“We are men of the hood, merry at your expense” I’ll start this out with the truth: Robin Hood is not Robin Hood—and that’s not a bad thing. You’ll catch on very early once you realize the name Robin Longstride for Russell Crowe’s lead character isn’t an artistic change because it rolls easier off the [...]

“Is he an evil wizard?” Being in Toronto for a convention that deals with anime meant I couldn’t leave the city without actually seeing an anime film, right? Lucky for us, the new Hayao Miyazaki film Gake no ue no Ponyo was playing at the local multiplex just minutes from our hotel. Distributed like his [...]

“It was nice to have met you” It’s an unlikely source, but an effective one—David Fincher giving us a heartbreaking tale of love discovered, lost, found, and forever enduring. The man responsible for bringing to screen the ultra-sick mind of a serial killer in Seven, the warped sensibilities of Chuck Palahniuk with Fight Club, and [...]

“So much time wasted in human life waiting” I’ll tell you, nothing gets one’s heart pounding more than a nostalgic theme song score playing during a film. Nothing is more iconic than John Williams’ music when it comes to Indiana Jones, unless you count the humor, the adventure, the whip, and the hat. Steven Spielberg [...]

“Tangled Up In Blue” Across the Universe is not the only film this year to use a musician’s work as the backbone to a story. Todd Haynes has used the life and music of singer Bob Dylan in order to composite a tale of his many selves in I’m Not There. I know little about [...]

“I will live right until the end” Whereas Elizabeth told a tale of royalty and the politics underlying every action to gain power, Elizabeth: The Golden Age weaves the story of how that strength survives. Michael Hirst gets help this time from the capable William Nicholson to explain what happens once the queen has proven [...]

“The Virgin Queen” Not being a fan of the biopic, I must say that Elizabeth leaves an impression. With outstanding performances, lush settings and costumes, as well as a well-crafted story, this film does exactly what is needed for a biography to succeed—and it sticks to a specific period of a legend’s life, without trying [...]

“Decaffeinated?” Simon Pegg and Edgar Wright are back, with a vengeance. Their send up to all those action films—as they say containing names picked at random from two hats, one of verbs, the other of adjectives—is a fantastic melding of British humor, preposterous action sequences, gruesome horror, and a bit of romantic comedy thrown in [...]

“Bound by the secrets we share” Talk about an unhealthy obsession. Notes on a Scandal is a tale told through the diary entries of a disturbed older woman whose newfound friendship with the first time art teacher soon becomes a dangerous infatuation. When the new teacher becomes involved with a student, our narrator Barbara, begins [...]