The death of a parent, the unspoken-of death of a child and the soon-to-be-avenged murder of a spouse stand uncontested in the lexicon of film deaths. All three offer clean, efficient endearment to a character but keep that tang of gossip about them. There is nothing to confuse an audience in the misguided struggle of [...]
Back to the Future is an excellent example of a traditional Hollywood blockbuster that really works. The story is formulaic and could easily fit into any of the by-the-numbers paradigms detailed exhaustively in screenwriting manuals everywhere, yet most people consider it one of the better movies from the 80’s. It’s still viewed affectionately [...]
Milk’s double win at the Oscars Sunday night spawned a nation-wide discussion about the high incidence of winning an award for “playing gay”. But even before Tom Hanks took home a little gold man in 1994 for his portrayal of the ailing Andrew Beckett in Philadelphia, Oscar has been handing out golden statues to [...]
You shouldn’t punch your mom in the face, we can all agree, but I would argue that the recent, web-omnipresent recording of Christian Bale’s on-set tirade is no rock solid proof that the phenomenal child actor (recall: Empire of the Sun v. A.I. and be honest with yourself about which teenager really holds [...]