BilmBlog500

The Oscars forced me to sit down with my print-out of the movies I'd seen that opened in 2014, and without further ado... 1.  Boyhood The very notion of the movie is crazy.  The challenges in making a film with a 12-year shooting schedule go far beyond anything.  You can't even compare it to the 7/14/21/etcUp documentary series by Michael Apted that has followed a group of kids from 7 until very close to today with films every 7 years.  It's one thing to just get together every seven years and see what's happened.  You don't have to worry about what happened in the intervening, you just have to report on it.  And in any event, Boyhood director Richard Linklater has already replicated that with his Before Sunrise/Before Sunset/Before Midnight series of films with Ethan Hawke and Juliette Delpy. Let's look at this: You can't sign a contract for longer than 7 years for an actor/actress, so for your primary cast members, there's the chance that you could be ...

So having completed the live blogging for the Oscars, this is my Baker's Dozen best of 2013, in no particular order: World War Z: This is grading on a curve.  But basically, there are so many really shitty special effects spectaculars around these days that I feel an urge to give some recognition to a movie that's just a little bit different.  Also, since I keep asking authors to revise their manuscripts, it's nice to see something in the popular culture where revision works.  In particular, the ending of this major CGI-ridden summer spectacular release is quiet.  One setting, one main character, a place where small little things count, where the tension is real.  A place where the violence is earned, justified by the movie being what the movie is, and now entirely thrown in just because someone thinks it's fun to plow a starship into a building, or to destroy Manhattan for the 18th time and pretend like it isn't, like Superman didn't save Manhattan in Superman ...

Edge of Darkness, seen Tuesday evening Feb. 9 2010 at the AMC Loews W. 34th St., aud. #4, was a pleasant surprise. It's one of those films that could, from the credits, go either way. Do you encounter the director Martin Campbell who did Vertical Limit, or the one who did Casino Royale? Mel Gibson? Is that the Lethal Weapon guy, the Lethal Weapon 4 guy, the Mrs. Soffel guy? It turns out to be a movie co-written by William Monahan, whose screenplay for The Departed was an excellent adaptation of the very good Korean movie Infernal Affairs. It turns out to be a movie edited by Stuart Baird. Now, who pays attention to who edited a movie? But Stuart Baird is the long-time go-to guy for Richard Donner, starting with The Omen and Superman, and with Mel Gibson dating back to Lethal Weapon, Maverick, one of those editors who works with people forever the way Thelma Schoonmaker has edited Martin Scorcese since forever or Michael Kahn has edited Spielberg for over 30 years dating bac...