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Hey, everyone. “Moriarty” here.
I’ve got more Fantastic Fest reviews still coming. I have a feeling I’ll chip away at those for a while. One of the films I really adored, though, is the new documentary NOT QUITE HOLLYWOOD, which is a loving look back at a whole wave of filmmakers who revitalized the Australian film industry using sex, violence, and a whole lot of stuntmen who seemed perfectly willing to die on camera.
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Dear Sony...
Y’know, some days it doesn’t pay to be a movie fan.
I’ve done tons of DVD coverage over the years here at AICN, and it’s funny... I’ve heard some people actually say, “But you guys don’t really cover DVD at Ain’t It Cool, do you?” I know I’ve been writing reviews for DVD since 1999 at least. And I’ve been a home video freak for as long as there’s been home video. I was a first generation video nerd in the ‘70s.
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Hey, everyone. “Moriarty” here.
Right now, as I start work on this article, I’m watching RESCUE DAWN on DVD in my office, so I’m not suddenly jumping ship or proclaiming DVD dead.
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Hey, everyone. “Moriarty” here.
William Powell and Myrna Loy, as a team, are one of my top ten favorite things about cinema. High praise, indeed.
I love the THIN MAN series unreservedly. I watch those movies one right after another after another twice a year. I use them to cleanse the palette whenever I feel like I’ve seen too much Hollywood or just had enough of hype or whatever. Whenver I’m feeling at all jaded about the joy of watching movies, I reach for these as a reminder of the existence of pure cinema pleasure. The sort of thing that never gets old for me. We all have our movie comfort food (I’d love to hear some of yours... stuff that you enjoy but don’t normally talk about), and for me, there’s something about the chemistry between Powell and Loy that works on all levels. They’re funny together. That’s a given. They know how to play verbal ping-pong, with clockwork timing in the back and forth. But there’s more than that. You believe the affection. They seem to enjoy each other, and that’s what makes it sexy. All the repartee, all the jokes, all the verbal sparring... it’s clearly a prelude to good ol’ fashioned fucking. It’s not even subtext. Considering when the movies were made, they are a shockingly randy couple, and it always seems to me that most of their scenes in their movies either start right after or conclude just before some seriously spirited marital bliss. They make the idea of marriage powerfully sexy in the THIN MAN movies. Myrna Loy gets worked up watching her husband do what he does best, and she always seems to find him most exciting when he’s most completely in his element.
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Let’s talk about Eddie Murphy.
I figure the occasion of Paramount finally releasing DELIRIOUS, Eddie’s Oscar nomination, and the release this weekend of NORBIT is a perfect opportunity to talk for a moment about Eddie as more than just a performer.
Eddie Murphy is a full-fledged Pop Culture Icon.
There are very few performers that cross over from star or even superstar to genuine Icon, but Eddie seemed born to do so. From the first time we saw him on SATURDAY NIGHT LIVE, it was obvious that there was something electric and amazing about his talent. He was compulsively watchable, and it seemed like everything he did on that show entered the pop lexicon immediately.
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This one’s been a long time coming. That’s what happened to a lot of films from the ‘80s that were financed by 37 different tiny companies. Skouras Pictures was the theatrical distributor in the US, but the film was financed by PRO, a British company. Over the years, the film has bounced from one video label to another. I saw the film as an imported Japanese laserdisc once, curious to see the original 124 minute theatrical version. The movie was cut for home video by Martin Donovan, the film’s director and co-writer. This isn’t the guy from WEEDS and the Hal Hartley films, though. Different Martin Donovan. This guy is from Argentina. He was a TV writer in the ‘70s on stuff like CHICO & THE MAN and THE MARY TYLER MOORE SHOW, and then he seemed to reinvent himself when he hooked up with a young writer named David Koepp. They wrote APARTMENT ZERO together, and then later they also wrote DEATH BECOMES HER, the Robert Zemeckis jetblack slapstick comedy. For many years, the only version of this film available has been the cut version, but Anchor Bay’s Feb. 20th release of the film will correct that and finally offer a worthwhile version for people to rediscover.
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Allow me to explain why I constantly try to set goals for myself that we all know I will never be able to maintain.
It’s because I’m a fucking idiot.
Oh, I’m a bright guy in conversation, and I’m well-read, and I think I have a fair sense of sentence structure and rhythm and decent taste, but when it comes to things like “realistic workload” and “time management,” I find that I am frequently optimistic to a moronic degree.
If you’ve been reading me for the last nine years or so, you know that I am capable of missing deadlines in a way that redefines missing them. And they’re always self-imposed, which is what makes it ridiculous. I always worry that people are going to think it’s because I just don’t give a shit, or because I’m lazy, or because I lose interest in something, but that’s never the case. My problem is always that I try to take on too much to do well, and I desperately hate doing something poorly. I’d rather not finish something than half-ass the effort.
