Walk Hard - Jake Kasdan (2007)

Screened at the Fresh Pond Cinema

At The Circus - The Marx Brothers (1939)

Groucho sings Lydia. Harpo plays jazz harp. Chico plays the piano. Skip the rest.

Duffy's Tavern - Miracle in Manhattan (12-22-1948)

More schmaltz than funnies.

Duffy's Tavern - Christmas Cards (12-29-1948)

No Way Home - David S. Wilcove (2008)

A Canterbury Tale - Powell and Pressburger (1944)

Moving story of four lost souls, young and old, traveling towards Canterbury to receive unexpected blessings. Reverential treatment of the British countryside. Slightly disturbing glue/hair theme has shades of Peeping Tom. Lovely expressionistic lighting used for quieter purposes than earlier German films. Love story parallels Once somewhat. Highly recommended.

Looney Tunes Golden Collection (disk 4) (2003)

Sweeny Todd - Tim Burton (2007)

More than a touch of Norman Bates in Judge Turpin. I think his framed picture might be the same as in the hotel and Norman's books came right off of the Judge's shelves. Unfortunately, Norman never sang...

Screened at the Harvard Square

The Amazing Spider-Man Pop-Up

I love popups and this one is technically impressive. Amazingly Stan Lee and Steve Ditko are not credited on this book despite their work making up everything but the die cuts and glue in the tome.

The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen: Black Dossier - Alan Moore & Kevin O'Neill (2007)

O'Neill and Moore pull out all of the stops. Loved the book without a book structure. The P.D. Wodehouse/H.P. Lovecraft mashup had me rolling on the floor laughing. Prospero slyly undercuts the MacGuffin the reader has been picking apart tediously from the start.

Phantoms of the Ice - Tom Dalgliesh (1994)

I won after a close playoff series with D

Pickup on South Street - Samuel Fuller (1953)

Sam Fuller makes me want to start smoking cigars.

The Golden Compass - Chris Weitz (2007)

I want to read the book (more for the article in the Atlantic rather than the movie itself...)

Screened at the AMC Studio 30 in Olathe, KS

Exit Wounds - Rutu Modan (2007)

Fantastic story of a man following in his estranged father's footsteps. Interesting artwork. Shifting and solid at the same time.

An Unreasonable Man - Henriette Mantel, Steve Skrovan (2007)

I had no idea that some liberals were so vitriolic about Nader's run for president. I don't believe that 'spoiler' stuff for a minute. If there is a problem, then it is with the voting system itself. It is set up to keep the two money-machine parties in power. When will we have a viable third party in this country?

Krazy & Ignatz: The Komplete Kat Komics 1935-1936 "A Wild Warmth of Chromatic Gravy" - George Herriman

Krazy & Ignatz in "A Wild Warmth of Chromatic Gravy"
The Komplete Kat Komics 1935 - 1936

The Men Who Made the Movies: William Wellman - Richard Shickel (1973/2007)

Part of Shickel's incredible 7-part series on great American directors.

Four Men and a Prayer - John Ford (1938)

Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? - Philip K. Dick (1968)

The value of all non-human life is made explicit in Sidney's price guide, but Decker here struggles with the relative value of human and android. Humans are barely functional, bickering chickenheads attached to empathy machines while the "andys" strive to their own version of empathy and civilization.

A state-run media religion called Mercerism inculcates group empathy through technology emplacements. The appropriately named Al Jarry serves as the unknowing figurehead for worship.

Unlike the film, humans and androids alike are not pretty. Their are either dieased and half-witted or eccentric and oddly-proportioned. Clever idea not played out the movie: Pris and Rachel are identical models - impossible to distinguish.

The Things We Have - The Campbell Playhouse with Orson Welles (5-29-1939)

A young immigrant takes an historical tour of American freedom with Orson Welles. Seems kind of early for Native American rights to be brought up, but there it is...

Lynch (One) - blackANDwhite (2007)

A scruffy film about Lynch's scruffy creative process.

The Manxman - Alfred Hitchcock (1929)

I believe this is Hitchcock's last silent film. A love triangle presented visually as a shifting set of pairs separated by a third placed in between. The three often play looking straight into the camera, which not only gives us the opportunity to dissect their emotions but at one point ensures that the girl's gaze is ambiguous. Which man is she lusting after? We can't know because we are staring directly into her eyes.

In a distinctly perverse Hitchcock touch, the wedding dinner is held in the same room where the lovers consummated their illicit affair. Graphic match on inkwell/ocean.

A touch of censorship? Oddly the the woman is free to voice her dirty secret to her lover, but the filmmaker was not free to add her words to the subtitles. We have to read her lips!

Dickie Dare in the Desert Pirates of Algiers - Milton Caniff (5-7-33 - 9-4-33)

Before Steve Canyon, before Terry and the Pirates, Milt Caniff's created Dickie Dare. You can see the inklings of his shadowy blacks and detailed location references. French Foreign Legion, camels and Arabs. Regarding the plot, who in the world would send their 10-year old on a trip around the world with an old college buddy?

In Search of the Obelisk - Douglas Trumbull (1993)

Trumbull's Showscan based ride-film consisting of a short elevator ride to the bottom of the archaeological excavations and a flying ride through an underground pyramid. The plot is minimal, but the motion and spectacle are convincing.

I never saw this ride in its original incarnation, but I believe a portion of it is no longer present - the six-story high ShowScan screen.

Screened at the Luxor Hotel, Las Vegas, NV