While walking back from the downtown Pita Pit today, I heard the following comment: “Finally, I found a reason to read readers’ comments.”The speaker was referring to his Netflix account. If you do business with Netflix, or any number of online movie sites, you know…
I’ve been to the new Magic Lantern Theatre three times now, and I’ve seen movies in both houses. Here’s what I’ve noticed.I’ve noticed sight lines, especially in the smaller house, that aren’t as good as they should be. I’ve noticed lights along the sides of…
Since “The Valley of Elah” is schedule to open in Spokane on Friday, I’ve been trying to find some advance reviews. One story I stumbled across was an interview with Tommy Lee Jones, the well-known difficult interview who is receiving advance Oscar talk for his…
The 2007 Washington State Book Awards selections are out, and you can see the top six choices (plus the other finalists) by clicking here. Or you can wait until Sunday and read who the winners are in the print edition of The Spokesman-Review.There are at…
If you ever wondered whether Hollywood is about business or about art, then you better read this story from the L.A. Times. Then again, is there anyone out there who imagines that studo heads care about anything other than big, bigger and biggest profit margins?
Seems like you just can’t trust the movie-release schedule. “Into the Wild,” for example, is supposed to open on Friday. But the movie, which is director Sean Penn’s adaptation of Jon Krakauer’s true-life story of the doomed Christopher McCandless, is opening only in four theaters…
It’s no surprise that the events of 9/11 changed the world. We who live in the U.S., protected from the worst horrors of two worlds wars, realized that a whole new war could – and suddenly had been – brought to our shores.That realization is…
I usually save my limericks for March when we hold our annual St. Paddy’s Day SR Limericks Contest. But watching James Mangold’s remake of the Western film “3:10 to Yuma” inspired me to scrawl down the following drivel:“Movies and actors are what I like bestWhenever…
Here’s a good moviegoing rule: Never pay attention to trailers.I used to love watching trailers. Whether devouring them from the back seat when my family went to the drive-in or at a posh downtown theater on a movie’s opening night (back when such things were…
Just received an e-mail from my old San Diego buddy Bill Devlin, now a resident of Portland, who had this to say about the YouTube short that I posted below:“I loved that little YouTube film. I found myself chuckling ‘way down deep and low’ as…
There are many ways to be afraid. And that goes for real life as well as the movies.Since real fears – whether we’re talking about facing down a mean teacher or someone holding a gun – permeate our actual existence, we use movies to assuage…
She doesns’t look much like Charles Bronson. But Jodie Foster, who has been making a go of it in Hollywood since 1969 when she was barely 7 years old, does seem to wield a gun as effectively as “Death Wish” Charlie ever did.Foster does so…
In holding an ongoing e-mail discussion with my colleague and fellow movie fan Ryan Pitts, we got to talking about what most people would call guilty pleasures. That is, movies that could in now way be called good but are, nevertheless, fun to watch.Like the…
Jane Wyman died the other day. That fact likely doesn’t mean much to many of today’s moviegoers. I’m not sure it means anything to those even of my generation.But Wyman once was a force in Hollywood. Besides her eight-year marriage to Ronald Reagan (which just…
I grew up watching Westerns, both on television and the big screen. That’s why I was excited about seeing James Mangold’s “3:10 to Yuma.” I even rented Delmer Daves’ 1957 original a few weeks ago to prepare myself.Bummer on both accounts.The original, which is basically…
Want to make your own personal statement about Atlanta Falcons quarterback Michael Vick, the dog-fighting commissioner of Virginia? Go to E-Bay and bid on one of these cards.
I receive about 200 e-mails a day. Most of the porn-related ones are caught by our company spam filter, but quite a few non-porn messages get through that are a mere waste of my time.Once in a while, though, something shows up that I find…
If you’re among those addicted to Red Bull, better click here and commence reading. This news came courtesy of 7 staff writer/blogger Tom Bowers.
To anyone who admires the truth, Hollywood isn’t the most reliable conveyer of history. Any movie that claims to be “based on a true story” is exactly that: It has some basis in fact – maybe a person, maybe an event – but not much…
Maybe it’s the era in which we live. Or maybe it’s the strangely weird political mood that has struck America since the events of 9/11. It could be all the paranoia and hypocrisy that seem to go so naturally hand in hand with all the…
It’s been mentioned in the news here and there that Barbara Morgan, the Teacher in Space who is holding lessons while part of NASA’s current shuttle team, is the wife of Clay Morgan.What’s not been made amply clear is that in the early ’90s, when…
Just received the following e-mail recommendation of a book from a nice guy I met the other morning:Hi Dan,I’m Bill Belknap, Gail Goeller’s cousin who had breakfast with you this morning. The book I was telling you about is “The Last Refuge: Patriotism, Politics, and…
Seem some researchers at the University of Washington have angered the great Disney machine. An explanation of the flap can be found by clicking here.
It’s a slow Friday afternoon, and I’m trying to write next week’s movie column. But two of my editors keep bombarding me with nasty comments they're finding about the ostensible comedy “Daddy Day Camp.”I’m giving in. The barbs being thrown at this cinematic turkey are…
According to one story out of L.A., some theatrical chains – Landmark Theatres in particular – are opting for living-room décor.Yeah, you heard right. They’re trying to make theater houses look as much as possible like the ideal home-screening venue, complete with couch-type seating, concessions…
A Dan Webster joint, discussing news, notes and everything about movies.
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