my top 5 favorite Blu-rays I currently own


1. Dr. Strangelove, Or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb
Okay, so I'm a sucker for the Blu-ray book thing. I think they're cool. I just don't think that every movie deserves one (like Falling Down with Michael Douglas). Stanley Kubrick, YES -- Joel Schumacher, NO.


2. The Third Man
This shit is already out-of-print, can you believe it? I love what Criterion has done on the BD format thus far (aside from inexplicably excluding the longer TV cut of Bertolucci's The Last Emperor) and I can't wait till they open the proverbial flood gates. Release Wise Blood dammit!!!


3. The Elephant Man (Region A & B)
The best thing about acquiring an import (besides realizing it actually plays on your machine) is that not every Joe Schmo has a copy of it in their collection right next to Stealth. Thank God someone appreciates this masterpiece besides me. Amazon UK, people.


4. Highlander: Immortal Edition (Limited Edition Steelbook)
This is another UK import and a perfect example of why the Brits have their shit together when it comes to appreciating genre film. They loved Heaven's Gate too and so do I. The steelbook thing is okay but I only own this 'cause it's Highlander.


5. Casablanca Ultimate Collector's Edition
In my humble opinion this is the only viable example of a perfect film that I can think of. The PQ on this Warner BD is nothing short of stunning. You can see Bogie's pores glistening. If I could only take one movie with me to a deserted island...


How the West Was Won and The Wizard of Oz (both from Warner and both featuring stupendous extras -- except for the colossally gay MGM documentary on the Oz BD that is hosted by Sir Patrick Stewart) also tied for fifth place.


Can't wait for March 23rd when The African Queen finally makes it's debut in the digital realm. It was never even released on DVD before. I'm geeking out big time.

Here are just a few honorable mentions:

2001: A Space Odyssey; Pinocchio; The Graduate; Ashes of Time Redux (UK import); Trading Places; The Italian Job (1969, UK import); Night of the Creeps; Zulu (UK import)

I have a lot more honorable mentions but it's way past my bedtime right now as it is. Nighty-night from Munchkinland.

trust me, this review's worth it

my favorite movies featuring Queen songs


Flash Gordon (1980)
Flash's Theme

Revenge of the Nerds (1984)
We Are the Champions

Highlander (1986)
Princes of the Universe, Who Wants to Live Forever

Waynes's World (1992)
Bohemian Rhapsody

Shaun of the Dead (2004)
Don't Stop Me Now, You're My Best Friend

Observe and Report (2009)
It's Late

World's Greatest Dad (2009)
Under Pressure

the greatest movie ending of all-time

Dan Dorman and


Quentin Tarantino's list of his personal top 20 favorite films since 1992 might be reflective of everything that's wrong with Hollywood filmmaking today. The fact that most people have settled for these types of shitty films (with a few notable exceptions) only proves to encourage bad filmmaking. So, since lists are mostly harmless fun, here's a list of my own personal top 20 favorite films (in alphabetical order) that have come out since 1992. I'm sure I'll be able to come up with 20 completely different titles in about 12 hours or less, so enjoy this one while it's still fresh. Ironically, you'll be quick to note the lone Tarantino entry on MY LIST. Hey, Pulp Fiction is a great fucking movie -- I don't care if the guy's gone to pot since then.

Although not technically in alphabetical order, hands down my favorite film from this era would have to be a tie between Clint Eastwood's Unforgiven (1992) and Goran Dukic's Wristcutters: A Love Story (2006).

Based on a script by David Webb Peoples, the story of Unforgiven is simple: an aging gunfighter is lured back into action for one last job. What makes Peoples' script and subsequently Eastwood's film so memorable are the blurred lines between myth and reality, heroes and villains & law and order. This film would prove to be a turning point in the history of the Western as well. Not since the critical thrashing of Heaven's Gate had a film in this genre come along to capture the imagination of the general public. Perhaps the truly elegiac thing is, there hasn't been one since.

Wristcutters is not the type of film that most people flock to see. It doesn't star a single A-List celebrity (unless you consider that kid from Almost Famous and Tom Waits to be A-Listers) and it's plot is a little on the morose side. Okay, it's downright depressing. It takes place in an afterlife for people who have committed suicide. Living conditions look more like George Romero's Night of the Living Dead and the residents there cannot physically smile. One of the things that makes this film so endlessly fascinating is you never know quite where the story is leading and you're always surprised to find humor at the most unexpected turns. The fact that the main character who cuts his own wrists after his girlfriend dumps him ends up getting a shitty job in the afterlife's shittiest pizza parlor still makes me laugh every time. For most people, this is an undiscovered gem. Based on the short story "Kneller's Happy Campers" by Etgar Keret.