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Since we’re going to be providing daily review content, I’m not going to be doing full-blown reviews in this weekly column anymore. Instead, this is a quick hits round-up of what I’m personally excited about or interested in for each week. This isn’t comprehensive. This isn’t every single title that’s coming out. And it’s not meant to be. But if it ends up on this list, it’s something that will end up on my actual shelf, something I’m genuinely curious about.
I’m still going to highlight one title each week, though, something that really stands out when looking at the list of upcoming releases. With that in mind...
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I never know which tone to take: “Yeah, yeah, I missed a few deadlines. Whatever. Moving on!”, or “I’m really sorry about the last few weeks, guys, and I hope this week’s column does as much as is possible to catch up.”
Whichever you’d prefer, please just pretend that’s the one I opened with.
My big DVD news of the week is that I took Toshi to Amoeba today to pick up a basketful of movies. I know that’s not big news to you, but trust me... in my house, this was a major, major event. Toshi has officially run amuck amidst Amoeba’s movie stacks now. He was preposterously charming while doing so. He was given a free t-shirt in his size by the cashier because he turned on the dimples and flashed his baby blues a bit. My kid is fifteen months old, and he’s got more game than his old man ever had.
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Hi, everyone. "Moriarty" here with some Rumblings From The Lab...
Didn't I just post a new release list? Do they really need to do new releases every single week? C'mon... give a man a break. It's a holiday weekend, but here I am, sitting down
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Hi, everyone. "Moriarty" here with some Rumblings From The Lab...
Can you feel that? The way all of Hollywood seems to have slowed to a standstill, like the entire town is inhaling before the exhale that is Toronto and the fall movie season? Th
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Hi, everyone. "Moriarty" here with some Rumblings From The Lab...
This turned out to be a really impressive overall platter of films. Put these in the other day and just hit play, one disc after another. Turned out to be one of my favorite full
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Hi, everyone. "Moriarty" here with some Rumblings From The Lab...
I really can't believe how far into the year we are. It doesn't seem possible that the summer's already over. And it must be if we're already getting summer movies from this year
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Hi, everyone. "Moriarty" here with some Rumblings From The Lab...
Before we even begin this week's list of new releases (which is a pretty damn great one, all things considered), two quick points.
First, I've moved into a house recently, so i
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Hi, everyone. "Moriarty" here with some Rumblings From The Lab...
It's been interesting watching the entirety of the media, both online and off, complete its transformation into The National Enquirer this week. Interesting and, yes, repulsive.
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Hi, everyone. "Moriarty" here with some Rumblings From The Lab...
How do you watch your DVDs?
It's an important question, I think. How you watch is just as crucial as what you watch. If you're watching everything on a laptop, I'm sure you're
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Hi, everyone. "Moriarty" here with some Rumblings From The Lab...
Holy shit, is July really over now? This year seems to be accelerating as it progresses, and it doesn't help that I move from one major obligation to the next, so swaddled in stre
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Hi, everyone. "Moriarty" here with some Rumblings From The Lab...
You want to know if you should rent or buy this disc, right? I can give you one reason, and it comes less than a half-hour into the film, when Kanye West takes the stage. "Ge
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Hi, everyone. "Moriarty" here with some Rumblings From The Lab...
Last week, I skipped the column for two reasons. First, it was the fourth of July, and with a family to take care of here in the house, there were other things that seemed more im
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Hi, everyone. "Moriarty" here with some Rumblings From The Lab...
Okay, so last week's redesign of the DVD Shelf seems to have gone over fairly well. I was happy with it, most of your feedback seemed like you were happy with it. For the moment,
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Hi, everyone. "Moriarty" here with some Rumblings From The Lab...
Today we're going to start tweaking the format of this new-release list. I don't want to run a review of a disc here, then run a separate one on the site as well. No point to it.
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Hi, everyone. "Moriarty" here with some Rumblings From The Lab...
The problem with sports films, especially true-life ones, is that we all know there's little or no reason to make a "based on a true story" movie that has an unhappy ending. T
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Hi, everyone. "Moriarty" here with some Rumblings From The Lab...
In Monday's column, I said there were going to be some changes around here. They begin today. I'm going to be trying to duplicate the type of content that I was experimenting wit
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Hi, everyone. "Moriarty" here with some Rumblings From The Lab...
That last twelve days or so has been the single best creative experience of my life, and I am dying at the thought that I have to wait for October before you guys are going to get
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Hi, everyone. "Moriarty" here with some Rumblings From The Lab...
I may be taking the last half of the month off from the weekly column, but if I'm going to do that, I'll put up one big catch-all column before I leave town. In the meantime, I kn
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