Jean-Jacques Annaud’s adaptation of Umberto Eco’s novel, The Name of the Rose, is an engaging tour-de-force with a fantastic cast, an intriguing mystery, and a fantastic setting. Amazingly, Sean Connery’s career was in a bit of a lull when he lobbied for the part, one which, it seems, much like Bond, and Indy’s father, he…
Tag: cast
Deep Blue Sea (1999) – Renny Harlin
This one is for my friend Lindsay, who insists this is a better shark movie than Jaws, and yet it can’t help but make a number of references to it, not the least of which is a familiar-looking licence plate. Director Renny Harlin does, for the most part, deliver a fairly solid thriller though even…
Close Encounters of the Third Kind: The Ultimate Visual History (2017) – Michael Klastorin
I remember the first time I watched Close Encounters of the Third Kind. It was 1984, it was my 13th birthday, I had read the fotonovel from the school library, was fascinated by the subject matter (I still am), and though I had seen the rubber toys in grocery stores when the film came out,…
Justice League: The Flashpoint Paradox (2013) – Jay Oliva
Flash (Justin Chambers) has his hands full after the timeline is changed around him in Justice League: The Flashpoint Paradox. Based on the graphic novel, Flashpoint by Geoff Johns and Andy Kubert, this animated feature, though featuring great voice work by its all-star cast suffers from the same thing most of the other adaptations suffer…
Young Guns II (1990) – Geoff Murphy
The amount my life changed between the first Young Guns, released in 1988, and Young Guns II in 1990 makes the movies themselves feel years upon years apart. Seeing that there was only two years between them is rather shocking seeing how many things happened in the space of that time. Rewatching it now Young…
The Equalizer (1987) – Blood & Wine: Part 1, and Part 2
The third season two-part opener of The Equalizer, which was filmed as part of the block at the end of season two, was broadcast on 23 September, 1987 as a feature-length episode. Written by Coleman Luck it featured a few familiar faces alongside Edward Woodward’s portrayal of Robert McCall, Keith Szarabajka shows up as Mickey,…
Bullet Train (2022) – Blu-Ray Review
Sony Pictures delivers a vibrant, energetic action comedy to home theatres with their release of Bullet Train to DVD and Blu-Ray. Kinetic, colourful and packed with laughs, this violent, almost over-the-top film based on the book by Kotaro Isaka puts Brad Pitt, who seems to be having the time of his life, center stage as…
1883 (2021) – Blu-Ray Review
It has been a while since I was utterly gobsmacked and left wordless following a television show, but 1883, an origin story for the hugely popular Yellowstone series (which I’ve yet to start) did that. It is available today on Blu-ray and DVD from Paramount Pictures. Written and created by Taylor Sheridan, who also created…
Poltergeist II: The Other Side (1986) – Brian Gibson
A number of cast and crew (including composer Jerry Goldsmith and visual effects artist Richard Edlund) return for Poltergeist II: The Other Side and while Julian Beck seems truly terrifying as Kane, the film doesn’t have the Spielberg or Hooper magic that made the first film such a hit. The Freeling family, Diane (JoBeth Williams),…
Star Trek Phase II: The Lost Series (1997) – Judith and Garfield Reeves-Stevens
Simon & Schuster Books takes me back to the early to mid-70s when I was a child and had just discovered the wonder of what was Star Trek: The Original Series in reruns. While I was meeting Kirk, Spock, McCoy, and the rest for the first time, Paramount and the creative minds behind the scenes,…
The Mind Reels 