The Big Lebowski (1998)
Jeff Bridges and John Goodman provide the heart and soul in this comedy/mystery/western/bowling/literary detective spoof. For anyone who's ever felt ashamed to go to the supermarket late at night in your bathrobe and write a check for sixty-nine cents.

Ed Wood (1994)
If you're one of those people who know anything at all about the real Edward D. Wood, Jr. and the real Bela Lugosi than you know about 96% of this movie is just pure nonsense. For those same people, this film is an absolute valentine.

Free Enterprise (1998)
One of the truly fascinating things about this little low-budget sleeper is for all it's quotes and references to other films, this movie itself never fails to get quoted or referenced by me at least ten times a week. "Kick the little fucker's ass."

Glengarry Glen Ross (1992)
Don't know who David Mamet is? See this movie right away. One of the best screenplays (and plays) I have ever watched come to life. A veteran ensemble cast led by Al Pacino and Jack Lemmon make you taste the acid and feel the grime.

In the Mood for Love (2001)
Wong Kar Wai clearly has a love for the films of Hollywood's yesteryear. It's impossible to not see a little bit of Humphrey Bogart in Tony Leung's performance. How the film manages to be both simplistic and original is still beyond me.

The Insider (1999)
Al Pacino playing a real character without histrionics. Russell Crowe proving that he can do anything. Michael Mann actually directing a movie that has style AND substance. Despite all this, it's Christopher Plummer who steals the whole show.

Kingpin (1996)
Another movie about bowling on here? Okay, so The Big Lebowski is not really about bowling but Kingpin most certainly is. Actually, it's part coming of age story, part love story and part sports film. All that and Bill Murray to boot.

L.A. Confidential (1997)
Curtis Hanson's love letter to the town that makes the movies. In actuality, it's the seedy underbelly that gets the most screen-time in Brian Helgeland's brilliant screenplay based on James Ellroy's dense novel. The cast is nothing short of genius.

Leon: The Professional (1994)
Luc Besson and Jean Reno became household names after this film literally exploded on the screen. There was something distinctly "European" about the way it was filmed. There remains something distinctly beautiful about the way the story unfolds.

Let the Right One In (2008)
Calling this a Swedish vampire movie would kind of be like calling Psycho a Hollywood serial killer movie. There's so much more going on than what you're likely to read on the back cover. The only way to know is to experience it for yourself. Again and again.

Mulholland Drive (2001)
David Lynch is one fucked-up bastard. Yet for some reason, I can't keep from going back to his films like some twisted recurring dream. However cryptic it is, this may be the one David Lynch film I can honestly say I understood what he was trying to do. I think.

Mystic River (2003)
Eastwood's turning out to be a bit like Woody Allen lately. Quantity over quality (at least in Allen's case). He should really slow down and make more movies like Mystic River. This is a dark odyssey of grief. Penn makes you feel it in your gut.

Pulp Fiction (1994)
Okay, I know. I like to bash Tarantino. Most of the time he deserves it. Believe it or not, there once was a time when his name wasn't a part of the Hollywood lexicon. Thank God though that it is now -- if just for this one brilliant fucking movie.

Rushmore (1998)
Wes Anderson has squandered his talent since this, his magnum opus. To be fair, I love Bottle Rocket (which came out before Rushmore). Bill Murray deserved an Oscar for this. He wasn't even nominated. He's practically been playing the same role ever since.

Saving Private Ryan (1998)
I was toying around with just giving this an honorable mention, but how do you erase the first twenty minutes from your psyche? The film takes on ebbs and tides like some sort of opera. Somehow it never fails to put you directly in the center of combat unlike any other film before or since.

The Sweet Hereafter (1997)
Atom Egoyan's version of the Russell Banks novel. On the surface, it's the story of a small town coming to emotional and legal terms with a tragic accident that leaves most of their children dead. Underneath it's about how we all lie to ourselves every day.

This Is England (2006)
Shane Meadows is a writer/director whose work you need to know. Start with this. It's his most powerful and compelling film. It's not a documentary as the title may imply, but you will end up feeling like what you've just seen was all true. That's because Meadow's lived it.

Waiting For Guffman (1996)
If you've ever done high-school or community theater you'll laugh just a little bit more than the uninitiated. Christopher Guest and company turn out one of the most hilarious improvs of all-time. I can't stop smiling from the first frame to the last.

