Movie Mondays

  • Movie Mondays: Modern Day Black-and-White

                 The overwhelming majority of films since the 1970s have been filmed in color. The few black-and-white films since then – The Last Picture Show, Paper Moon and Young Frankenstein in the ’70s, The Elephant Man, Raging Bull and Zelig in the ’80s, Schindler’s List, Ed Wood and Clerks in the ’90s, and Good Night, and Good Luck, Sin City and Persepolis in the ’00s – represent some of… Continue reading

  • Movie Mondays: DVDs Delving Deeper – Orson Welles

    In certain circles the received wisdom is that Orson Welles, a theatrical prodigy who rose to fame through live drama and radio, made one cinematic masterpiece, Citizen Kane, and then floundered for the rest of his career, squandering his talent by appearing in wine cooler commercials and Transformers movies. However, even the briefest exploration into… Continue reading

  • Movie Mondays: Hollywood Classics at the University Branch

                     All month long the University Branch is highlighting classic Hollywood genres with free screenings every Saturday afternoon! Join us at 2:00 PM for these upcoming features. Did I mention FREE POPCORN? Continue reading

  • Movie Mondays: When the Oscars Get it Right

    The 86th annual Academy Awards are imminent. The Oscars are the Super Bowl for film nerds and they can certainly cause just as much anguish and frustration as when <INSERT FAVORITE TEAM HERE> loses. Looking back over the Academy’s track record can be a dismal experience. There’s the year Driving Miss Daisy beat out Do… Continue reading

  • Movie Mondays: 2013’s Other Black Films

                    2013 has been called a banner year for Black film, with the critical and commercial success of 12 Years a Slave, Lee Daniels’ The Butler, Fruitvale Station and 42. But, as Slate’s Aisha Harris pointed out in her blog, not all Black films deal with the struggle for civil rights or battles… Continue reading

  • Movie Mondays: Don’t Judge a Romance by most Rom-Coms

                      2013 was a year of great debates – about health care, gay marriage, recreational marijuana….and whether Love Actually is a good or a bad movie. It seems that for every person who defends its poignant charm, there is someone to deride it for its treacly sentimentality. In an effort… Continue reading

  • Movie Mondays: A Chaplin Centennial

    One hundred years ago this week, cinema’s most iconic and enduring character, Charlie Chaplin’s the Little Tramp, was born. On February 7, 1914 theatregoers were given their first taste of the lovable, laughable vagabond as he wrought havoc in Kid Auto Races in Venice. Two days later saw the release of Mabel’s Strange Predicament, a… Continue reading

  • Movie Mondays: See the Movies of Tomorrow Today (In Your Mind)!

    Hollywood looking to books for inspiration is not a “novel” idea. (Ahem.) Certainly the upcoming slate of 2014 theatrical releases is no different. After the runaway success of the Hunger Games and Twilight sagas, teen fiction will continue to provide fodder for the multiplex with adaptations of Vampire Academy, Divergent, The Fault in Our Stars,… Continue reading

  • Movie Mondays: Happy Birthday, David Lynch!

    Director, artist, musician and all around good guy David Lynch turns 68 today. Lynch is indisputably one of the most distinctive voices in contemporary cinema, a man whose style has often been aped but never replicated. No other director can so often scare the pants off me and wow me with intense beauty, often in the same… Continue reading

  • Movie Mondays: Why so Blue?

                 Is there another color that has figured so prominently in a movie title? Possibly, but I can’t remember the last time three good movies with the same color in the name came out at the same time. Continue reading

  • Movie Mondays: While you’re waiting…

    While you’re waiting for Nebraska, check out director Alexander Payne’s first feature, Citizen Ruth (1996).  Laura Dern is Ruth Stoops, an irresponsible gas-huffer who finds herself pregnant for the fifth time – and at the center of a tug-of-war between pro-life and pro-choice groups when a judge (Kurtwood Smith) orders her to get an abortion. This wicked… Continue reading

  • Movie Mondays: The ‘Inside Llewyn Davis’ Primer

    It has been three long years since a Coen brothers film graced the silver screen. Thankfully, the drought ends this month with the release of their sixteenth feature, Inside Llewyn Davis. The film follows a struggling singer-songwriter in the burgeoning New York folk scene of the early 1960s. Want to get the most out of… Continue reading

  • Movie Mondays: Doppelgänger Movies

    Many people remember Philip Seymour Hoffman’s tour-de-force performance as Truman Capote in the biopic Capote, which earned him an Academy Award. Less well known is the fact that another movie was released shortly thereafter which covers almost exactly the same ground: Infamous. Both films are about Capote’s efforts to research and write his landmark book… Continue reading

  • Movie Mondays: Albert Brooks, “West Coast Woody Allen”

    Let’s take a look at the underappreciated Albert Brooks – director, actor and author. You’ll recognize his face from supporting roles in Taxi Driver, Broadcast News , Out of Sight and Drive, and as the voice of Marlin in Finding Nemo. He’s the author of the novel 2030. However, it’s his work as a director… Continue reading

  • Movie Mondays: Literary Adaptations, Indie Style

          For every bestseller that makes it to the big screen, there are a number of novels whose adaptations can only be found in art house or independent theatres in major cities. These adaptions often fly under the radar and often receive mixed reviews from critics and audiences, but they’re worth a look. These six… Continue reading

  • Movie Mondays: Kings of Comedy

    This fall we saw the publication of books about two comedy giants – the biography Furious Cool: Richard Pryor and the World That Made Him by Henry David and the autobiography Still Foolin’ Em: Where I’ve Been, Where I’m Going, and Where the Hell are My Keys? by Billy Crystal. The following films, some of their finest and funniest, are… Continue reading

  • Movie Mondays: HBO Original Films

    Although you won’t see them in theaters,  HBO produces original films that are on par with theatrical releases. Here are five original films produced by HBO in 2013. Behind the Candelabra is the most notable of HBO’s original films this year. Based on the memoir by Scott Thorson, it tells the story of Thorson (Matt Damon) and… Continue reading

  • Movie Mondays: The “Three Flavours Cornetto” Trilogy

                                         Never heard of the “Three Flavours Cornetto” trilogy? How about the “Blood and Ice Cream” trilogy? If not, you’re likely familiar with the quirky, genre-bending British films starring Simon Pegg and Nick Frost and directed by Edgar Wright, rather than the Cornetto ice cream flavors that appear in each film.… Continue reading