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Tom

Life is just a mirror. What you see out there, you must first see inside of you.

About Me

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My life could probably best be summed up (to date) as being an "Entertainment Industry Jack-of-All-Trades," having worked extensively (both in my native land, Canada, and primarily in the U.S.) in the fields of MUSIC (as a songwriter and musician, as well as a longtime freelance writer and Editor of two prominent international music publications), FILM (screenwriting/directing/producing/ acting/editing/etc.), THEATRE (pretty much the same as for film, only without the editing...), serving as EDITOR for prominent international pop culture publications, lots and lots of freelance POP CULTURE FREELANCE WRITING (ranging from reviews to interviews, biographies to feature stories), PUBLICITY (for Music, Film, Theatre, Live Concerts & Tours, Books, Events, etc.), etc... Basically, any project that seems like its people and process will be both fun and a challenge.
(I think filmmaker extraordinaire Jim Brooks said it best: "I'll do anything." How else would you ever have time to experience every ride at life's fascinating little amusement park?)
My absolute pride and joy has been writing and performing in the band, FSI, for the past 20 years with my two best friends in the world. (We have actually been dubbed: "The 21st. Century Pink Floyd," although "Cinematic Art Rock" is only one genre we dabble in, each of us having wildly diverse musical tastes - there's a recent pic of us posted in my photos file).
And I work alternately as either Tom Mureika and/or Tomas Mureika - just to keep things interesting... or at least, to keep myself amused. (I amuse easily.) ;~}
AND IF I MAY OFFER SOME CURRENT VERY WORTHWHILE "HEADS UP"s!:
AFTER A TWO-YEAR ABSENCE (NOT COUNTING LAST YEAR'S WHY-IS-THIS-SO-DREARY?, JUST LIKE HEAVEN, WHICH NOBODY SAW ANYWAY), REESE REALLY RETURNS IN RENDITION... AND I COULDN'T BE HAPPIER!
REMEMBER, THIS IS THE ACTRESS WHOSE DEBUT IN 1991's THE MAN IN THE MOON SHOULD HAVE GARNERED REESE HER FIRST OF WHAT I COUNT SHOULD BE FIVE OSCAR AWARDS BY NOW. INSTEAD, THE DEFIANTLY BRAVE REESE WITHERSPOON TOOK THAT RAREST OF PATHS TO HER OSCAR (15 YEARS LATER FOR WALK THE LINE) ~ SHE CHOSE DARING, DARK AND OFTEN BAFFLING CHOICES FOR PROJECTS.
THERE REALLY IS NO COMMON THREAD TO HER EARLY WORK ~ JUST TRY TO CONNECT THE DOTS FROM A FAR OFF PLACE THROUGH S.F.W. TO HER TWO BEST PERFORMANCES IN MATTHEW BRIGHT's CREEPFEST FAIRY TALE, FREEWAY, AND HER CLASSIC DEAPAN COMEDIC TURN IN THE BROAD LOL COMEDY, OVERNIGHT DELIVERY.
THE ONE COMMON ELEMENT IS THE PASSION THAT HAS COME THROUGH IN EVERY ONE OF HER PERFORMANCES ~ FROM THE ROM.COM. (LEGALLY BLONDE, HER DECADE-LATE-EARNING-PUBLIC-FAME SMASH HIT) TO THE THRILLERS (TWILIGHT, FEAR (1996)) TO THE FANTASIES (PLEASANTVILLE, LITTLE NICKY) AND EVEN THE HIGH-GLOSS WICKED SMUT SATIRES (CRUEL INTENTIONS, AMERICAN PSYCHO), REESE ALWAYS PLAYED THE ROLE LIKE IT WAS THE ROLE SHE WAS BORN TO PLAY.
LIKE I SAID, BY MY COUNT, SHE SHOULD HAVE HAD FIVE OSCARS BEFORE JUNE CARTER CASH, BUT THAT'S MY DEAL. NOW ~ FINALLY! ~ THE FIRST OF HER FILMED-POST-OSCAR PERFORMANCES IS ABOUT TO REACH THEATERS. AND THOUGH IT'S NOT THE ONE THAT WAS SUPPOSED TO COME FIRST [I'VE BLOGGED ABOUT HER SELF-PRODUCED PENELOPE BEFORE AND PROMISE I WILL AGAIN WHEN THEY'RE READY TO RELEASE IT!], IT'S PROBABLY THE MORE APPROPRIATE.
ALONGSIDE OSCAR-CALIBRE PERFORMERS INCLUDING MERYL STREEP & ALAN ARKIN AND VIRTUAL BROS-IN-LAW, JAKE GYLLENHAAL & PETER SARSGAARD AND UNDER THE DIRECTION OF TSOTSI AUTEUR GAVIN HOOD (ALSO ATTACHED TO MAKE WOLVERINE FOR 2009!) AND WITH A TIMELY WAR ON TERROR CONSPIRACY THEORY THRILLER TO BOOT, REESE SHOULD ONCE AGAIN SHINE LIKE OSCAR GOLD!
THERE ARE FEW ACTRESSES (FAR FEWER THAN MALE ACTORS) THAT DARE TO TAKE THE ROAD LESS TRAVELLED ~ THE CHALLENGES ARE STEEP, THE ODDS DAUNTING, TO SAY THE LEAST. BUT WITH SUCH AWESOME TALENTS AS KRISTEN BELL, ELLEN PAGE, ALISON LOHMANN, RACHEL McADAMS, MILA KUNIS & RACHEL HURD-WOOD FOLLOWING IN THE FOOTSTEPS OF THE DARING MS. WITHERSPOON, HER BEING CROWNED THE HIGHEST-PAID ACTOR IN HOLLYWOOD (FOR NEXT YEAR's FOUR CHRISTMASES WITH VINCE VAUGHN), REESE HAS NOW CEMENTED HER LEGACY AS THE PATRON SAINT OF YOUNG HOLLYWOOD ACTRESSES. AND WITH HER BEAUTIFUL CHILDREN, REESE HAS ACHIEVED UNPARALLELED STATUS IN A MALE-DOMINATED INDUSTRY ~ AND SHE's DONE SO ON HER OWN TERMS, BREAKING A PATH FOR MANY BRIGHT NEW ARTISTS TO BRAVELY FOLLOW. AND... ALL THAT WITHOUT A SINGLE DUI OR SIMILAR PUBLIC MELTDOWN! THE WOMAN JUST EMBODIES CLASS ACT-ING...!
OH, YEAH... RENDITION STARTS FRIDAY, OCTOBER 19... BUT IT COULD BE "THE PHONE BOOK" STARRING REESE WITHERSPOON AND I'D STILL BE THERE! ;~)
Check out this video: Rendition Official Trailer
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And now that it's finally coming out, I can actually talk about how great The Game Plan really is. And if there were ever a film that was meant to be entertaining for the whole family, this is it!
Credit for the film's lol drop-dead humor goes to director Andy Fickman, one of the greatest directors ever to transition from stage to screen (and a huge proponent of the divine Kristen Bell, which really says something. After a successful career directing L.A. 99-seat theatre shows, Andy took the masterpiece, Reefer Madness (later to become Reefer Madness: The Movie Musical, one of my all-time favorite films), to Broadway and then to film. He also brought Porky's or Judd Apatow-grade raunch back to the lifeless teen comedy (2003's highly-underrated Who's Your Daddy?) and genuine wit back and intelligence back to family entertainment (last year's extremely clever reworking of Twelfth Night starring Amanda Bynes, She's the Man). To boot, he is currently attached to direct a remake of Alan Parker's masterpiece, Fame, cementing his reputation alongside Parker as one of the best musical directors on the planet.
The Game Plan is a hoot ~ truly fun for the entire family. Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson is a revelation in his comic timing and self-parodic performance (Andy has a knack for bringing out astonishing performances in his actors) and the former "Can you smell what he's cooking" megastar's supporting cast are all at the top of their game!
The reason I would say The Game Plan is fun for the whole family is that it's a legitimate PG-rated Disney film that's highly-entertaining and genuinely touching. But one of Andy Fickman's greatest strengths is his ability to work in highly-subversive elements (which manifest in the relationship between quarterback The Rock and his caustic sports agent, played with dry wit by a brilliant Kyra Segdwick) and it's amazing to see how much Andy can get away with in a Disney film.
For the kids, the relationship between The Rock and his newly discovered daughter (another spot-on performance, this time from the precocious-but-not-too-precious Disney TV vet, Madison Pettis) provides loads of physical and verbal comedy, flying at you at a laugh a minute. And there's the expected touching father-daughter bonding, but Andy never lets it get it too sappy. Like I said, the man's the master of tone and timing! And for the adults, the Rock-Kyra relationship provides many double entendres that will safely fly over the heads of most kids, but are relatively edgy for a Disney pic. (NOTE: It'll be really interesting to see Andy's other project currently in pre-production, a remake of one of the classic '70s Disney bizarro masterpieces, Alexander Key's Witch Mountain!)
So all the hype about this being a "film for the whole family" is fully warranted! Once again, director Andy Fickman has delivered another masterwork - one that will keep both kids and parents entertained, enthralling the former and often titillating the latter with some wickedly subversive comedy.
The Game Plan truly is a film for the whole family to enjoy! If you take your kids to only one movie this year, The Game Plan, for my money, is hands down (or should I say, "touch down!") the one to beat!
THE GAME PLAN opens Friday, September 28 ~ and I could not recommend it any more highly!
Sit back with your family and enjoy!
Check out this video: The Game Plan Trailer
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AND THIS YEAR's TV SEASON HAS THREE POTENTIAL NEW "MUST SEE"s FOR MY MONEY: the second season of Heroes - After the compelling storytelling of Season One, this is also the next career highlight (along with providing voice-over for literary adaptations ranging from Flatland the Movie to Gossip Girl the CW show) for the uber-talented Kristen Bell; the ultra-dark reinvention of THE BIONIC WOMAN; and the "Thank-goodness-it-looks-more-like T2 than T3!", THE SARAH CONNOR CHRONICLES (which, incidentally, is set shortly after T2. Alas, no Lindsay Wagner or Linda Hamilton, but I do still think James Bonds got progressively better through Pierce Brosnan...
First and foremost... Heroes!
All I have to say are the following: A brilliant concept by creator Tim Kring, the presence of Graphic Novel Gods Tim Sale & Jeph Loeb, an incredible ensemble cast and writing team, Um... Season One? Now on DVD! Wow! The aforementioned boundlessly-gifted Kristen Bell. And this pretty much says the rest...
HEROES, SEASON 2 STARTS MONDAY, SEPT. 24 @ 9 PM on NBC...
Heroes Season 2 Trailer
..
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Now to understand why Bionic Woman (also NBC, but on directly opposite Gossip Girl - Okay, who brilliantly planned that??) and The Sarah Connor Chronicles (if it even makes it to FOX) are so important requires some perspective. After this past summer's horrifying "series-cides" of what were the two best live-action shows on TV, VERONICA MARS (one of the most egregious cancellations in history ~ and what MUST be a capital crime for robbing the greatest actress of our generation, Kristen Bell, of her signature role ~ and one of the greatest TV characters ever created!) and that blip on June's radar that was Kevin Williamson's HIDDEN PALMS, fanboys and fangirls the world over await the promise these two programs recently presented at ComicCon...
To paraphrase Homer Simpson, "TV... please don't let me down!" (I feel somewhat cheapened saying that in a world in which the CW's chief executive can issue a statement believing she gave VERONICA MARS a "fair shot" ~ obviously ignoring the Mars bars stockpiling up in front of her door... Hopefully, these two programs can bring real life moral ambiguity to its characters and genuine originality (and not more of the same cookie-cutter regurgitation) back to television.
I mean, if we're going to be distracted by the moral ambiguity and fantastic stories told on the evening news, series television's really going to have to compete. Even V.MARS would have had trouble pulling off one of its rich & powerful elite characters shooting someone in the face and just pretending it didn't happen. Seriously, Veronica would have gotten him dead to rights within the hour, before he could even say, "Just wait until my blood alcohol level goes down before you expect an apology!"
So here's hope for these three bright lights amidst the new season...
THE SARAH CONNOR CHRONICLES: The Sarah Connor Chronicles: Teaser 2

