George Sanders: A Mitigated Cad
“Where on the screen I aminvariably a sonofabitch, in life I am a dear, dear boy.”
Category: Actors & Personalities
The Rote High School Persecution of Ellen Page
There’s something definitely original about the scattershot editing collage techniques of THE TRACEY FRAGMENTS (2007), getting a belated US DVD release after a year in Canada and the broken film[…]
The Pantheon of Macho-Fey
Sounds like some evil tournament Bruce Li would enter to find the man who killed his master, but no – “macho-fey” is a term coined by the celestial Kim Morgan[…]
Great Dads of the Seventies #13: Jack Nicholson in THE DEPARTED
Just because THE DEPARTED doesn’t really seem to occur in the 1970s doesn’t mean Nicholson’s amazing performance as the Irish criminal top dog villain, Frank Costello, doesn’t count. Nor doesn’t[…]
Actors & Personalities · Directors · Interviews
Birds Do It, Bees Do It: Isabella Rossellini Talks About Bug Sex, Human Sex, and Green Porno
“A laugh and information!”
Happy 100th Birthday Bette
Bette Davis would have been a hundred this past Saturday, and over on her indispensible Sunset Gun, Kim Morgan celebrates via a round-up of some of diva Davis’s most bad-ass[…]
The Epic Actor – Charlton Heston (1923-2008)
To see Charlton Heston in person was to realize that some people are born to be movie stars. He had a larger-than-life presence on-screen. And off-screen as well. In 1980,[…]
Actors & Personalities · Pre-Code
Miriam Hopkins & the Pre-Code Menage-a-trois
Imagine Angelina Jolie and Jennifer Aniston deciding to live together and share Brad Pitt! How hot would that be? But no, now we live in a much more (as in[…]
Actors & Personalities · Essays
Presence and Absence: Toward a Working Conception of Screen Characters
“A basic consistency on the actor’s part remains uniquely convincing as character, no matter how simplistic that character’s definition.”
Nuts to the Squirrels and Roués Redeemed: The Discreet Charm of Charles Boyer
“In Boyer, self-belief and theatrical technique are seamlessly fused together.”
Actors & Personalities · Essays · SF & Fantasy
A Boy and His Dog: On Will Smith, Apocalypse, and I Am Legend
“Neville remains wholly oblivious, falling into each trap the ferals set … “
Actors & Personalities · Music & Musicals
Ode to Lili: And Leslie Caron
“This MGM movie is studio-system filmmaking at its most protective, and it’s designed entirely to showcase Leslie Caron …”
Remembering Maila Nurmi (1921-2008)
Maila Nurmi, aka Vampira – actress, comedienne, artist, and horror hostess – was one of the most interesting and extraordinary persons I have ever met. MAILA KNEW EVERYBODY The first[…]
Daniel Day Lewis… the New Dark God of Actors
If you’re as hung up on the mythic greatness of THERE WILL BE BLOOD as I am (if you haven’t seen it, may I advise you do so?) then you’re[…]
Edna May Oliver, Heal this Nation!
In honor of the sudden John Ford deluge at the DVD-o-teque nearest you, I’d like to suggest that Edna May Oliver, the stoically ornery widow of Ford’s DRUMS ALONG THE[…]
Forever… Marlene
So after delays and cancelation and sorrow I get into Chicago for Xmas and my parents books us each in a big suite in a big empty Sheraton near O’Hare…[…]
Two Overlooked Supporting Performances of 2007
What with all the year-end lists we’ve been seeing lately, I’ve been surprised at some of the omissions. Well, not all that surprised, since lists like these almost always[…]
Actors & Personalities · Directors · Reviews
Looking at Charlie — The Gold Rush: An Occasional Series on the Art and Life of Charlie Chaplin
Hats off, dudes! A masterpiece! The Gold Rush is Charlie Chaplin’s masterpiece — the one film in which his desire to make the audience laugh and the desire to make[…]
The Birds Remake – Too Obvious Casting
Hey, I love Naomi Watts as much as anyone, but you couldn’t find an actress who looks more like Tippi Hedren (The Birds‘ original star) if you tried. Will she[…]
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