Tag: Film

  • That Guy in That Thing

    When I moved to New York City nineteen years ago, with the help of a friend, I got a job working at a theatrical rehearsal studio. It wasn’t a bad job; helped me get a financial foothold in the City. Made some pretty good friends while doing it, as well. But the most interesting aspect of that job was always having this “deja vu” feeling while watching tv, especially when seeing commercials.

    Follow me on this…

    Working at a rehearsal studio meant that I was in contact with hundreds if not thousands of actors. Not only were actors coming in and out for rehearsals, but lots of castings were held in the studios; plays, musicals, tv shows, reality tv shows, movies, and tons upon tons of tv commercials.

    On the whole, actors are a pretty out going and friendly group. Some can be strange, and others can be “chip on the shoulder assholes” but by and large, good people. Chatty people, too. Everyone had a story to tell, or a show that they were in that they wanted you to come and see. Hell, I would try to talk them in to seeing one of my puppet shows, and they would try to get me to go to their staged reading – it’s how the industry works. And it was fun talking to people.

    Then I would go home, turn the tv on to watch something, and there in the Raymore & Flannagan commercial was the guy who was telling be about the reading he was in. Or I would see the woman who was at the second call back for a new musical playing a dead body on Law and Order. Or, I would see a TD Bank ad and wonder to myself, “Don’t I know that guy at the teller widow?” Or “Isn’t that the gal who was warming up in the hallway today in the Jeep commercial?”

    Then a couple of days or weeks would go by, and that actor would walk into the studio for an audition or rehearsal, and my mind would trigger back to that commercial, and I’d say to them, “Saw in that Ben and Jerry’s ad.”

    Other times, I wouldn’t see them again to tell them good job, because they started to work their way up the ladder. Slowly, ad after ad, no lines, then one line. Then featured in an ad, then a background character for some show. Then an under five, leading to a featured role.

    Still to this day, when I’m watching a show or a movie, I’ll still get this feeling when an actors comes on in a small role, that I met them before, a long time ago. I can never prove it, but I do wonder.

  • The Power of Patrick Swayze (Unedited)

    So, I was all gearing and ready to go, to sit down and knock out a blog for today. My wife had left the tv on as she was finishing her lunch, and being that I was planning on working on the couch, I needed to shut the tv off to concentrate. But what was on tv was the final fifteen minutes of Red Dawn. The real Red Dawn. The 1984 John Milius directed Red Dawn that started among many, Patrick Swayze. It had been a couple of years since I had seen it, and the ending is pretty good, with the brothers on the bench Ikiru style.

    And then Road House came on, (I guess it was a Patrick Swayze marathon) and I totally got sucked into that movie. Make no mistake, and I have written about both Road House movies before, the original Road House is a bad movie. But man! It sure is a fun bad movie.

    BUT… I had work to do, so I thought it best to talk about the Power of Patrick Swayze.

    Actually, I wanted to talk about bad movies, and how I find myself needing them more than ever.

    And I love movies. I love seeing them in a theatre. I love watching them late at night. I love reading about movies, and how they were made. And I agree with the notion that good movies, even gut wrenching, tragic, everyone dies dramas, will always leave you feeling better than when you started.

    But right now, with the way the world is, a bad movie that just wants to be entertaining, and that is what Road House is, feels correct for these times. Bad yet entertaining movies know they’re bad, and not good for you. But I know that eating ice cream and cookies for dinner is bad for me, but some nights, it’s what I need to make it to the morning, and try all over again.

  • Barbarian Movies – Bad Movie Bible

    If I had a spirit animal, it would be Rob Hill.

    In case you missed it, I’m a huge fan of bad movies, and also a particular adamant fan of Rob Hill and his Bad Movie Bible YouTube channel. The above Barbarian video is the latest entry in Hill’s “Borrowing Blockbusters” series, which examines a movie that had an enormous, if not game changing, affect on the genre, and the inevitable rip-off movies that followed. I found it surprising that I had seen many of these rip-off Barbarian movies, especially all the films that came from Italy.

  • So, That Was the Oscars

    I’m a sucker for the Oscars. Not award shows, just the Oscars. As a theatre guys, I don’t much care for the Tony’s. But if it’s the Oscars, I will be there for all their hokieness, and over the top showmanship, and fake glamor. Because at the end of the day, the Oscars are nothing more than a room full of very successful and rich people giving each other gold trophies and saying, “You did very good last year!”

    For about five or six years in the late 90’s and early 2000’s, I was seeing every movie that was nominated for all the major categories. It was when I was living my poorest life, but I always found a way to scrape the money together and get to the movies. Living outside of Dallas also afforded me a couple of arthouse movie theatres, so I was able to take in international movies, independent stuff, as well as midnight and cult films. I was also lucky enough to have a solid group of friends that was committed to seeing these movies. We debated endlessly about what were the best films of each year, and we were a very film literate group, most of us worked in video stores, so we did know what we were talking about.

    But when you constantly see good and great movies, you start to understand that the Oscars truly don’t award the best movies of the year. It’s a popularity contest. Sometimes it’s a fun popularity contest, but it always is, and forever shall be, about who is the most popular.

    It’s probably been 12 years since the last time I saw all the movies that were nominated for best picture, and that was due to my wife gifting me tickets to a two-day marathon at a theatre in Manhattan that showed all the nominated movies. (And that was the best experience, because it was nothing but great movies. But don’t forget your tissues.) But I still get a welcome level of enjoyment from the Oscars. Movies are wonderful make-believe and brilliant storytelling when in the right hands. It does feel that good movies are on the rise against, and the ‘splosion fests are on the wane. I’ll catch most of the best pictures streaming on this or that platform, which is fine. Though, to be in a movie theatre with an audience enthralled by a movie is a bit like a religious experience; one that I do miss.