Mon Jun 18 13:06:09 EDT 2018

I am sick of hearing about movies setting box-office records. To what extent are these "records" just documenting inflation, rather than viewership? Don't tell us people are paying more for movies. That's not news; people are paying more for everything. Tell us more people are going to the movies - or not, if that's ( Read more... )

Sun Feb 25 17:06:14 EST 2018

Why do they rank movie blockbusters by dollars of ticket sales and not the number of tickets sold? You're not telling us how many people went to see the movie. Ticket prices vary by region, location, and showtime, and they vary over time. The sales of "Black Panther" and "Avatar" and "Titanic" and "Star Wars" can't be ( Read more... )

Sun Jan 1 17:06:19 EST 2017

They were just announcing how much various movies (many of which I'd never heard of) made over the holidays. I have a problem with this form of reporting. The numbers keep going up. But we have inflation, and prices keep going up, so the rising ticket sales in dollars doesn't mean anything. I want to know how many ( Read more... )

Sat Oct 26 19:29:48 EDT 2013

I've just watched Our Man in Havana. I've never been disappointed by an Alec Guinness movie, and he's one of the search targets for my DVR. The movie was "shot on location in Havana, just two months after the overthrow of the Batista regime" in 1959.

It's amazing what people will obsess over: vacuum cleaners in movies ( Read more... )

Sun Feb 3 23:05:58 EST 2013

I've just watched Surprise Package, a terribly silly movie, but pretty much what I should have expected, considering the cast: Yul Bryner, Mitzi Gaynor, and Noël Coward for the headliners. There was only one musical number, with Noël and Mitzi singing, but there was plenty of the flippant comedy-of-errors banter you'd ( Read more... )

Date: Fri, 4 May 2012 23:08:52 +0000


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There's a couple of networks, ATV (Antenna TV (odd name for a cable network)) and RTV (Retro TV (not to be confused with the soon-to-be-defunct ReplayTV DVR)), that show old TV shows. RTV has just started (re-)showing "The Saint", starring Roger Moore. These first episodes are from 1957. (Vintage moi.) What's really appalling is the smoking. Simon ( Read more... )

If you like depressing movies, I notice that On the Beach (wiki) is airing on TCM Saturday evening (17:30-20:00 EST). It's about an American submarine crew based out of Australia after a round of mutually-assured destruction from nuclear strikes. (Made in 1959, set in 1964. Just learned there's also an Australian-TV remake (wiki) from 2000, set in ( Read more... )

I watched about 10 minutes (call me a slow learner), but I wish I had read the Wikipedia page before I deleted the movie from the DVR. (The quoted bit is a spoiler, in case one of you might ever watch this movie, otherwise highlight the "invisible" white text with your mouse.)... he settles the family's accounts in an orgy of slaughter (filmed ( Read more... )

I can't understand the mentality behind this:When RKO acquired the distribution rights to Le Jour se lève (1939) in preparation for remaking it as The Long Night (1947) they also sought to buy up all available prints of the original film and destroyed them. For a time it was thought that the French film had been lost completely, but copies of it re ( Read more... )