Tag: review
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Lord of the Rings
The Turner Classic Movies channel is showing Academy Award winning films all day every day this month in a series called “31 Days of Oscar.” I watched Lord of the Rings: Return of the King last night and realized something. I would remember that trilogy for the rest of my life. I hadn’t read the…
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Some Like It Hot
Published in the North Central Chronicle on November 2, 2007, as part of a series called “Chad Picks Classic Flicks.” After tackling a few different genres—film noir, thriller, crime drama—all of which can take a heavy toll on your senses, I thought it best to visit a genre much older than the film medium and…
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Taxi Driver
Originally published in the North Central Chronicle on October 19, 2007, as part of a series called “Chad Picks Classic Flicks.” In this edition of “Chad Picks Classic Flicks,” I’m skipping over the 1960s in favor of tackling the wide array of great movies in the 1970s. I will return to the decade of sex,…
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Rear Window
Published in the North Central Chronicle on October 5, 2007, as part of a series called “Chad Picks Classic Flicks.” Today we’re going to visit the 1950s, a time when television shows delivered the least objectionable content, when the president of the United States was roundly respected, and when rock stars needed only to shake…
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First Love Birds: Notes on ‘The Notebook’
I watched The Notebook again recently. I still really like it, but now I have some reasons for it. (Though I’m still searching for more.) There is a bird motif. Birds of some kind appear in 3 obvious time: in the very beginning, when old Allie overlooks a boater we assume is Noah/Duke; on the…
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The Third Man
Originally published in the NCC Chronicle on September 21, 2007, as part of the “Chad Picks Classic Flicks” series. With the parade of loathsome summer threequels having turned the corner, and with Oscar season nearing full bloom, I can finally take refuge in some good cinema. But with my schoolboy-like excitement for new good movies…
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Quinceañera
Our protagonist, Magdalena (newcomer Emily Rios), is on the verge of her own quinceañera, the Latino equivalent of a bar mitzvah/Sweet Sixteen for girls. But she first has to take part in her friend’s quinceañera, which is way more decked out than hers will be, and she knows it. Coveting her friend’s wealth notwithstanding, she…
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Switchfoot’s ‘Oh! Gravity’ brings us back to earth
Originally published in the North Central Chronicle on January 26, 2007. Switchfoot has been in the biz for upwards of a decade, so one would hope that they would evolve for the better during that time. Thankfully, this ensemble can still make good rock music. That, however, doesn’t make the band invulnerable to the destined…
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The Prestige
The Prestige is a film about magicians and their illusions, but it is also an illusion itself. In the film and in magic, we are first shown the Pledge; a seemingly ordinary scenario that we will assume is probably not so ordinary. Alfred Borden (Christian Bale) and Rupert Angier (Hugh Jackman) two rival magicians who…