By Tim Morrison and Kevin Wetmore

A return to form by Terry Gilliam, Wim Wenders, John Carpenter and Francis Ford Coppola- These once great directors have all lost their way. Coppola has shown some signs of life with Tetro and Youth Without Youth, now lets try to match Apocalypse Now. As for Gilliam, we are excited to see The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus, I wish Gilliam would stay away from the CGI stuff though. Here’s to hoping he finally makes The Man Who Killed Don Quixote, as he hinted he may. John Carpenter should reunite with Kurt Russell and create one more example of genre-film badassery. As for Wenders, the great German new wave artist may sadly be a lost cause. -KW

Could this have been Gilliam's masterpiece?

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(In no particular order and totally non-definitive.)

Pan’s Labyrinth – Guillermo Del Toro understands that the purpose of fantasy has always been an escape mechanism. Set in Franco’s post-civil war Spain, Pan’s Labyrinth follows a young girl, Ofelia, as she shifts between a mystifying dream world and an oppressively cruel real life living under her despotic and cruel army officer step dad. Pan’s Labyrinth is a thoughtful examination into the duality between our fantasies and the harsher realities of life and how the two can intermingle and bleed into one another. Pan’s Labyrinth is sublime, beautiful, and easily the best fantasy film of the decade.

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There Will Be Blood

Coming into There Will Be Blood, Paul Thomas Anderson had already directed three terrific films in Boogie Nights, the great Magnolia and the underrated Punch-Drunk Love. However there was nothing in his work that could have hinted where he would go next, an epic period drama about the greed and cruelty possessed by the human race. Think of it as Citizen Kane in hell. Daniel Day-Lewis plays Daniel Plainview in the best performance of the decade. The best way to describe his character would be to quote Mike Tyson’s description of Don King in the 2009 documentary Tyson: he’s a ‘wretched, slimy, reptilian motherfucker.’ Plainview is hateful towards all. He puts on an act of a sincere family man when he needs to, using his son, H.W., as a prop to get to the oil he desires. Once his son loses his hearing in an accident, Plainview no longer has any use for him and sends him off to a boarding school. When H.W. comes back to him later in the film to reveal that he will be drilling his own oil, a competitor, Daniel chases him out of the house berating him as a “bastard from a basket” and telling him he is not his son. There is no sadness or veiled-attachment to be found in this vintage Day-Lewis explosion, just pure hatred. Was Daniel Plainview evil from the start, or is he driven to this point by a combination of greed, power and alcoholism? Read more…

By Tim Morrison and Kevin Wetmore

Biggest Movie Theater Scam: Imax

The newest excuse big theater chains have found to jack up ticket prices is by showing new blockbuster films on an ‘Imax’ Screen. However a large portion of such theaters actually do not possess an Imax screen. A true Imax theater projects the best film format out there onto a 76 foot tall screen. Now many multiplexes are advertising a 28 foot screen as Imax. For this they charge five extra bucks. Over-charging for popcorn was one thing, I just don’t buy popcorn anymore. When movie tickets surpassed $10 I was angry but I can deal with it if that’s what it will take keep to the movie theater business going in this day and age. Now multiplexes have resorted to damaging the actual viewing experience in order to make a few extra dollars. First many started dimming the projection, a heinous act. False-advertising of an Imax experience shows that they will allow their greed to continually damage the theater going experience deep into the 21st century. -KW

Courtesy of rogerebert.com

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By Tim Morrison and Kevin Wetmore

9:  ’Avatar’ (2009)

The apex of James Cameron's career.

After over a decade in the making, the self-proclaimed revolutionary film experience Avatar finally saw the light of day in 2009 and immediately gained a heap of praise from critics and fanboys alike. The masses battled snowstorms and dressed up in blue to get to their nearest 3D Imax screens to see what the magician James Cameron could concoct with the biggest budget of all time. Cameron was right about one thing, Avatar looks great. It is by far the most impressive CGI world ever created and the 3D effects actually work to improve the viewing experience for the first time in the history of 3D effects. Here’s the problem, James Cameron may still be a master of special effects, but he also has not changed at all from the hack writer that he was when he penned Titanic. Maybe some room should have been made in that reported $350 million budget to hire someone to assist Cameron in writing dialogue. Leave it to Cameron to make a love story between a giant blue alien and crippled Marine into a brainless rehashed borefest. -  KW

8:  ‘Finding Nemo’ (2003)

Ellen Degeneres in 'Finding Nemo.'

Pixar’s ‘Finding Nemo’ is championed by the most annoying demographic: The grown-up desperately trying to regain the lost whimsy of childhood. Led by the voice-overs of lame joke purveyors, Ellen Degeneres and Albert Brooks, ‘Finding Nemo’ desperately tries to entertain the middle ground between parents and children. While the tykes may enjoy the aquatic tale of a father clownfish looking for his lost son, adults will be left trying to find a film to replace ‘Finding Nemo’ after being subjected to its 200^th viewing. Or perhaps it would just be wiser to find a bottle of the hard stuff to drown out the obnoxious clatter of cartoon voices.  – TM Read more…

Weather.com is reporting that my town will receive between 10-15 inches of snow. Since I’m besieged by snow, I thought that I would post some film recommendations to make your  shoveling, the general misery of the cold, and your bruised ass from slipping on the ice seem slightly more tolerable. Read more…