It’s no secret that the Hollywood Comet loves musicals. In 2010, I revealed I had seen 400 movie musicals over the course of eight years. Now that number is over 600. To celebrate and share this musical love, here is … Continue reading →
Barton Weiss from VideoFest got in touch to ask:Do you know the percentage of a film festival’s budget that comes from entry fees? I have heard that it was 9% - what have you heard?Thirteen years ago, when I interviewed 523 film festival directors, the average was under 14.8% of income.However, when the Raindance Film Festival opened its books to me three years later, its submission-fee income accounted for 35.6% of its total income.So I didn’t have a clean figure to provide to Barton off the…
1959 whodunnit, dir. Otto Preminger, James Stewart, Lee Remick: IMDb. The soldier killed the bartender who raped his wife. But is it really that simple?
There are few things which make me happier than Deanna Durbin movies, so I'm thrilled that her first full-length feature film, THREE SMART GIRLS (1936), was just released on Blu-ray.Given how much I love Durbin, I've been upgrading her films from DVD to Blu-ray as they're released, and I'm thrilled that this important movie in her filmography finally joins many of her other titles on Blu-ray.As a matter of fact, my earliest Durbin viewing, including this film, was on VHS; I first saw THREE…
I recently watched two East German movies about World War Two on Kanopy. Here are my initial impressions. “Star-Crossed Lovers” [Königskinder] (DEFA, 1962), dir. Frank Beyer This film is about two young men and a young woman, friends since childhood, who are separated in the Nazi era because of their circumstances and choices. The film is well made and interesting, but the scenes that depict the men fleeing the Wehrmacht for the Red Army and being well received strain belief, which interfered…
AuthorKatie HenryReviewHow does a YA book make me feel so seen?! I, too, believe in love and wish the church would evolve more quickly. But this book made me wonder about the nature of forgiving the church for being imperfect. 15 years working in the church and I never considered that. Powerful.🔍Data provided by Open Library
A country boy in the city falls into the clutches of a stylish vampire, forgetting his fiancee, his responsibilities and his self-respect. The perils of New York! Home Media Availability: Released on Bluray Oh, you vampire! Before Theda Bara menaced men onscreen with her vampirish antics, the Kalem company produced their own picture based on […]
Last month I reviewed Jean Gabin in the title role of the very enjoyable police detective movie MAIGRET SEES RED (1963).MAIGRET SEES RED recently had a single-title Blu-ray release by Kino Lorber; now that film has also been released as part of Kino Lorber's three-film Inspector Maigret Collection, along with MAIGRET SETS A TRAP (1958) and MAIGRET AND THE ST. FIACRE CASE (1959).MAIGRET SETS A TRAP, also known as INSPECTOR MAIGRET or, in France, MAIGRET TEND UN PIEGE, was the first of Gabin's…
Back in 2010 (the birth year of Cherry and Spoon), Illusion Theater won two Ivey Awards (remember the Ivey Awards, Minnesota's own Tony Awards?) for their adaptation of Willa Cather's novel My Ántonia, one for playwright Allison Moore and one for Kate Guentzel, who played the title character. I didn't see it that year, but lucky for me Illusion continued to produce the show every few years, and even toured it around the Midwest and into Cather's Nebraska. I've seen it three times, most recently…
Marshal Knight argues that RuPaul's Drag Race All Stars 11 episode 6 proves that the bracket format is broken—even more than the incomprehensible family resemblance criteria!
Reading selections from his Dictionary, and his Mohamet Marx and Engels mention:“The man who deprived seventeenth-century metaphysics and metaphysics in general of all credit in the domain of theory was Pierre Bayle. His weapon was scepticism, which he forged out of metaphysics’ own magic formulas. He himself proceeded at first from Cartesian metaphysics. Just as Feuerbach by combat-ing speculative theology was driven further to combat speculative philosophy, precisely because he recognised in…
When it was recently announced that a relaunch of the, "Avengers," comic was happening with Chip Zdarsky writing, my first reaction was, “Wasn’t this declared months ago?” You see, in my apparent ignorance, I thought the new, “Avengers: Armageddon,” comic which Chip Zdarsky is doing with artists Delio Diaz and Frank Allier, was the latest ongoing book about the Avengers, hence, you know, the book’s name. Apparently, it is merely a five-issue miniseries that will lead into the actual relaunch…
The archetypical Edinburgh Fringe show makes the most of its constraints: simple, sparse sets in front of an immobile audience. Most artists lose money at the fringe, so why go further into the red with “immersive” performances that require expensive and elaborate sets, or trade ticket sales for participation? Yet some brave souls persist. So here is my list of shows I’m keeping an eye on. There’s no strong guiding principle – don’t ask me why this or that show is or isn’t included, I will…
by Nathaniel R Four inspirations for 2026 movies: Mrs Dalloway becomes CLARRISA, The Unfaithful Wife becomes MINOTAUR, Rocky (1976) gets a making of bio with I PLAY ROCKY, and of course the bestseller turned blockbuster PROJECT HAIL MARY As someone who never used to have writers block but who has it frequently now, I have a newly reinvigorated respect for fellow writers who perservere. That said, the screenwriters life can't be easy given the amount of script doctoring, star and director and…
One of the earliest articles on Twin Peaks Blog was about artwork by English artist Jon Atwood displayed on the Double R Diner set. This article kicked off years of research into identifying props and other set decorations (there’s even a page dedicated to this work now). I love identifying these set pieces as they... The post Twin Peaks Prop – “Woodland Pool” in Annie Blackburn’s Hospital Room appeared first on TWIN PEAKS BLOG.