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THE ONE GOOD THING IS THAT YOU CAN STILL WATCH THE FULL EPISODES OF HIDDEN PALMS ON THE CW's WEBSITE ~ CATCH THE GOOD ONES WHILE YOU CAN! THEY DON'T SEEM TO STICK AROUND MUCH ANYMORE...
AND, HEY, CW... WHAT HAPPENED TO HAVING FAITH IN A BELOVED SHOW ~ AND BACKING IT BASED ON ITS MERITS AND POTENTIAL FOR LONGEVITY...
*** AND A NOTE TO LIONS' GATE ON THE HIDDEN PALMS BOX SET: PLEASE, OH PLEASE RELEASE THE COMPLETE SEASON OF HIDDEN PALMS (INCLUDING THE UNAIRED EPISODES) FOR THOSE OF US WHO WERE WELL ON OUR WAY TO BECOMING DIE-HARD FANS...
*** AND ON THE SAME NOTE TO WARNER BROS: HOW WONDERFUL IT WOULD BE TO SEE THAT "5 YEARS LATER FBI AGENT" ALTERNATE PILOT ON THE VERONICA MARS, SEASON 3 BOX SET...
******AND! ~ IF YOU NEED ANYONE TO START WORK ON VERONICA MARS: THE MOTION PICTURE BEFORE THE CAST ALL SCATTERS TO NEW PROJECTS AND YOU LOSE YOUR CORE AUDIENCE... I'M RIGHT HERE ~ WILLING, ABLE & PASSIONATE ABOUT THIS SHOW - AND THESE CHARACTERS!
CHECK MY RESUME ~ SERIOUSLY! ROB THOMAS IS ALREADY BUSY WITH HIS NEW SHOW ANYWAY... AND IT WOULD BE THE LEAST YOU COULD DO AFTER KILLING THE TWO BEST LIVE ACTION SHOWS ON TV WITHIN A MONTH OF EACH OTHER!
AND - SPEAKING OF THE DIVINE KRISTEN BELL (AND WHEN ISN'T A GOOD TIME TO DISCUSS THE DELIGHTFUL K-BELL?) - THIS IS WHY YOU MOST DEFINITELY WANT TO CONTINUE MARKING TUESDAY NIGHTS @ 9:00 PM ON THE CW PROMINENTLY ON YOUR CALENDAR UNTIL VERONICA IS TRAMPLED BY... GET THIS ~ BEAUTY & THE GEEK! [Insert Cruel Irony Joke Here!]...!
AFTER THE FINAL NIGHT'S DOWNER ENDING TO ANOTHER FANTASTIC SEASON, IT WOULD BE A TRAGIC SHAME TO LEAVE POOR VERONICA OUT IN THE COLD RAIN (WHICH - SINCE THE SHOW's OFFICIALLY BEEN CANCELLED - WILL BE THE LAST PLACE WE'LL HAVE SEEN HER)! ;~{

THE SESON THREE BOX SET GOES ON SALE TUESDAY, OCTOBER 24, SO YOU CAN HAVE WHAT MAY BE YOUR LAST CHANCE TO CATCH ONE OF THE SINGLE GREATEST PROGRAMS TO EVER CROSS TELEVISION SCREENS ~ ITS LIFE CRUELLY CUT SHORT IN ITS PRIME! LET'S SEE... WHAT OTHER INSIGNIFICANT SERIES WAS CANCELLED IN ITS PRIME, DESPITE ITS POTENTIAL AND RABID FANBASE...? WHAT WAS THAT CALLED AGAIN? OH, YEAH... STAR TREK! WISE CHOICE TO HAVE CANCELLED THAT FRANCHISE ~ IT NEVER WOULD HAVE AMOUNTED TO ANYTHING, AS EVIDENCED BY THAT RABID AND EXTRAORDINARILY ACTIVE FANBASE...
AND ~ FOR THAT MATTER ~ WHY DOESN'T KRISTEN BELL ALREADY HAVE TWO EMMYS AND WHY ISN'T SHE UP FOR HER THIRD VICTORY THIS YEAR...? (BUT THAT'S ANOTHER WHOLE BLOG ENTIRELY...!)
***(AND ~ AS I MENTIONED UNDER MY HIDDEN PALMS TIRADE ABOVE ~ I'M AVAILABLE FOR PRE-PRODUCTION ON VERONICA MARS: THE MOTION PICTURE IF ROB THOMAS IS BUSY ON HIS NEW SHOW AND BEFORE YOUR PEERLESS ENSEMBLE CAST SCATTERS TO VARIOUS NEW COMMITMENTS AND VMARS' DIE-HARD FANBASE TURNS COMPLETELY TO CULT STATUS...
(AND MEMO TO DC COMICS ~ AS MUCH AS I LOVE COMIC BOOKS, THEY AREN'T GOING TO FEATURE THAT OUTSTANDING CAST, NOW ARE THEY...?)
VERONICA MARS ~ ONE OF THE SINGLE GREATEST SHOWS OF ALL TIME... R.I.P....
...FOR NOW!
AND ONE LAST NOTE ON THE DELIGHTFUL K-BELL...
THE EXPANDED TRAILER FOR THE EAGERLY-AWAITED FANBOYS ~ HER HYSTERICAL-LOOKING STAR WARS SPOOF (OR, TO PARAPHRASE KRISTEN's WORDS, "A VALENTINE FOR FANBOYS AND FANGIRLS EVERYWHERE") WAS PREMIERED AT STAR WARS CELEBRATION IV IN L.A. OVER MEMORIAL DAY WEEKEND!
THOUGH THE FILM NOW HAS A JANUARY 18, 2008 RELEASE DATE, THIS PREMIERE OF THE NEW CLIP DEFINITELY MAKES IT SEEM WELL WORTH THE WAIT...! (ONE OF THE MOST CLEVERLY ORIGINAL MOVIES OF 2008...?)
**NEW FANBOYS TRAILER AT STAR WARS CELEBRATION IV**:
AND BY THE WAY ~ IF YOU HAVEN'T SEEN THIS YET ~ THIS IS WHAT NEXT SUMMER'S ALL ABOUT...
DIRECTOR CHRISTOPHER NOLAN, WRITER DAVID S. GOYER & STAR CHRISTIAN BALE ARE ALL BACK FOR THE RIDE...!
THE DARK KNIGHT ~ COMING JULY 18, 2008! The Dark Knight Trailer

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My Interests

***Music.
***Film.
***Theatre (Especially musical theatre or anything even close to resembling Rock Opera!).
***Television that isn't cookie-cutter-made.
***Science Fiction & related niche genres, such as Horror & Supernatural Thrillers (for both the storytelling and the concepts raised).
***Seeing strong, smart, independent female leads steering a narrative. (There still aren't nearly enough and they're usually far more interesting and complex characters, for my money!)
***Exploring and talking about "what all of this means." (I really don't intend for that to come across as pretentiously as it sounds ;~} - BUT isn't that what most of us are actually accomplishing through most everything we do?)
***Graphic Novels
(AKA "Comic Books for mature readers," prior to "Comic Book" becoming a negative connotation); Personally, I find Rock Opera and Graphic Novels to be two unique media through which artists can explore concepts at a level unreachable by other artforms.
***Exploring spirituality and different states of being.
***Traveling and discovering new places, cultures, ideas and philosophies.
***Trying new things and experiences in general. (I think director Jim Brooks said it best: "I'll Do Anything" - albeit perhaps qualified with the word, "once"... and I do wish he would release a version of that film with the Prince songs in that movie!)
***Continually keeping an open mind while striving to live a good life and to leave the people and world around me better for the experience.
In essence, all this boils down to two basic (and trying-not-to-be-too-cliche!) arenas:
~~Art & Pop Culture - and if there is any difference between the two, just who exactly gets to make that choice? - and open-mindedly exploring the ways each medium can be used to express the human condition; and;
~~Discovering new experiences, meeting new people and genuinely connecting with them! - coinciding with the endless pursuit of life, love and the meaning of it all.
Come to think of it, Happiness would be a really nice thing to find someday too, though I think it's actually more a process than a result...

Actually, this video sums up my background, interests, shared sense of humor and heroes (well, "heroine," I guess, is more appropriate in this case) rather nicely... ;~)

AND AN EXTREMELY WORTHY CAUSE I HIGHLY RECOMMEND SUPPORTING, HOWEVER YOU CAN...

Find out what YOU can do to help!

And, frankly, this is just fun to look at ~ actually, looking at these Dali masterpieces in rapid succession like this is kinda unnerving... but still fun anyway!