Zodiac (2007)
I don't just think that David Fincher's Zodiac is one of the best films of the last two decades, I think it is one of the best films I have ever seen. It's a nearly 3-hour murder-mystery that isn't even solved by the end. Oliver Stone would be proud.

honorable mentions:

Anvil! The Story of Anvil (2008), Boogie Nights (1997), Bram Stoker's Dracula (1992), The Cable Guy (1996), City of God (2002), Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban (2004), Idiocracy (2006), The King of Kong: A Fistful of Quarters (2007), The Lives of Others (2006), The Lost Son (1999), Mad Detective (2007), Match Point (2005), Napoleon Dynamite (2004), Observe and Report (2009), Shaun of the Dead (2004), Sin City (2005), Spirited Away (2001), Superbad (2007), Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street (2007), There Will Be Blood (2007), Trainspotting (1996), Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me (1992), World's Greatest Dad (2009), Y Tu Mamá También (2001)

What are some of your favorites?

If you don't know by now, the Coen Brothers' new movie is not a remake but a retelling of True Grit which originally starred John Wayne as Rooster Cogburn in the only role that ever won the Duke a competitive Best Actor Oscar. The original film was based on a novel by Charles Portis. Reportedly, the Coens have gone back to the book and are doing a straight adaptation of it -- not a remake of the 1969 Henry Hathaway film starring Wayne. The really exciting thing about all this is, they appear to have cast none other than the Dude himself to play the Duke's famous part: Jeff Bridges. Coincidentally, I just watched The Big Lebowski this weekend and was reminded not only of how great the film is, but of how amazing Bridges was in it. Never in all my life would I have cast Bridges in that part -- but he's so fucking brilliant it's unthinkable he wasn't even nominated for an Oscar. Unless you've been living under a rock, you're probably aware of Bridge's current movie Crazy Heart which has attracted a lot of Oscar buzz. Basically, it's a rip-off of two other similar stories also with brilliant central performances by aging-country-western-singer-characters: Tender Mercies (which won Robert Duvall an Oscar for Best Actor in 1983 -- Duvall also costars with Bridges in Crazy Heart) and the little seen 1973 film Payday starring Rip Torn (before he was known as that old guy from Men in Black and Dodgeball).

More than likely, this is Bridges' year. If he somehow manages to lose the nod for Crazy Heart, how cool would it be for him to win it for playing Rooster Cogburn? Hell, how cool would it be for him to win it for both consecutively? When I heard the Coens were doing True Grit (a film I respect but never actually loved), the first thing that came to my mind was Raising Arizona or O Brother, Where Art Thou?. I hope they try and make something serious out of it the way they took on Cormac McCarthy's No Country for Old Men. I had secretly hoped their next film after No Country would be McCarthy's masterpiece Blood Meridian but a filmed realization of that has yet to be seen from anyone. I also thought they might get Tommy Lee Jones (speaking of old guys from Men in Black) to play Cogburn in True Grit. To be perfectly honest, I would have been okay with either Bridges or Jones. Either way, it's the type of thing that spells: OSCAR. Matt Damon and Josh Brolin are also rumored to be costarring. No word yet on who will be playing the "Mattie" character (Kim Darby in the original film). I can't wait. This has got me more geeked-out right now than seeing William Shatner on a Star Trek Cruise meet and greet. A decent western in the works, directed by a decent group of filmmakers, starring one of the most tremendously gifted and underrated actors of our generation...I can't get in line soon enough! Now I just hope it doesn't suck. Could this be the Unforgiven of the 21st century? Shit, I'd be satisfied if it was the next Silverado.

great forgotten performances

Ann-Margret in Mike Nichols' Carnal Knowledge (1971). It was Nichols' second feature-length film after winning the Academy Award for Best Director in 1967 for The Graduate. Ann-Margret played one of Jack Nicholson's love interests in a very adult story about sexual and psychological politics. Margret was nominated for Best Supporting Actress as the masochistic "Bobbie" but she lost that year to Cloris Leachman for The Last Picture Show. It's a shame really. Margret wouldn't have another role this memorable until Tommy in 1975 (thanks to her now infamous rolling in baked beans scene). She has always been an underrated actress more known for her stunning looks and sexuality than for her capable acting prowess. Check it out if you've never seen it.

For everyone who grew up watching the original trilogy and had a little piece inside of them die when they saw the prequels...you owe it to yourself to watch this (all 7 parts)...before it inexplicably disappears from the face of the Earth.