On Golden Pond (1981) – Mark Rydell

The next title up in the Ten Bad Dates with De Niro book, under the category of movies not to watch while you are medicated, is this classic Oscar-nominated film starring Henry Fonda, Katharine Hepburn, and Jane Fonda. The film, based on the play by Ernest Thompson, who also wrote the screenplay, follows Norman (Henry…

War of the Worlds (1988) – The Second Seal, and Goliath is My Name

Team Blackwood has its hands full this week as the War of the Worlds continues. Patrick Barry pens the first episode up this week, that originally aired on 7 November, 1988. The Mortheren, still referred to as Martians at this point, attempt to take over a military base that may store information about the 1953…

Star Trek: Deep Space Nine (1994) – Rivals, and The Alternate

Station log: stardate unknown Rivals was written by Joe Menosky from a story by Jim Trombetta and Michael Piller. It originally aired on 2 January, 1994. Quark (Armin Shimerman) has trouble on the Promenade when an El-Aurian con artist, Martus Mazur (Chris Sarandon) arrives on the station and plans to open a competing bar. Mazur…

Life is Beautiful (1997) – Roberto Benigni

Walking away with Oscars for Best Foreign Film, Best Original Score, and Best Actor in a Leading Role for Benigni, Life is Beautiful is the next recommendation from the Great Movies – 100 Years of Film book following my screening of Schindler’s List. In this partly whimsical tale that touches on true humour while facing…

Quantum Leap (1989) – Star-Crossed and The Right Hand of God

  Sam’s (Scott Bakuka) leaps really get under way this week with Star-Crossed. Penned by Deborah Pratt with an air date of 31 March, 1989, Dr. Beckett finds himself leaping into an English Lit professor, Gerald Bryant, in an Ohio college on 15 June, 1972. The professor has a drinking problem, and is involved amorously…

Red Rising (2014) – Pierce Brown

  With hints of the Hunger Games, Battle Royale, Ender’s Game and the guise of an educational setting, Pierce Brown’s science fiction novel, Red Rising, the first of a trilogy, is strongly written and completely engrossing. I’ll admit it took me about the first third of the book to get really hooked on the story,…