I'd like to meet:

(I'm assuming this question usually allows for including dead people too - and a lot of these are naturally going to be in my favorite artists and heroes categories as well, so...)
John Lennon, Jesus, Al Pacino, Prince, Alanis Morissette, Leonard Cohen, three phenomenally daring actresses: Reese Witherspoon, Ellen Page & Kristen Bell (not only is the latter the morally-complex "Veronica Mars," but also the star of the Top Two Films I saw last past year - Reefer Madness: The Movie Musical [And, yes, I know! - technically, it was released the year before, but the DVD really didn't hit till the very end of the year...] and the wildly visionary apocalyptic nightmare, Pulse -- K-Bell is one incredible actress with astonishing range, talent to spare, impeccable taste in projects and unbelievable potential - in my opinion, the most daring and exiting actress to emerge since the about-time!-Oscar-winning Ms. Witherspoon's star turn 15 years ago in The Man in the Moon!), Andrew Lloyd Webber, Tim Rice, Harold Prince, Cameron MacKintosh, David Geffen, Robert Stigwood, Jon Landau, Stephen Colbert, Mario Kassar & Andrew Vajna, Buzz Feitshans, Joseph Papp, Andy Fickman (one of the most ingenious - and definitely funniest - directors to ever successfully transition from stage to screen, steering the endlessly entertaining and subversive Reefer Madness musical, as well as restoring genuine wit <[i>She's the Man] and pure gleefully-unadulterated, prime Porky's-grade raunch <[i>Who's Your Daddy?] to contemporary teen comedies), Christine Lakin, Robert Torti, Kristen Chenoweth, Kevin Williamson (hands down, one of our greatest screenwriters, on the basis of the Scream trilogy, Dawson's Creek and The Faculty alone!), Wes Craven (ditto, one of our greatest directors), Bill Maher, Laura Linney, Seth MacFarlane, St. Paul the Apostle (arguably the greatest writer ever in any language!), Eminem, Agatha Christie, Jean-Paul Sartre, Walt Disney, Steven Hunter Flick, Emma Watson, Elisha Cuthbert, Bob Saget, Jeff Foxworthy, Ron White, Sarah Michelle Gellar, Freddie Prinze, Jr., Taye Diggs, Timothy Olyphant, Christine Baranski, Ryan Phillippe, Jessica Alba, Hannah Spearritt, Kristen Stewart, Colleen (Vitamin C) Fitzpatrick, Gary Sinise, John Whynot, Greg Berlanti, Neale Donald Walsch, Martin Luther, MLK, Robert DeNiro, Thomas Edison, Thomas Aquinas, Albert Einstein, Albert Hofmann, Dr. Dre., Trevor Horn, Malcolm McLaren, Claire Danes, Aaron Sorkin, Allison Janney, David Thewlis, Lee Curreri, Clive Owen, Wesley Snipes, Dan Mintz (director of one of the ultimate puzzle films, American Crime [2004]), Kurtwood Smith, Patrick Wilson, David Koepp, Pierce Brosnan, Ehren Kruger, Baz Luhrmann, Jim Broadbent, Richard Roxburgh, Harold Zidler (if he was anything like Jim Broadbent's portrayal in Moulin Rouge!), Bill Murray, Kelly Ripa, Bob Dylan, Joan Baez, Chuck D, Christopher Nolan, David S. Goyer, William F. Nolan, Buddha, Katherine Heigl, Hugh Jackman, Nicolas Cage, James Garner, Sam Mendes, Alan Ball, Bonnie Tyler, Roger Kumble, Wayne Beach (brilliant screenwriter of Murder at 1600 and The Art of War), Leigh Whannell, Tobin Bell (whose Jigsaw is easily one of the most fascinatingly complex screen characters in recent memory!), Rachel McAdams, Amanda Petersen, William Petersen, Leelee Sobieski, Dennis Miller, Chris Rock, Mahatma Gandhi, Rufus Wainwright, Lee Majors, Lindsay Wagner, Richard A. Anderson, Rob Thomas (both the writer and the singer, actually), Jason Dohring, Steve Buscemi, Amanda Bynes, Melissa Michaelsen, Joel Silver, Jerry Bruckheimer, Joss Whedon, Joshua Jackson, Mandy Moore, Nora Zehetner, Theo Avgerinos, Matthew Perniciaro, J.J. Abrams, Nectar Rose, Magaret Langrick, Maury Chaykin and as many other nice people as I possibly can!

Actually, perfectly encapsulated in the words of my favorite songwriter (Each of Alanis Morissette's albums have always spoken directly to wherever I am at every point in my life so far... which is always comforting):
"All I really want is a soulmate... Someone else to catch this drift... What I wouldn't give to meet a kindred..."
'Nuff said...!
(paraphrased from "All I Really Want" by Alanis)

AND HERE'S ONE MORE DEFINITE "MUST SEE" YOU WON'T WANT TO MISS ~ !:

...THE THIRD TIME'S THE KICK-ASS CHARM IN THIS RELIABLY ENTERTAINING SCIENCE FICTION MYTHOLOGY FRANCHISE...

~ AND COMING ON THE HEELS OF HER AWESOME GRAPHIC NOVEL VISUAL FEAST FROM LAST YEAR, ULTRAVIOLET, THE VERY IDEA OF THE ULTRA-GYMNASTIC LI'L "LEELOO," MILLA JOVOVICH TAKING ON A POST-DAMNATION ALLEY MEETS THE ROAD WARRIOR VEGAS-STYLE APOCALYPSE...?
SO... WHICH OF THE HUGE SUMMER FRANCHISE CHAPTER 3s TURNS OUT TO BE THE MOST CREATIVELY COMPELLING? ;~)
NOW ~ LET'S GET BUSY WITH PULSE 2 ~ PICKING UP RIGHT WHERE THE FIRST ONE LEFT OFF ~ SO THAT OUR GREATEST NEW MULTI-TALENT, KRISTEN BELL, CAN FINALLY HAVE HER SHOT AT DOING SOMETHING LIKE THIS...? NOW THAT WOULD TRULY ROCK...!


RESIDENT EVIL: EXTINCTION ~ ARMAGGEDON BEGINS FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 21!

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AND IF IT'S COMING UP ON HALLOWE'EN...
I'M NOT SURE WHERE THIS IS GOING TO GO SINCE EVERY MAJOR CHARACTER FROM THE FIRST THREE ENDED UP DEAD BY THE END OF PART III... BUT HASN'T THAT BEEN THE TRUE THRILL OF THE FIRST THREE OF THESE MODERN MORALITY PLAYS... (MALIGNED AS "TORTURE PORN," WHICH IS TO DISMISS THE FACT THAT THE ACTUAL VIOLENCE IS MINIMAL IN SCREEN TIME ~ IT'S THE DENSELY LAYERED CHARACTERIZATIONS, STORYTELLING AND ANTICI - PATION THAT TRULY SLAYS IN THESE FILMS!)
AND, ALAS, THIS OUTING IS THE FIRST TIME THAT SERIES CREATORS LEE WHANNELL & JAMES WAN HAVE NOT WRITTEN THE SCRIPT...
BUT THE BRILLIANT DARREN LYNN BOUSMAN (WHO HELMED THE LAST TWO) IS BACK AND SO (PRESUMABLY VIA FLASHBACK) ARE THE REALLY TERRIFYING "AMANDA" (SHAWNEE SMITH) AND THE TERRIFYINGLY REAL "JIGSAW" (TOBIN BELL IN THE COMPLEX AND LEGENDARY ROLE THAT ONLY COMES ONCE IN A LIFETIME). AND SO... I GUESS I'M THERE TOO...!

IF IT'S HALLOWE'EN TIME... WELL, YOU KNOW... OPENS FRIDAY, OCT. 26 EVERYWHERE...

Music:

I literally love and admire things about every single genre and style of music, though I will confess an irresistible sweet tooth for catchy pop hooks married with brilliant lyrics, cutting-edge experimentalism - and pretty much everything in-between. [...Did I happen to mention that my parents put an AM radio in my crib when I but a wee young 'un...?]
;~}
However... if pressed to make this artistic equivalent of "Sophie's Choice" - and being an unabashed child of the New Wave - my all-time favorites would have to be:
Blue Rodeo, Prince (& his entire Paisley Park ensemble: The Revolution, The Time, Wendy & Lisa, Mazarati, The Family, Vanity/Apollonia 6, Jill Jones, Madhouse, The NPG, etc., etc.), Jim Steinman, Alanis Morissette, U2, Pet Shop Boys, Red Box, Kristen Bell, Pink Floyd, Martin Briley, Andrew Lloyd Webber, Sarah Brightman, Amy Lee & Evanescence, Ben Moody, Tim Rice, Bob Wiseman, Underworld (esp. pre-electronica '80s incarnation!), Amy Spanger, Charlotte Church, Becky Taylor, Emmy Rossum, James Reyne & Australian Crawl, Mike Patton, Jane Child, Meat Loaf, Bonnie Tyler, Pandora's Box, Leonard Cohen, Gavin Friday, Associates/Billy MacKenzie, Renaissance & Annie Haslam, Suede, Rob Cavallo, Glen Ballard, Alan Parsons Project, Barry Gibb, George Michael, Pat Benatar, Gordon Lightfoot, The Sherman Brothers (esp. Disney musicals), The Waltons {'90s Canadian band}, Kate Bush, Peter Gabriel, Jimmy Jam & Terry Lewis, Janet Jackson (esp. Control & Rhythm Nation 1814), L.A. & Babyface, Radiohead, Eminem, Alan Menken & Howard Ashman, Kevin Murphy & Dan Studney, Richard O'Brien, Tori Amos, Ian & Sylvia, Public Enemy, The Judds, David Gates & Bread, Lee Curreri, Miles Davis, Midnight Oil, NWA, BWP, LL Cool J, Kool Moe Dee, KLF, Brilliant & Youth, Bob Ezrin, Alice Cooper, Tim Curry, 2Pac, Film Score composers (esp. Elfman, Horner, Barry, Zimmer, Dudley, Beltrami, Williams, Goldsmith, Poledouris, Shore, Young, Morricone, Newton Howard, Conti, Shearmur, Clouser, Trevor Rabin, John Scott, Nathan Wang & David Manning), Roxy Music, Ultravox, Daniel Lanois, Flood, Wagner, Grieg, Albinoni, Aldo Nova, Talking Heads & David Byrne, Canadian Pop Music (esp. '70s, '80s and '90s!), Alphaville, Sisters of Mercy, Jacques Brel, Asia (--their first two albums - Wow!), Beck, The Adventures, Paul Oakenfold, Manic Street Preachers, Todd Rundgren, Nick Cave, Rufus Wainwright, Sonic Youth (esp. the Ciccone Youth Whitey Album), Jonathan Larson, Twisted Sister, Frost, Giorgio Moroder, Puccini, Arnold Lanni, The Cars, Platinum Blonde, DAFP, Foetus, Dead Kennedys, Men Without Hats, Strange Advance, Classix Nouveaux, Duran Duran, The Choir, Nellee Hooper, Marius DeVries, Craig Armstrong, Baz Luhrmann, David Arnold, Korn, Gregg Alexander, Danielle Brisebois, Shaun Cassidy [if the pop stuff's not quite to your liking, definitely check out his brutally-underrated, Rundgren-produced 1980 Wasp LP!], Max Martin, Britney Spears, Mandy Moore, Real Life, Strange Advance, Chaz Jankel, BMD, R.E.M., Vitamin C, Pork Dukes, Pigbag, Mac Davis, Wayne Newton, Cibo Matto, Bjork, Scarlet ('90s UK 2-girl group), Sherbet, Daryl Braithwaite, Karen Finley, Skyhooks, Stephanie Dosen, Asobi Seksu, Liza Minnelli, Elton John & Bernie Taupin, Fleetwood Mac, Patsy Kensit & Eighth Wonder, Bolland (esp. The Domino Theory!), Our Lady Peace, Chantal Kreviazuk, Barbra Streisand, Kris Kristofferson, Paul Williams, Kenny Ascher, Quincy Jones, The Tears, The Wreckers, Mike Chapman, Nikki Chinn, Holly Knight, Keith Forsey, Giorgio Moroder, Blondie, Simple Minds, Brian Wilson, The Beach Boys, Alta Dustin, Cypress Hill, Wayne Newton, Olivia Newton-John, Deborah Gibson, Ana [AKA "Mia" Rogriguez ~ Whatever happened to her??], NKOTB, Maurice Starr, Freddie Perren {Why have Freddie's film, Record City, and its phenomenal soundtrack completely disappeared??), David Motion, Phill Brown, SPA, Tommy Page, Jules Shear, 'Til Tuesday, Tina B, Arthur Baker, John Robie, Ish, Oxo, Latin Dance (esp. Tango) Music, Matthew Fisher [his solo albums even more than his work with Procol Harum], Mercury Rev, Life Sex & Death [with Stanley ~ Now whatever happened to him??], Spookey Ruben, Sixteen Horsepower, Fabulon, "Spelling on the Stone" (Curb, 1989); Dayglo Abortions, Karyn Rachtman, Bob Badami, Kathy Nelson, Tom Teeley, Metallica (esp. everything up to The Black Album & S&M - perhaps the world's first "metal-opera"??), '80s New Wave (if you hadn't already guessed as much) and - pretty much a given - John Lennon & The Beatles.
***I'm sorry to have had to leave out so many people due to space... My unbridled passion for all of the artists that have m,oved me could fill books just in trying to answer these questions completely....!

NOW, FOR MY MONEY, THE VIDEO DIRECTLY BELOW IS BOTH JUST PLAIN FUNNY ~ AND WICKEDLY CLEVER IN ALL ITS META-SATIRICAL LEVELS...!
(N.B. BE SURE NOT TO MISS ALANIS' PIMPED-OUT BACKUP DANCERS' HYSTERICALLY-MYSTIFIED EXPRESSIONS AFTER SHE SINGS,
"YOU DON'T WANT NO DRAMA..."
AND THE VIDEO ABRUPTLY TAKES ON CLASSIC! ALANIS FASHION...!)
;~}

DESERT ISLAND DISCS:
1) Purple Rain - Prince and the Revolution (a perfect album that encapsulates a remarkable time in music history, while remaining as timeless as the day it was born!)
2) The Wall - Pink Floyd (proof positive of the vast scope of the Rock Operatic canvas - and, with the the right visionary at the helm, of its ability to delve into powerful concepts in a way no other art form can)
3) The Circle & The Square - Red Box (for my money, the most beautiful and spiritually-moving album ever made!)
4) Performance (that is, provided someone would finally transfer the DVD of this phenomenal milestone tour onto CD before I get stuck on said desert island!) - otherwise, I'd have to go with... Actually - (both by the) Pet Shop Boys
5) Supposed Former Infatuation Junkie - Alanis Morissette (the best - and most ambitiously daring - sophomore album I've ever heard, fearlessly defying all expectations of superstar artists "playing it safe" in the wake of phenomenal success - which leads directly to...)
6) Achtung Baby - U2 (the beginning of a phenomenally baffling and wildly exciting 10-year stretch for the world's greatest "Superband," including the jaw-dropping Zoo-TV and PopMart tours -- The Joshua Tree II, it's most certainly not!)
7) Super Hits: The Columbia Legacy - Bonnie Tyler (a superlative distillation of the best tracks from Faster than the Speed of Night and Secret Dreams & Forbidden Fire - Until there's a single definitive Jim Steinman collection, this is the next-best thing - with no sleight whatsoever meant to Meat Loaf, without question one of the world's greatest male vocalists!)
8) Tremolo - Blue Rodeo (a hard pick from a phenomenal catalogue of possible choices, but this is decidedly the most challenging and daringly experimental album from Canada's all-time best band! - It also neatly serves as the third in their trilogy of landmark CDs, also including Five Days in July and Nowhere to Here)
9) Mr. Bungle - Mr. Bungle (Mike Patton as produced by John Zorn... What more need be said?)
10) The Beatles (The White Album) - The Beatles

HONORABLE MENTIONS:
Little Earthquakes - Tori Amos; The Hurting - Tears for Fears; Fear of the Unknown - Martin Briley; Forward Your Emotions - One to One; Heartbeat City - The Cars; Original Sin - Pandora's Box, A Song for All Seasons - Renaissance, dogmanstar - Suede; Shag Tobacco - Gavin Friday; OST - Reefer Madness: The Movie Musical (2005) [the greatest thing to hit musical theatre (courtesy of Kevin Murphy & Dan Studney) since Menken & Ashman were let loose in the Disney Cartoon Factory - a brilliant social satire with inspiredly-infectious songs, performed by the perfect cast (featuring the endlessly-talented Kristen Bell) under a visionary director, Andy Fickman!] & OST - A Star Is Born (Streisand & Kristofferson; 1976) [the point at which modern (pop-rock) musical theatre sensibilities finally entered the mainstream as something more than a novelty, paving the way for the whole Jim Steinman|Operock genre, with Evanescence and My Chemical Romance now following faithfully along this hallowed path].

NOT MEANING TO OVERKILL THE ALANIS THING, BUT IT HAS BEEN A REALLY LONG TIME SINCE HER LAST ALBUM OF NEW MATERIAL...!
SO CHECK THIS OUT... AT A RECENT L.A. HOTEL CAFE GIG, ALANIS DOES A COVER OF RAGE's "GUERILLA RADIO" ~ AND, LIKE SHE ALWAYS DOES, THE WOMAN MAKES THE SONG ENTIRELY HER OWN... (Sorry, Rage fanatics. But she does...!)

ESSENTIAL SONGS:
"Total Eclipse of the Heart," "Ravishing" & "Rebel Without A Clue" (Bonnie Tyler), "When Doves Cry," "The Beautiful Ones," "Joy in Repetition" & "Thieves in the Temple" (Prince), "Uninvited," "Joining You," "That Particular Time," "Forgiven" & "21 Things..." (Alanis Morissette), "Bad," "Discotheque/Pop Music," "One" & "Electrical Storm" (U2), "Revolution #9" / "Goodnight" & "Golden Slumbers/Carry That Weight" (The Beatles), "Rent," "Your Funny Uncle," "It's A Sin" & "So Sorry I Said" (Pet Shop Boys), "Tonight Is What It Means to Be Young" & "Nowhere Fast" (Jim Steinman's Fire Inc.), "Billy's Line," "The Power Is Down" & "Now Ask" (Red Box), "Hasn't Hit Me Yet," "Try," "Tired of Pretending" & "Moon & Tree" ["Ear to the Ground" 1993 Version] (Blue Rodeo), "Original Sin" (Pandora's Box), "Surf's Up" & "Bad for Good" (Jim Steinman), "Comfortably Numb," "The Final Cut," "The Trial" & "What Shall We Do Now?" (Pink Floyd), "The Future," "Anthem," "Famous Blue Raincoat" & "A Thousand Kisses Deep" (Leonard Cohen), "Chain Lightning" (Don McLean) - [one of those jaw-dropping songs that makes you wish you'd been smart enough to have come up with it first!], "Land of Sunshine" (Faith No More), "Old and Wise" & "Silence and I" (Alan Parsons Project), "One Step Behind," "Heart of Life" & "Another Rainy Day in NYC" (Martin Briley), "Three Babies" & "Troy" (Sinead O'Connor), "Independent Love Song" (Scarlet), "Pray" & "Moaner" (Underworld), "Thoughtless" (Evanescence's phenomenal Korn cover! - Why exactly was this never released as a single??), "Imaginary" and "Going Under" (all by Evanescence), "Prologue" & "In the Year 2525" (Zager & Evans), "Let's All Chant" (Michael Zager Band), "Letting Go" (Straight Lines), "Gethsemane," "Requiem for Evita," "Close Every Door" & "The Point of No Return" (Andrew Lloyd Webber), "Kindness (At The End)" & "A Song for All Seasons" (Renaissance), "Like A Cloud" (The Choir), "...Baby One More Time" & "Oops...! I Did It Again" [So what if they're the same song? They're still perfect pop confectionaries!] (Britney Spears & Max Martin), "Life Is A Lemon," "Objects in the Rear View Mirror..." & "Bat Out of Hell" (Meat Loaf), "This Corrosion," "Something Fast" & "Dominion/Mother Russia" (Sisters of Mercy), "There Was a Time," "Don't Call It Love" & "Black or White" (One to One), "The Wild Ones," "We Are the Pigs" & "Stay Together" (Suede), "Sugar Water" (Cibo Matto), "Miss Me Blind" & "Victims" (Culture Club); "Mad World" & "Suffer the Children" (Tears for Fears); "Jeanny (Part I)" (Falco & Bolland), "Batman Theme" (Danny Elfman), "Mary's Prayer" (Meet Danny Wilson), "Fantasy" (Aldo Nova), "The Honeythief" (Hipsway), "Rapture" & "Europa" (Blondie), "Back to Life" (Soul II Soul), "Bring the Noise," "Fight the Power" & "Burn Hollywood Burn" (Public Enemy), "Straight Outta Compton" (NWA), "The N**** Ya Love to Hate" (Ice Cube w/ The Bomb Squad), "How to Survive in South Central" (Ice Cube), "Ever Brighter" (The New Mix), "Two Minute Brother" (BWP), "Same Old Lang Syne" (Dan Fogelberg), "Cancao do Mar" (Dulce Folses), "Alsatia's Lullabye" [from Toys] (Trevor Horn & Julia Migenes), "So Many Things" & "You Take My Breath Away" (Sarah Brightman), "Confessional Song" & "Casualty of Love" (Charlotte Church), "Imagine" & "Jealous Guy" (John Lennon), "Tusk" & "Sara" (Fleetwood Mac), "Still" & "Sail On" (Commodores), "You Caught Me Out" & "I Close My Eyes and Count to Ten" (Tracey Ullman), "The Reflex [LP Version]" (Duran Duran), "You Suck" (Consolidated), "Still Loving You" (Scorpions)...
...To Be Continued...But first...

I'D LIKE TO PRESENT MY REMARKABLE FRIEND,
JAYE BARNES LUCKETT AKA POPERRATIC ~
AN EXTRAORDINARILY MULTITALENTED MUSICIAN (AND FELLOW USC FILM SCHOOL ALUMNUS!) WHOSE SONGS ARE AS COMPELLING AND DARINGLY EXPERIMENTAL AS HER FILM SCORE WORK FOR ACCLAIMED CULT MOVIEMAKERS, LUCKY McKEE & ANGELA BETTIS.
TO GIVE YOU A TASTE OF BOTH SIDES OF POPERRATIC, HERE'S A VIDEO OF JAYE ACOUSTICALLY PERFORMING HER CHILLING SONG, "PLUTO," THE INSTRUMENTAL PORTION OF WHICH DOUBLES AS THE THEME FROM ONE OF THE YEAR'S ABSOLUTE BEST FILMS, ROMAN.
[THERE'S A RAVE REVIEW OF ROMAN (2007) UP IN MY ARCHIVED POSTS, IF YOU'RE INTERESTED ~ IT'S A CAPTIVATINGLY CLEVER & HYPNOTIC FILM, DIRECTED BY ANGELA BETTIS, WRITTEN BY LUCKY McKEE AND STARRING LUCKY, NECTAR ROSE & KRISTEN BELL (WITH YET ANOTHER DARINGLY DARK PERFORMANCE FROM OUR GREATEST ACTRESS ~ THE DIVINE MS. K-BELL ~ WHO, LIKE DEBUTING DIRECTOR ANGELA BETTIS, IS ALSO AN ESTEEMED ALUM OF THE SMASH 2002 BROADWAY REVIVAL OF THE CRUCIBLE WITH LAURA LINNEY.]
THE REAL FABRIC THAT HOLDS ROMAN TOGETHER AS A UNIQUE FILM EXPERIENCE IS JAYE LUCKETT/POPERRATIC'S HAUNTINGLY BEAUTIFUL SCORE/SOUNDTRACK, ANCHORED BY HER BEAUTIFUL BALLAD, "PLUTO"... WHICH I THINK SPEAKS TO THE GREATNESS OF JAYE'S PEERLESS TALENT MORE THAN WORDS POSSIBLY CAN...
POPERRATIC ~ "PLUTO" (LIVE ACOUSTIC):

ESSENTIAL SONGS, PART II:
"Crosseyed & Painless" & "The Lady Don't Mind" (Talking Heads), "Face to Face" & "Cities in Dust" (Siouxie & the Banshees), "Dancing Barefoot" (Patti Smith), "White Rabbit" (Jefferson Airplane), "Coming Home (Major Tom)" (Peter Schilling), "Human" & "The Sound of the Crowd" (Human League), "Blackened," "Master of Puppets" & "One" (Metallica), "Information" (Dave Edmunds), "Foolin'," "Love Bites" & "Armageddon It" (Def Leppard), "Loving You's a Dirty Job" (Bonnie Tyler & Todd Rundgren), "Smells Like Teen Spirit" (Nirvana and Tori Amos), "Tie Dye on the Highway" & "Big Log" (Robert Plant), "Please Please Please Let Me Get What I Want" (The Smiths and The Dream Academy), "Coming" (Jimmy Somerville, David Motion & Sally Potter), "Fast Car" (Tracy Chapman), "Southern Cross" (CS&N), "Gremlins Rag" (Jerry Goldsmith), "Idiot Stare" (Jesus Jones), "Kashmir" & "Immigrant Song" (Led Zep), "Making Love Out of Nothing at All" (Air Supply & Jim Steinman), "A Fairytale of New York" (Kirsty McColl & The Pogues), "All of My Life" (Midnight), "Jamie" (Footloose), "Edge of Sundown" (Danny Joe Brown & the Danny Joe Brown Band), "Father Figure" & "Careless Whisper" (George Michael), "A Criminal Mind" (Gowan), "The Honeythief" (Hipsway), "Slow Dancing in the Big City ('The Ovation')" (Bill Conti), "Borderline" & "Satin Green Shutters" (Chris de Burgh), "Tower of Strength" (The Mission UK), "The Mercy Seat" (Nick Cave), "The Flesh Failures/Let the Sunshine In" (from Hair), "Back in Black (AC/DC), "Green Mind" (Dink), "Angels/Losing/Sleep" (OLP), "Surrounded" (Chantal Kreviazuk), "The Reflex" & "Union of the Snake" (Duran Duran), "Bohemian Rhapsody" (Queen), "Movin' On" & "Slicksville" (BMD/ Brothermandude), "Wind Him Up" & "How Do I Look?" (Saga), "Dancing with Tears in My Eyes" & "Hymn" (Ultravox), "Round, Round We Go" (Trooper), "Psychopomp" (The Tea Party), "They Say It's Gonna Rain" (Hazell Dean & Stock-Aitken-Waterman), "Wrapped Around Your Finger" (The Police), "Every Word" (Rudy Davis), "Just Once" (Quincy Jones w/ James Ingram), "Walking on Thin Ice" (Yoko Ono & John Lennon), "Poison," "The Ballad of Dwight Frye" & "Might As Well Be on Mars" (Alice Cooper), "The Rhythm Divine," "Kites," "Club Country" & "Breakfast" (Associates), "Little Earthquakes," "Hotel," "Winter" & "Jackie's Strength" (Tori Amos), "Yes" (McAlmont & Butler), "Sad Lady" (Morningstar ~ '70s Columbia Records band), "She Bop" & "All Through the Night" (Cyndi Lauper), "J for Jules" ('Til Tuesday), "Ain't Nothing Goin' on but the Rent" (Gwen Guthrie), "Little Baby Nothing" & "A Design for Life" (Manic Street Preachers), "Boys of Autumn" (David Roberts), "Just an Illusion" (Imagination), "Paid in Full" (Eric B & Rakim), "Trans-Europe Express" (Kraftwerk), "Halo" & "A Question of Lust" (Depeche Mode), "You Suck" (Consolidated), "The Sun Always Shines on TV," "Hunting High and Low" & "Manhattan Skyline" (A-ha), "Libby" (Carly Simon), "Last Train to St. Tropez" (David Gates), "Remember When (Beverly's Song)" (Mac Davis, "Years from Now" & "A Little Bit More (Dr. Hook), "Welcome to the Real World," "You, Bluebird" & "Ramona, My Love" (Jane Child), "For A Million" and "Sounds Like A Melody" (Alphaville), "Catch Me I'm Falling [Original LP Version] (Real Life), "Saturdays in Silesia" (Rational Youth), "Violet" (Hole/Kurt Cobain), "Zero" (Smashing Pumpkins), "Navras" [from The Matrix Revolutions] (Don Davis vs. Juno Reactor, "Killer" & "Kiss from a Rose" (Seal), "Two Tribes" & "Welcome to the Pleasuredome" (FGTH), "All of My Heart" (ABC & Anne Dudley), "Paranoimia" [Video Version] (Art of Noise w/ Max Headroom), "Without You" (Beware of the Boo), "Mind Games" (Ostrich Head), "Sexuality" (Natalia), "Thursday" (Asobi Seksu), "Got to Tell Me Something" (Ana), "Hyperactive" (Thomas Dolby), "The Gift of Love" (Bette Midler), "A New Day Dawns" (Pasadena Tabernacle Songsters), "Elsie" (Divinyls), "Journey's End" (Matthew Fisher), "The Friends of Mr. Cairo" (Jon & Vangelis), "Smile & Wave" (Headstones), "Rose" (James Horner & Sissel), "The Game Is Over" (John Denver), "Best I Ever Had (Grey Sky Morning)" (Vertical Horizon), "Both Sides Now" (Joni Mitchell), "You Spin Me Round [Murder Mix]" (Dead or Alive) and "Bulworth Breakdown" (Warren Beatty's brilliant, slightly-left-of-socialist rap from Bulworth).

CURRENTLY LISTENING TO:
Prince - Planet Earth; Serena Ryder - If Your Memory Serves You Well; Blondie - Autoamerican [Remastered]; Mandy Moore - Wild Hope; the HAIRSPRAY movie soundtrack!; Melee - Devils & Angels; Rufus Wainwright - Release the Stars (executive produced by Pet Shop Boy Neil Tennant!), Yakova - S/T EP; Cara-C - Starchild; Art of Chaos - Lucid EP, both Moulin Rouge original soundtrack volumes (They just never get old, do they?), the SPIN / MYSPACE Smashing Pumpkins Tribute CD (Gliss' "Rhinoceros" rocks! ~ but why no cover of SP's masterpiece, "Zero"??), Brett Anderson - Brett Anderson, the latest side projects from Blue Rodeo's Greg Keelor and (the recent-Juno Award-winning) Jim Cuddy Band, Alan Parsons Project - Eye in the Sky (25th Anniversary Edition), Lily Allen - Alright, Still..., Amy Winehouse - Back to Black, Alta Dustin - Dychology 101, Tori Amos - American Doll Posse, Beware of the Boo - "Without You," Ostrich Head - "Mind Games", Poperratic - Vagus (The Wandering Nerve), Jaye Barnes Luckett - MAY and Other Selected Works (finally containing some of Jaye's remarkable soundtrack work for Roman (2007) - one of this year's best films! - and The Woods ~ Priceless!), Caroline - Venner, the 10th Anniversary expanded soundtrack for William Shakespeare's Romeo+Juliet (the world's first rap-opera?), the soundtrack to Leonard Cohen: I'm Your Man, My Chemical Romance (& Rob Cavallo) - The Black Parade (a near-perfect album!), Jon Mullane - The Source (the kind of irrisistibly catchy record they don't make any more - for true music lovers of all ages!), Jane Child - Surge and Surge Remixed, BMD's Brothermandude (feat. "Moving On" and "Slicksville" - easily two of 2006's best songs!), Evanescence's The Open Door & Anywhere But Home (probably the best live concert package ever assembled), Meat Loaf - Bat Out of Hell III, Pet Shop Boys' Fundamental (their best work since 1990's haunting Behavior), Eminem presents The Re-Up, The Sadies - In Concert, Vol. I, Andrew Lloyd Webber's Phantom of the Opera film soundtrack (two years later, it's still a beautifully luscious recording of a truly great piece), Kathleen Edwards - Back to Me, Elia Cmiral's brilliantly minimalist score from Pulse, a whole bunch of Reggaeton (Bimbo, Cheka, LDA), George & Giles Martin's Cirque-inspired Beatles Love mash-up, Blue Rodeo - Are You Ready?, Lindsay Lohan - A Little More Personal (RAW), Martin Briley - The Mercury Years (finally!), David Marx - Jesus Was A Socialist, Sarah Kelly - Where the Past Meets Today, Duncan Sheik's intriguing new musical: Spring Awakening, Alexa Ray Joel - Sketches, Keane, Muse, soundtracks to Shock Treatment, She's the Man, Jim Steinman & MTV's Wuthering Heights. Christina Milian. Anna Nalick. Jem. Collin Herring. Michael Mangia. Delays. Rammstein. Justin Rutledge. V.K. Lynne. Noam Weinstein. Kurt Reifler. David T. Carter. Chris Velouris. Isis. Red Star Romance. Natasha Bedingfield - and just about anything else that catches my ear.

HOTLY ANTICIPATING:
Jim Steinman's The Dream Engine's debut release, Bazil Donovan and Emmy Rossum's eagerly-awaited solo debuts, any new musical by Kevin Murphy & Dan Studney, Collin Herring's upcoming third CD and new full-length albums from Blue Rodeo, Red Box, Plenty, Gavin Friday, Alta Dustin, Jane Child, Natalia (featuring the awesome, "Sexuality") and Alanis (whose brilliant "My Humps" was a very kind "hold-me-over" till then...!)

