Fuck Yes

David Cronenberg and Howard Shore make an opera out of their operatic 1986 masterpiece The Fly.

I was thinking about this flick recently anyway for two reasons:

1. because Guillermo Del Toro's Hellboy II plays like an opera, too, thus unlocking Del Toro's films for me in a different way.

2. because I'm also in the middle of reviewing 1986's Blue City with Judd Nelson and Ally Sheedy, reminding me that while 1986 was one of the best years of film in that decade (and many others - Blue Velvet, Down By Law, The Mosquito Coast, Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer, Sid and Nancy, Aliens, Ferris Bueller’s Day Off, The Fly, Big Trouble in Little China, Something Wild, Mona Lisa, Night of the Creeps) it also hosted that trilogy of Brat Pack suck: this one, The Wraith and Wisdom.

WALL·E Talkback

By not-so-popular demand, a WALL·E talkback. Because my own opinion of the film falls squarely in line with the status quo, it's not really worth regurgitating. I did love it, though, and I think it's pretty obvious that Andrew Stanton and Brad Bird are the brightest of Pixar's bright lights.

EW indeed

I let my ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY subscription lapse a couple of years ago largely because of their increased reliance on stunts like this. Anyway, curious to see what the consensus around here is for their list of the 100 Best Films of the Past Quarter Century. (The "New Classics," they're calling it.) The Top 10 reads like this:

1. Pulp Fiction (1994)
2. The Lord of the Rings trilogy (2001-03)
3. Titanic (1997)
4. Blue Velvet (1986)
5. Toy Story (1995)
6. Saving Private Ryan (1998)
7. Hannah and Her Sisters (1986)
8. The Silence of the Lambs (1991)
9. Die Hard (1988)
10. Moulin Rouge (2001)

If you think Moulin Rouge is a real say what, honky?! choice, you haven't seen the rest of the list, which ranks Napoleon Dynamite above Back to the Future and There Will Be Blood, thinks bizarrely highly of Casino Royale, and would draw most laymen (that's who this is for, right?) to the conclusion that very few films have been made outside the United States since 1983.

The Other Blu-Ray Reviewer

Just a heads-up that today marks the first FILM FREAK CENTRAL review by Bryant Frazer, who'll be joining me on the increasingly unwieldy Blu-ray beat. (The nice thing about getting in on the ground floor of a new format is that because the screener pool isn't yet spread thin, the studios send you everything. The downside? The studios send you everything.)

Readers of this blog have long heard me sing the praises of Monsieur Frazer and his excellent website DEEP FOCUS. As a fan of his work, it's an incredible honour to be working with him in this capacity; he's a true-blue cinephile who will undoubtedly only improve our street cred.

Join me in welcoming him aboard. Bryant's first review for us, The Other Boleyn Girl, is online now--and be sure to check out his own formidable archive of reviews while you're at it.

Mothersite NOT Down

Hey all,

Apparently a transformer exploded in the vicinity of our webhost and some important transmitter-type stuff was burned to a crisp, so FFC and its attendant e-mail server will be down until further notice.

This blog will remain unaffected.

UPDATE (06/02/08): Back in business.

Innndddyyyyyyy!!!!!!!!!!

Walter's review of Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull is finally live. (We forgot it opened on a Thursday.) Anyway, if we did a talkback for X3, we should surely do one for Indy 4, so: bombs away.

Also, what's your fave entry in the series? Really, that one?! Whatchu talkin' about, Willis?

P.S.: Be sure not to miss THE HOUSE NEXT DOOR's appreciation of the OT, "Smitten with a Whip". Between Matt's and Keith's apologias for Temple of Doom and The Last Crusade, respectively, I felt like Indy in the thrall of Mola Ram.

DVD Cover of the Decade?

They don't make B-movies like they used to, but bless 'em for pretending they do: