Category Archives: Film

Paul Simon’s Live From Philadelphia

This concert from Philadelphia’s Tower Theater was filmed in 1980, the same year that Paul Simon released his feature film One Trick Pony. The Simon-scripted One Trick Pony was the story of a once popular folksinger who’d had a hit … Continue reading

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Peter Weir’s Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World

Ahoy there, matey! When’s the last time you went to the local cinema to feast your eyes on yards and yards of canvas, miles of oak, cannons, salty sea dogs, vast panoramas of ocean, waves the height of buildings, and … Continue reading

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Steven Spielberg’s Hook

Kate Brown wrote this review. An outstanding film, Hook follows up the original story of Peter Pan, in which a lost boy in ‘Neverneverland’ takes on a villainous pirate who would steal his innocence. Peter Pan is the boy who … Continue reading

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P. J. Hogan’s Peter Pan, Mike Newell’s An Awfully Big Adventure, and Marc Forster’s Finding Neverland

Michelle Erica Green wrote this review. Peter Pan: wonderful childhood fantasy about a land where the young-at-heart have adventures with pirates and fairies, or dysfunctional parable of the dark side of childhood in which every girl is expected to play … Continue reading

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Michael Curtiz’s The Sea Hawk

It may be hard for some to believe, but Pirates of the Caribbean notwithstanding, the pirate movie genre wasn’t always as moribund as it is today. Tall ships with billowed sail pursuing each other through the seas, blazing cannons, swashbuckling … Continue reading

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Gore Verbinski’s Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl

Norrington: “You are without a doubt the worst pirate I’ve ever heard of. Jack Sparrow: “But you have heard of me.” Yo ho, yo ho, the pirate’s life for me. From Errol Flynn sailing the high seas to Cary Elwes … Continue reading

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Rob Reiner’s The Princess Bride

L.G. Burnett wrote this review. Envision a film with Billy Crystal, Carol Kane, Peter Falk, and Peter Cook that is absolutely hilarious, yet none of them appear in the lead roles. “Inconceivable!,” you cry and I reply, “I do not … Continue reading

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It Happens Every Spring

Craig Clarke wrote this review. Ray Milland is a total charmer as the lead in this light-hearted baseball fantasy. Milland stars as chemistry professor Vernon Simpson, who accidentally discovers a potion that repels wood after a baseball flies through his … Continue reading

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Michael Bayley Hughes and Bob Hewitt’s Strat Masters: The Definitive History Of The World’s Most Famous Guitar

In recent months I have seen some excellent films. But, not features. No… the lowly documentary film has roared back with a vengeance. The House That Ahmet Built (about Ahmet Ertegun & Atlantic Records,) Life Through A Lens (the story … Continue reading

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Katsuhiro Otomo’s Steamboy

Rachel Manija Brown wrote this review. Steamboy looks great in the trailers. The camera swoops through an impossibly detailed animated world filled with elaborate machinery emitting clouds of exquisitely rendered fog: steampunk in sepia. So you rush to buy your … Continue reading

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