Movies:

To start with: The absolute BEST musical (and the most brilliantly subversive, non-stop entertaining, endlessly watchable film, for that matter!) that I've seen in recent memory...
(And in case anyone was wondering, my "MySpace profile page address" (childhoodsback) is actually lifted from a lyric in this show. To paraphrase the great Bono paraphrasing other people, "All artists steal. Great artists steal from greater artists.")
Reefer Madness: The Movie Musical:
And... my other favorite film of last year - which, in true Gemini / Ying & Yang / Duality of Man kinda fashion - showcases the other aspects of life and art that excite me. This criminally-underappreciated Wes Craven reinvention of Kiyoshi Kurosawa's Pulse (It is just so incredibly much more than any of the other recent J-horror straight remakes - I'd love to make a sequel!) tapped into the exact type of supernatural-spiritual-science-fiction-horror-psycho-drama which I absolutely love to wrap my mind around!
And as if that wasn't far enough up my alley, it also features a kick-ass leading heroine! (See my "Interests" section above) ~ and she just happens to currently be my favorite actress and all-around cool human being, Kristen Bell...
As you may have figured from the Music section, I usually find something to like, appreciate or admire in literally every aspect and area of life, art and entertainment... so kindly forgive the number of people and works I felt compelled to acknowledge as major influences in my life. (And, as you've also probably guessed, I'm a writer by trade and greatly enjoy composing things that are both entertaining to read, while also giving you as much info as possible.)
So I guess if you've read this far, you're actually interested in the works and people that have largely shaped who I am (or, I see my reflection in them, depending on your perspective), as well as having influenced my own work.
My hope is that these lists will provide a hint of my eclecticly diverse (or "utterly whacked," depending on your perspective) tastes, as well as my enthusiasm & passion for the people and things I really love...
I hope my offering some rather unorthodox choices speaks to others out there... and I heartily welcome any reactions (OR "Are you serious??"-es) you'd like to share with me. These ARE meant as great conversation-starters, aren't they...?
I have to confess I found filling this field to be by far the most challenging. How do you collect the unwieldy mass of spectacular cinematic achievements, personal faves, guilty pleasures and films that simply captured your life at that particular time and you felt spoke directly to you? And then how do you best present why these certain artists and films excite you, no matter popular or critical opinion? Artists that keep us returning to the cinema over and over, so great our faith in their works.
Having been a film buff (okay, more accurately: a die-hard fanboy) ever since being ceremoniously taken to experience MARY POPPINS at the highly-impressionable age of 2 - and then to the life-defining STAR WARS (Yes, George Lucas is the reason I (like many) moved down here 20 years ago to attend USC's Cinema School, Mr. Lucas' alma mater) - the movie theater has often been my private little church. The place where - if you will - God often speaks to me, makes me think and makes me laugh ~ as it's usually the only way to stay sane with the cinematic prism to make some of life’s harsher rays more palatable.
Anywho... I've figured out a way that will hopefully convey not just whom and what I admire, but the overall pattern of why that makes this bizarre range of filmmakers and films that have inspired my fervent devotion. Moreover, these are meant as conversation starters. They are my personal tastes and nothing more; please feel free to ask me what I was thinking when I made these choices ~ truth be told, I'd gladly welcome the debate…!
First of all, here are some of the filmmakers whose works speak to me at inexplicably deep levels and on a very consistent basis. The only way I could possibly make sense of this odd canon (given space limitations) was to limit myself to the "Top 10 Lists" I’ve been making since before I was even 10!
[Vaguely humorous sidebar: The turn of the millennium was a pretty rough time for me, movie-wise: Following a deluge of compaisons to John Cusack's sad-sack obsessive record-collecting spongebrain in High Fidelity, things managed to die down just long enough for Almost Famous to render me the brunt of a whole new set of endless jokes about the fledgling rock journalist and his mother who keeps deluding herself that being a "fanboy" is just another adolescent phase. Fanboyism respects no boundaries - sex, age, race - and fanboys and girls born into families that don't "get it" and never will are advised to start making really good friends who not only accept you for everything you are, but also accept everything that you're not.]
So, my deepest apologies to so many talented people whose work I love but whom I couldn't fit on these limited lists. I also listed "hyphenate filmmakers" (i.e. James L. Brooks, Michael Douglas, Robert Rodriguez) in only one categorgy - for space reasons - even though it's often that very "hyphenate" role they play in their films which I admire so much. Anyway, these are my All Time Top Fave "above the line" (for space reasons only again) cinematic talents that could film the phone book and still find me first in line at the midnight preview screening...!
TOP DIRECTORS: Paul Verhoeven, Tim Burton, John McTiernan, Peter Jackson, Wes Craven, Alan Parker, Warren Beatty, Robert Rodriguez, Sam Raimi, Mike Newell, Baz Luhrmann, Andy Fickman, John Duigan, Peter Hyams, Robert Altman, Orson Welles, John Carpenter, John Woo, Dwight Little, P.J. Hogan, Michael Bay, Renny Harlin, Dan Mintz, Norman Jewison, Christopher Nolan, David Cronenberg, Denys Arcand, Stephen Sommers, Luc Besson, Sam Mendes, Sydney Pollack, Sidney Lumet, William Girdler, Robert Stevenson, Michael Anderson, Alfred Hitchcock, Luis Bunuel, Albert Magnoli, Doug Liman, George Pan Cosmatos, Jeannot Szwarc, Kevin Reynolds, Gregory Hoblit, Mark L. Lester, Tom Tykwer, Simon Wincer, Stuart Gordon, Christian Duguay, Julie Taymor, Geoff Murphy, Rocky Morton & Annabel Jankel {Please make more movies, you two!}.
TOP ACTRESSES: {tie} ~ Kristen Bell & Reese Witherspoon, Ashley Judd, Michelle Pfeiffer, Natalie Portman, Neve Campbell, Tara Fitzgerald, Rachel Hurd-Wood, Laura Linney, Ellen Page, Alison Lohmann, Maggie Gyllenhaal, Judi Dench, Mila Kunis, Anne Hathaway, Geena Davis, Helen Mirren, Katie Holmes, Katherine Heigl, Selma Blair, Nicole Kidman, Naomi Watts, Amanda Bynes, Sigourney Weaver, Rachel Leigh Cook, Piper Perabo, Famke Janssen, Franke Potente, Laura Harris, Claire Danes, Rachel McAdams, Robyn Lively, Gretchen Moll, Sarah Michelle Gellar, Jennifer Love Hewitt, Laurie Metcalf, Glenn Close, Jessica Alba, Molly Parker, Penelope Ann Miller, Nikki De Boer, Leelee Sobieski, Sarah Polley, Jeanne Tripplehorn, Mena Suvari, Christine Baranski, Dana Delaney, Swoozie Kurtz, Mary Louise Parker, Annette Bening, Joan Cusack, Emmy Rossum, Hope Davis, Samantha Mathis, Julianne Nicholson, Jacqueline Bisset, Barbra Streisand, Brenda Vaccaro, Maura Tierney, Alfre Woodard, Ali Larter, Hayden Panettiere, Christina Ricci, Clea Duvall, Jordana Brewster, Evan Rachel Wood, Thandie Newton, Meg Ryan <[i>esp. when doing other than rom.coms. - i.e. D.O.A. (1988)!], Audrey Tautou, Kristen Stewart, Anna Friel, Kristen Chenoweth, Michelle Williams, Patsy Kensit, Gabrielle Anwar, Sarah Silverman, Jacinda Barrett, Heather Matarazzo, Miranda Cosgrove, Monica Potter, Angie Harmon, Jordan Hinson.
SADLY "M.I.A.," AS OF LATE: Meredith Salenger, Melissa Joan Hart, Linda Hamilton, Amanda Petersen, Julie Andrews, Linsday Wagner, Barbara Bach, Jenny Agutter, Helen Slater, Heather Menzies, Mary Stuart Masterson, Margaret Langrick, Melissa Michaelsen, Meredith Monroe, Traci Lind (Lin), Marisa Coughlan [Actually, she just resurfaced on Lifetime's new series, Side Order of Life!, Kristy McNichol, Kim Richards and Anna Chlumsky.
TOP ACTORS: Al Pacino, Leonardo DiCaprio, Jeff Bridges, Michael Douglas, Kevin Spacey, Bruce Willis, Alan Rickman, Dennis Quaid, Laurence Olivier, Gene Hackman, Jonathan Pryce, Johnny Depp, Tom Cruise, Edward Norton, Jim Broadbent, Richard Roxburgh, Wesley Snipes, Jon Voight, Sean Penn, Lee Majors, Roger Moore, Pierce Brosnan, Billy Bob Thornton, Antonio Banderas, Armand Assante, Ewan McGregor, Nicolas Cage, Kurtwood Smith, Samuel L. Jackson, Christian Bale, William Petersen, Edward Norton, Jean Reno, Alan Alda, Alan Cumming, Bill Murray, John Mahoney, Wes Bentley, Jack Nicholson, Kevin Bacon, Alfred Molina, Dick Van Dyke, Christopher George, Will Patton, James Garner, Michael Keaton, Michael Caine, Michael York, Kurt Russell, Christopher Walken, Timothy Olyphant, Tobey Maguire, Elijah Wood, Taye Diggs, Patrick Wilson, Matthew Lillard, Jeff Goldblum, Michael York, Paul Sorvino, Richard Gere, Jean Reno, Tim Robbins, David Duchovny, Rutger Hauer, Morgan Freeman, James Woods, James Marsden, James Van Der Beek, Joshua Jackson, Justin Long, Jack Lemmon, Ryan Phillippe, Kerr Smith, Taylor Handley, John Cusack, Jerry O'Connell, Sam Elliott, Robin Williams, Treat Williams, William Forsythe, Josh Hartnett, John Leguizamo, Andre Braugher, Michael Clarke Duncan, Charles Dance, Dougray Scott, Hugh Jackman, Matt Damon, Dylan McDermott, Colin Farrell, Harrison Ford, Dylan McDermott, David Thewlis, Ron Livingston, Craig Bierko, Viggo Mortenson, James Brolin, Jan Michael Vincent, Arnold Schwarzenegger.
TOP SCREENWRITERS: Kevin Williamson, Aaron Sorkin, Ehren Krueger, Alan Ball, Charles Edward Pogue, Alvin Sargent, David Koepp, Wayne Beach, Daniel Waters, David S. Goyer, John August, Roger Kumble, Michael Mann, Robert Towne, Stephen E. DeSouza, Hugh Wilson, William Butler, Billy Ray, Sam Hamm, Laurence Kasdan, Michael Cooney, Harold Ramis, John Hughes, Brian Helgeland, Martin Donovan, Sylvester Stallone, Joe Eszterhas, Kevin Murphy & Dan Studney, Bob Clark [R.I.P., Bob!}, James Mangold, Jason Reitman, Gregory Poirier, Steve Shagan, Matthew Bright, Zucker/Abrahams/Zucker.
TOP PRODUCERS: Joel Silver, James L. Brooks, Jerry Bruckheimer, Robert DeNiro, Joel Soisson, Mario Kassar & Andrew Vajna, Walt Disney, Ivan Reitman & Joe Medjuck, Danny DeVito, Richard Donner, Jon Davison, Judd Apatow, Kathy Conrad, Denise DiNovi, Douglas Wick & Lucy Fisher, Lawrence Gordon, Oliver Stone, Tom Hanks, Edward L. Motoro, Stanley Jaffe, Sherry Lansing, Laura Ziskin, Mel Brooks, Dan Jinks & Bruce Cohen, Saul Zantz, Martin Scorcese, Steven Soderbergh & George Clooney, James Cameron, Jon Landau, Arnon Milchan, Brian Grazer, Arnold & Anne Kopelson, Benjamin Melniker & Michael Uslan, Jon Peters & Peter Guber, Golan & Globus and George Lucas & Steven Spielberg (they were definitely both at their best while working in tandem from 1973-1984 and then again on Revenge of the Sith!).
Props also to Avi Arad for some truly amazing work on faithfully developing the Marvel Comics Films Division... but, c'mon: Hulk? (from the director of Brokeback Mountain and Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon?? ~ that can't possibly have looked like a good idea even on paper... And that's with no offense intended to the talented, Mr. Lee ~ his The Ice Storm you'll find on my favorite films list below... It's just ~ ... Hulk?? ...)
DESERT ISLAND FILMS:
[Picking your "All Time Top Favorite Films" from more than 100 years of cinematic history is hardly an accurate representation of a film buff's widely-varied tastes. So this is a kind of compromise: my "Top 10 Types of Films" (different types for different moods and occasions), with my Best Example and then a couple of my other Faves I'd put in the same category...]
<[b>TIE - each “#1” representing a key part of my filmic tastes and sensibilities]:
1. STAR WARS - raised on science fiction, this was when (like most people my age) I learned of cinema's transcendent power to literally take you out of this world!
ALSO: ALIEN; CLOSE ENCOUNTERS OF THE THIRD KIND; LOGAN'S RUN, CAPRICORN ONE & DAMNATION ALLEY.
1.2 MARY POPPINS - although I would not figure it out till later, apparently so-called "family entertainments" are, indeed, the best possible vehicles for hiding subversive, left wing, anti-establishmentarian messages to brainwash our young influential minds about the world of the "counter-culture"... [It was also much later I learned I am actually the adopted lovechild of Ms. Poppins and Bert the Chimney Sweep! But please... Keep that one on the low-low, huh?}
ALSO: Three of cinema’s most brutally-underappreciated masterpieces, DR. SEUSS' "THE 5,000 FINGERS OF DR. T," (1952); P.J. Hogan's visionary reworking of PETER PAN (2003) (equally memorably for featuring the jawdroppingly-astonishing debut of Rachel Hurd Wood!) and Barry Levinson's peerless, TOYS (which, along with EDWARD SCISSORHANDS and A CHARLIE BROWN CHRISTMAS), also makes up my “Essential Annual Christmas Viewings!”
2. ROBOCOP - it's rather ironic to me that the greatest "comic book movie" ever made was not directly drawn from a comic book; this film - coming from the director who had already changed the way I saw film (see # 5, below) - reached into my psyche and produced the comic book movie I'd been waiting the first 20 years of my life to see realized. We're just going to call this the "Paul Verhoeven Science Fiction" genre (which comes so close to my own s.f. aesthetic, it's uncanny!).
ALSO: TOTAL RECALL, STARSHIP TROOPERS.
3. BATMAN RETURNS - Tim Burton's second Batman movie perfectly captured the Denny O'Neill Batman comics of the late-'60s thru '70s. Those were the first pages I ever read as a kid and Burton had finally found the reclusive, internalized, borderline-psychotic chemistry between my childhood hero and dream girl - Batman and Catwoman - and then rendered it deeply larger than life and very, very terrifyingly real.
Other great "comic book" movie adaptations: SUPERMAN I & II; SPIDER-MAN 1 & 2.1; BATMAN (1989) & BATMAN BEGINS; THE PUNISHER (2004); GREYSTOKE (1984); CONSTANTINE; GHOST RIDER; SIN CITY; BLADE (1998).
4. DIE HARD - Wow! A film that more than lived up to its claim to "blow you through the back wall of the theater." (And which hasn't lost one iota of its dyamic sheen in the two decades since...!) It made Bruce Willis, Alan Rickman, John McTiernan and Joel Silver into instant demi-gods and changed the face of action films forever! Not to mention: DIE HARD 2: DIE HARDER, DIE HARD WITH A VENGEANCE & DIE HARD 4.0 <[/b>AKA LIVE FREE OR DIE HARD] are all relentlessly non-stop thrill rides worthy of the Die Hard moniker, as are Michael Bay's epic ARMAGEDDON, James Cameron's apocalyptic T2: JUDGMENT DAY and the "more-than-lives-up-to-its-name-and-never-lets-up" caffeinated masterpiece, SPEED, directed by DH DP Jan deBont!