Another early from Luigi Maggi, co-directing with the euphoniously-named Arturo Ambrosio. No idea how they divided the duties or why they needed to. It’s less than ten minutes long! “Galileo studies the rotational motion of the earth.” A challenge for filmmakers of this period, making the kind of thing one more naturally associates with Paul […]
I talked with Top Chef season one star Lee Anne Wong about her latest competition experience—and her first-ever win—on 24 in 24: Last Chef Standing.
Having just finished Spider-Noir (and thoroughly enjoyed it), I felt the need to read a few reviews of the show to see if my opinion matched with those of the critics. It did – Spider-Noir is widely considered an entertaining and visually unique show, with a distinct and very stylish noir aesthetic. However, several of the reviews stated that this was Nicolas Cage’s first TV show – something that isn’t quite correct… In fact, Cage has dipped his toe in to TV waters once or twice over the years,…
Well this is one of the nerdiest things I’ve ever seen, and I love it. Laser engraved coasters for notable chips from computing history: www.evilgeniuslabs.org/macrochip…
Miscellaneous bits of news and fun stuff from around the Internet......Kino Lorber has announced that TILL WE MEET AGAIN (1944) will be released August 25th. The Blu-ray disc, from a 4K scan of the 35mm nitrate original negative and 35mm composite fine grain, is a restoration by Universal and the Film Foundation. It will include a commentary track by Imogen Sara Smith....Leonard Maltin reviews the new Blu-rays of NIGHT WORLD (1932) and THE BIG COMBO (1955)....Chris Yogerst has a new article for…
Watched “The Dogs of War” (United Artists, 1980) this evening, directed by John Irvin, starring Christopher Walken. I didn’t know anything about it going in, but Walken did not disappoint.
It’s getting close to bed time so let’s all say “good night” to Special Agent Dale Cooper. This publicity photo was scanned from a photo slide I acquired via an online auction. It’s a still photo taken during Twin Peaks episode 1.002 just before Cooper’s strange dreams of the Red Room, Laura Palmer’s cousin, BOB... The post Twin Peaks Publicity – Special Agent Dale Cooper Sleeping in Episode 1.002 appeared first on TWIN PEAKS BLOG.
What time is it? Time to continue my look at the new-to-me movies I saw back in August 2025 as part of TCM’s Summer Under the Stars event. In today’s post, I’m taking a look at Days 7, 8, and 9. Day 7: Ruby Dee – A Long Day’s Journey Into Night (1982) Earlier last year, I’d tried watching the Katharine Hepburn version of this Eugene O’Neill play, but I didn’t get far. I think it’s because I didn’t really understand what was going on. But while doing the research for the Blu-ray release of The…
Watched on Saturday June 6, 2026.
The first recording today starts with the end of Finley the Fire Engine. Then it’s Kerwhizz – Funfair Freeway. Media Centre Description: It’s all the fun of the fair in the quiz with added whizz. Join teams Ninki, Twist and Kit as they hop on the ride and try their luck at Kerwhizzitor’s kerwhizzical questions. Will getting the best Pod Mod help them win in this funtastic rollercoaster of a raceworld? Recorded from BBC TWO on Tuesday 16th February 2010 07:38 BBC Genome: BBC TWO Tuesday 16th…
Making a welcome return to the Melbourne stage after only four years, John Cranko’s Romeo and Juliet consolidates its position as a treasured favourite of dancers and audiences alike. Staged for this season by Yseult Lendvai and Mark Kay, the performance is brimming with youthful joy, all too brutally offset by the weight of tragedy. Festival scenes are joyously buoyant, the Capulet Ball is ostentatiously splendid, and sword fighting is thrillingly visceral. The sumptuous revival grandly fills…
Anthony Head, best known for playing Rupert "Ripper" Giles on the classic TV series Buffy the Vampire Slayer, died on June 1, 2026 at the age of 72. The cause was complications from pneumonia. He also starred in the shows Little Britain, Merlin, and Ted Lasso. With Sharon Maugham, he appeared in a series of commercials for Nescafé Gold Blend coffee from 1987 to 1993.Anthony Head was born on February 20, 1954, in London. His father was documentary filmmaker Stewart Head and his mother was…
Gathered up these lobby cards from the twelve corners of the internet for possible inclusion in our latest video essay, Glorious Disaster… and then I don’t think we used any of them. There was too much other good stuff to put in. Well, what doesn’t go into a video SHOULD appear here on Shadowplay, so… […]
It’s time once again to revisit the Sixth Doctor’s Big Finish audio adventures. Last time, we took a little side trek to check out the first season of The Lost Stories, in which Colin Baker and Nicola Bryant reunited to bring to life stories originally destined for the cancelled version of Season 23; before that, we delved into the triumphant run of Sixth Doctor/Charley Pollard stories. With Blue Forgotten Planet wrapping that sequence up, the main range was back to a point where the question…
