasp Woman
5. The Tingler
6. Sssssss
7. A Bucket of Blood
8. Invaders from Mars
9. Blacula
10. Plan 9 from Outer Space

...plus 50 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.

My favorite Charlie Chaplin movies. The only true cinematic genius. I left off his shorts here because there's so many I haven't seen. Nor have I seen his last movie either, A King in New York.

1. Modern Times
2. The Great Dictator
3. City Lights
4. The Gold Rush
5. Limelight
6. The Circus
7. The Kid
8. Monsieur Verdoux

I love a good football movie but there aren't too many to choose from.

• Rudy
• Friday Night Lights
• The Longest Yard
• Brian's Song
• All the Right Moves
• North Dallas Forty
• Remember the Titans
• Invincible
• Any Given Sunday
• Draft Day

...plus 1 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.

My Top Twenty baseball movies.

1. The Natural
2. Moneyball
3. Bull Durham
4. Field of Dreams
5. The Bad News Bears
6. Eight Men Out
7. The Pride of the Yankees
8. The Bingo Long Traveling All-Stars & Motor Kings
9. Major League
10. A League of Their Own

...plus 10 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.

My Favorite sports movies ranked. Have a feeling I've forgotten some

1. Rocky
2. Rudy
3. The Natural
4. Breaking Away
5. Moneyball
6. Million Dollar Baby
7. Raging Bull
8. Bull Durham
9. Field of Dreams
10. The Karate Kid

...plus 40 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.

Maybe the most important sub-genre of Crime Movies. One with many, many great films to choose from. Unlike other lists I've seen like this, my list contains no movies where organized crime or mobsters don't play front and center. Therefore, you won't find Pulp Fiction, John Wick, or Riffifi anywhere on my list. Those movies and others like them belong on my Crime Dramas list.

1. The Godfather
2. The Godfather Part II
3. GoodFellas
4. Road to Perdition
5. The Irishman
6. Casino
7. The Untouchables
8. Miller's Crossing
9. The Departed
10. The Godfather Part III

...plus 21 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.

The sports genre is one of my favorite and my favorite sub- genre in that are boxing movies. Inspired by "Rocky" at the age of fourteen, and the glory days of boxing when Ali, Fraizer, and Foreman, dominated the scene, I joined an after school boxing club when I got into high school. The ultimate goal was to someday get into the Golden Gloves Tournament. I did okay for awhile, compiling a record of 7 wins and 3 losses before giving it up. My last fight I got hit so hard in the kidney it killed any desire to take the sport any further. It also gave me an appreciation for the sport that exists to this day.

1. Rocky
2. Million Dollar Baby
3. Raging Bull
4. The Set-Up
5. Cinderella Man
6. The Fighter
7. Somebody Up There Likes Me
8. Fat City
9. Requiem for a Heavyweight
10. Unforgivable Blackness: The Rise and Fall of Jack Johnson

...plus 8 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.

My top ranked westerns. One of my favorite genres.

1. Rio Bravo
2. The Searchers
3. Unforgiven
4. Shane
5. Lonesome Dove
6. The Good, the Bad and the Ugly
7. True Grit
8. The Ox-Bow Incident
9. A Fistful of Dollars
10. High Noon

...plus 42 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.

My all time favorite director. So many questions I'd like to ask him. Even his worst movie is still great.

1. Kill Bill: Vol. 1
2. Kill Bill: Vol. 2
3. Pulp Fiction
4. Once Upon a Time... in Hollywood
5. Reservoir Dogs
6. Django Unchained
7. Inglourious Basterds
8. Jackie Brown
9. Death Proof
10. The Hateful Eight