ALSO: For my money, the DIE HARD films are the best American equivalent to the phenomenally-reliable JAMES BOND movies (in actuality, our only answer to the franchise to end all franchises!), though the canon of “Must-See” Bonds for me runs (with sincerest apologies to both Connery and Fleming purists ~ it's nothing personal, I promise!) from THE SPY WHO LOVED ME straight through THE WORLD IS NOT ENOUGH (excepting the transitionary (and, in both cases, extremely silly), A View to a Kill & The Living Daylights - but including ON HER MAJESTY‘S SECRET SERVICE).
5. THE 4TH MAN - There comes a time in everyone's life ~ if they're interested in truly exploring this world's many dimensions - when a film opens up your mind and makes you realize there are different ways of making movies than linear storytelling - Call them visual poems or villanelles. And Paul Verhoeven's Dutch masterpiece about the way an artist perceives the world, God and the sanity of his perspective is the film that truly blew my mind, belonging rightly at the very top of this list!
ALSO IN THIS CATEGORY: BRAZIL (1985); PINK FLOYD: THE WALL; BULWORTH; UN CHIEN ANDALOU (Dali rocks!!); PERFUME: THE STORY OF A MURDERER; 2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY and THE FIFTH ELEMENT - storytelling so cool, it switches into a completely different movie every 15 minutes ~ and actually makes it work! Wow!
[And though not quite in the same genre, for its brilliant portrayal of an artist's relation to the world around them, props must be given to: LEONARD COHEN: I'M YOUR MAN.
6. {tie} EVITA and REEFER MADNESS: THE MOVIE MUSICAL {two different sides of the Modern Musical - the first seriously intense, the second subversively playful} ~ And what more is there to say other than that both musicals and rock operas rock? (...By definition, even!) With their combination of book, music and lyrics, the modern (pop/rock) musical can touch heartstrings deeper than any other art form is capable of reaching. (Which is pretty much what makes each art form unique, right?)
Other Outstanding Modern Musicals (live action listed only, again for space reasons): MOULIN ROUGE! (2001); WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE'S ROMEO+JULIET (1996); JESUS CHRIST SUPERSTAR; THE PHANTOM OF THE OPERA (2004); THE ROCKY HORROR PICTURE SHOW; SHOCK TREATMENT; PINK FLOYD ~ THE WALL; HAIR (1978); WEST SIDE STORY; FAME (1980); OLIVER! (1968); A CHORUS LINE; THE FANTASTICKS; GRAFITTI BRIDGE; 8 MILE; PET SHOP BOYS ~ IT COULDN'T HAPPEN HERE; A STAR IS BORN (1976), NEWSIES and Prince's absolute masterstroke, PURPLE RAIN!
7. MURDER AT 1600 - This is what I'm going to call the "subversive, twisty-turny-to-the-end (often revealing paranoid conspiracies to be true) thriller" [...or the "puzzle film," for short...] ~ and the four biggest criteria here are: 1) They have to be IN-tense!; 2) They have to be juicy (even borderline-tawdry) and - most importantly - entertaining on repeat viewings; 3) The climactic twist has to upend your entire perspective on what you think you've been watching; and; 4) They have to actually make sense! (That last one's usually the deal-breaker, BTW.) I chose to put MURDER AT 1600 up front because, for my money, it has the best ensemble cast ever assembled (matched only perhaps by PRIMAL FEAR), all playing at the top of their game! ~ as well as a crackling Wayne Beach script and Dwight Little's densely atmospheric direction. In a perfect world, Wesley Snipes' "Detective Harlan Regis" would have been a franchise film character!
EQUALLY AS VIABLE IN THIS CATEGORY: WILD THINGS [Original R-Rated Theatrical Cut ~ for reasons why, check under 1998 films below ~ and for which Neve Campbell and Bill Murray should have DEFINITELY won Oscars!], AMERICAN CRIME (2004) {positively brilliant for giving you enough clues to put together the only possible solution to its "Whodunnit," but then never actually spelling out the answer, leaving "solving the puzzle" up to the audience - plus Rachel Leigh Cook is an absolute revelation in this film!}; the aforementioned brilliant brain-twister, PRIMAL FEAR; THE PLAYER; BASIC INSTINCT; THE ART OF WAR; D.O.A. (1988); PSYCHO (1960) [Kind of the prototype for this genre]; THE DA VINCI CODE; END GAME (2006); THE THIRTEENTH FLOOR (1999); THE USUAL SUSPECTS {AKA: What do you get when you marry a perfectly detailed actor with a perfectly plotted script?}, THREE DAYS OF THE CONDOR and the classic late-'70s AGATHA CHRISTIE trilogy (MURDER ON THE ORIENT EXPRESS, DEATH ON THE NILE and THE MIRROR CRACK'D); also available in headtrip <[b>IDENTITY (2003)], cat-and-mouse game <[b>HARD CANDY] and cyberpunk <[b>THE MATRIX (1999)] editions.
8. THE FLY (1986) - Actually, it was seeing GRIZZLY (1976) at the tender, impressionable age of nine - with its gritty realism, intense cast and genuine "scare-the-pants-off-you-yikes!-this-is-really-happening home movie feel" ~ (one of which The Blair Witch Project would attempt a misfired "Dogma 95" version some 25 years later) ~ that kept me up for three days straight ~ and made me appreciate the power of horror films to explore primal fears as visceral metaphors. Cronenberg's reinvention of a camp '50s "monster movie" into the world's most horrifyingly tragic love story ~ by patiently saving the intensity and magnitude of the terror till it perfectly externalized the emotional horror ~ showed me how this could be done to perfection! Along with BRAZIL, I'd also have to rank this as perhaps the most powerful film ending ever!
OTHER HORROR/GENRE MASTERPIECES: THE FACULTY; GRIZZLY; the SCREAM, SAW, CUBE and FINAL DESTINATION trilogies; I KNOW WHAT YOU DID LAST SUMMER; JAWS & JAWS 2, KING KONG (2005); PSYCHO (1960); DEAD ALIVE; EVIL DEAD II; THE THING (1982), THE KISS (1988), FATAL ATTRACTION (It may not have been originally written that way, but Adrian Lyne sure made it into one hell of a great horror movie!), HELLBOUND ~ HELLRAISER II; WES CRAVEN'S NEW NIGHTMARE and PULSE (2006) (featuring the peerless Kristen Bell in one of her most intense performances!).
9. AMERICAN BEAUTY ~ What I like to call the "putting the 'fun' back in dysfunctional" family melodrama ~ Hint: These are usually very cathartic to have seen, but many people seem to have a hard time watching the dynamics unfold in each film's utterly toxic concept of what comprises a "family." (Insert your own "holding the mirror a little too close" or "Schaudenfreude" quip here.)
Other absolutely essential "Must Sees" in this category: TERMS OF ENDEARMENT; ORDINARY PEOPLE; THE FAMILY STONE and - in weird, artistic/spiritual/metaphoric model ways, John Duigan's elegant masterpiece, SIRENS (1994), Mike Leigh & David Thewlis' variant for thoughtful misanthropic hermits, NAKED, and Michael Mann's complex layering of the many manifestations of "family" in the greatest crime drama of all time, HEAT (1995).
10. AIRPLANE! ~ I'm just going to call this the comedies that keep me coming back for more whenever I need a laugh ~ and Zucker-Abrahams-Zucker's masterpiece has proven to be the template for the "manic, flying pop culture non-sequitir" style that would be adopted by The Simpsons, Ren & Stimpy, Family Guy & American Dad. What more need be said?
My other essential comedies: GHOSTBUSTERS; CRUEL INTENTIONS; TEAM AMERICA ~ WORLD POLICE; HAROLD & KUMAR GO TO WHITE CASTLE; TOOTSIE; PORKY'S; BULWORTH; GO and NATIONAL LAMPOON'S VACATION.
As film - like with most art - has such an immediate connection to the time, people, places and events surrounding it ~ and, given that our tastes evolve over the years (what I liked when I was 10 impacted me at that point in time and space, though it may seem thoroughly frivolous to others) ~ I thought the best way to present my “Essential Must-See Films” (again, reluctantly edited for space) would be by year... and, that way, most reflective of my time-changed sensibilities, the scope and diversity of what I really like and has shaped the way I see the world (for whatever reason)... and that compulsive “Top 10” list-keeping thing I mentioned I’ve been doing for as long as I can remember...
Anyway, I remember the years by the movies and music surrounding me at that particular time ~ so this would be my most basic time capsule canon:
[If a year follows the title in brackets, it’s only to separate it from other films with the same title ~ and with the onslaught of recent studio shelvings, dumpings and combined foreign and can-to-DVD delays, don’t blame me if those completion and released years don’t always match...!]
2007 [so far]: Die Hard 4.0 (AKA Live Free or Die Hard); Roman (2007); Fifty Pills; Ghost Rider; Black Book [Zwartboek]; The Game Plan; The Simpsons Movie; Resident Evil ~ Extinction; Sicko; The Messengers; Flannel Pajamas; Flatland the Movie; Dead Silence [UNRATED DVD CUT....which fills in a few of the theatrical blanks quite nicely!]; Knocked Up; Hairspray (2007); Feast; In A Dark Place (2006); Harry Potter & the Order of the Phoenix; The Contractor; Slow Burn (2005), The Calling; The Plague; The Hills Have Eyes 2 (2007); Glass House II ~ The Good Mother; The Breed...
2006: Reefer Madness: The Movie Musical; Pulse (2006); Where the Truth Lies; The Prestige; Hard Candy; Saw III; Perfume ~ The Story of a Murderer; Leonard Cohen ~ I’m Your Man; Hollow Man 2; End Game (2006); Slither; Ultraviolet; She’s the Man; The Woods; A Prairie Home Companion; Thank You for Smoking; The Da Vinci Code (which I don't get what all the religious backlash was about - Both the film and the book espouse as Christian a message as any other recent entertainment, if you really think about it...), Just Friends; The Devil Wears Prada; Snakes on a Plane; I Love Your Work; Art School Confidential; Running Scared (2006); Lone Star State of Mind; Final Destination 3; The Wicker Man (2006); The Tenants; Take the Lead.
2005: Star Wars, Episode III: Revenge of the Sith; American Crime (2004); Madhouse (2004); King Kong (2005); Batman Begins; The Family Stone; An American Haunting (2005); Saw II; Constantine; Charlie & the Chocolate Factory; Venom (2005); Deepwater (2005); Shopgirl; The Island (2005); The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants; Sin City; The Girl in the Cafe; Kiss Kiss Bang Bang; Blind Horizon; Jarhead; Sarah Silverman ~ Jesus Is Magic; Havoc (2005); Flightplan; Red Eye (it is a real nail-biter right up until the plane lands!).
[OUTSTANDING MADE-FOR-TV MOVIE: Stripsearch (HBO).]
2004: Closer; The Phantom of the Opera (2004); The Passion of the Christ [Original Theatrical Release ~ and, again, if you look closely, the actual movie itself isn't even remotely anti-Semitic]; Spider-Man 2; Team America ~ World Police; The Punisher (2004); The Same River Twice; The Incredibles; Saw; Spartan; Mean Girls; The Notebook; The Butterfly Effect [Director's Cut on DVD!]; Starship Troopers 2; When Will I Be Loved?; Cookers (2001); Walk the Line; Spanglish; Anacondas ~ The Hunt for the Blood Orchid; Blind Horizon; ManThing; Torque; Metallica ~ Some Kind of Monster; Renegade (AKA Blueberry); Cube Zero; Van Helsing; The Big Empty; Dawn of the Dead (2004).
[OUTSTANDING MADE-FOR-TV MOVIE: Gracie's Choice.]
2003: Love Actually; Peter Pan (2003); Harold & Kumar Go to White Castle; Mona Lisa Smile; Freaky Friday (2003); De-Lovely; Identity; The I Inside; City of God; The Barbarian Invasions; The Sweetest Thing; What a Girl Wants; Charlie‘s Angels ~ Full Throttle; Bad Boys II; Jeepers Creepers II; May (2003); Who's Your Daddy? (2003); School of Rock; Camp; The Company; Final Destination 2; The Magdalene Sisters; The Rundown; In the Cut; Big Fish; Spun; I Capture the Castle; Bad(der) Santa; Legally Blonde 2 ~ Red, White & Blonde; Matchstick Men; Blue Collar Comedy Tour; Scary Movie 3; Mystic River; The Big Empty; Looney Toons ~ Back in Action; Kangaroo Jack; Swimming Pool (2003); The Matrix Reloaded and The Matrix Revolutions (OK. So... they had virtually nothing to do with the first movie's cool mind-bending philosophical supposition and played like over-bloated, melodramatic graphic novels... just like the Robocop sequels. And... What exactly is the problem with that second part about over-bloated, melodramatic graphic novels...?) ;~}
[OUTSTANDING MADE-FOR-TV MOVIE: The King & Queen of Moonlight Bay.]
2002: Secretary; Spider-Man (2002); The Rules of Attraction; Insomnia (2002); The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers; 8 Mile; Austin Powers in “Goldmember;” High Crimes; Abandon; Frida (2002); Cube 2 ~ Hypercube; Crossroads (2002); Scooby-Doo; Sweet Home Alabama; My Best Friend’s Wife (AKA Grownups); New Best Friend; The Cat Returns; Resident Evil; Catch Me if You Can; Solaris (2002); White Oleander; Repli-Kate.
2001: Moulin Rouge! (2001); The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring; Planet of the Apes (2001); The Mummy Returns (2001); Anti-Trust; Thirteen Days; Monsters, Inc.; Lost & Delirious; Pootie Tang; Blow Dry; The Anniversary Party; The Musketeer (2001), Harry Potter & the Sorcerer's Stone; Soulkeeper; Legally Blonde; Josie & the Pussycats; The Glass House; Joy Ride (2001); Osmosis Jones; Ocean's Eleven (2001); Along Came a Spider; Uprising; Mulholland Drive; Sugar & Spice; Scary Movie 2; The Princess Diaries; The Trumpet of the Swan; Iris.
2000: Mission: Impossible 2; The Beach; Wonder Boys; Reindeer Games; The Art of War; The Fantasticks; Scream 3; Dogma (2000); Simon Birch; The Gift (2000); Coyote Ugly; Gossip; The Adventures of Rocky & Bullwinkle; The Original Kings of Comedy; U-571; Dr. T. & the Women; Scary Movie; Molly (2000); American Psycho; Requiem for a Dream; Where the Heart Is (2000); Dracula 2000; Fight Club; Attraction; Memento; Traffic; Final Destination; Dude, Where's My Car?; The Family Man; Little Nicky; The Broken Hearts Club; Timecode; Maze.
1999: American Beauty; Cruel Intentions; Go; The Matrix; Teaching Mrs. Tingle; The World Is Not Enough; Drive Me Crazy; Arlington Road; Double Jeopardy; The Thirteenth Floor; Star Wars, Episode I: The Phantom Menace; The Mummy (1999); Lake Placid; South Park ~ Bigger, Longer & Uncut; Run Lola Run; End of Days; SLC Punk; A Map of the World; Varsity Blues; Topsy-Turvy; The Messenger; Joan of Arc (1999); New World Disorder; Election.
1998: Bulworth; The Faculty; Armageddon; Wild Things [Original, R-Rated Theatrical Cut, NOT Unrated Version! ~ one tiny relationship reveal over the end credits (very wisely excised from the Theatrical Version!) nearly pushes this delicious thriller into self-parody ~ Trust me; this is one of those rare cases where the studio cut's actully far superior!]; Primary Colors; Twilight; Deep Rising; The Object of My Affection; Ronin; 54; Spice World; Simon Birch; John Carpenter’s Vampires; The Mask of Zorro; Blade (1998); The Wedding Singer; Disturbing Behavior; Can't Hardly Wait; Dark City; Babe ~ Pig in the City; Pleasantville; Kids in the Hall ~ Brain Candy; Polish Wedding; Bug Buster; The Gingerbread Man; Living Out Loud; Beavis & Butthead Do America; The Big Lebowski.
1997: Starship Troopers; The Fifth Element; Scream 2; Murder at 1600; Overnight Delivery; Tomorrow Never Dies; As Good As It Gets; I Know What You Did Last Summer; Lawn Dogs; The Ice Storm; Cube; Jackie Brown; Romy & Michelle’s High School Reunion; The Devil’s Advocate; Donnie Brasco; My Best Friend’s Wedding; Volcano; The Locusts; Brassed Off; In the Company of Men; Hercules (Disney; 1997); Titanic; U-Turn; Vegas Vacation; Con Air; The Lost World ~ Jurassic Park (1997); City of Industry; The Shadow Conspiracy; The Assignment (1997); That Darn Cat (1997); Conspiracy Theory; Contact; Lolita (1997); Prince Valiant (1997); Wishmaster; Switchback; The Usual Suspects.
1996: Evita; William Shakespeare’s Romeo+Juliet (1996); Freeway; Scream (1996); Primal Fear; Mars Attacks!; The Long Kiss Goodnight; The Frighteners; Goldeneye; Tales from the Crypt ~ Bordello of Blood; Kingpin; Joe's Apartment; Muppet Treasure Island; The Rock (1996); Houdini (1996); Rasputin (1996); Multiplicity; Hard Core Logo; The Birdcage (1996); Bound (1996); Eraser; Fear (1996); Looking for Richard; The People vs. Larry Flynt; The Craft; Eraser; Welcome to the Dollhouse; Jerry Maguire; The Glimmer Man; The Evening Star; G.I. Jane; Broken Arrow; Dragonheart; Secrets & Lies; Star Trek: First Contact.
[OUTSTANDING MADE-FOR-TV MOVIE: Norma Jean & Marilyn.]
1995: Heat (1995); Before Sunrise; An Awfully Big Adventure; Die Hard with a Vengeance; Casper; Safe (1995); The Quick & the Dead (1995); The City of Lost Children; Showgirls; Village of the Damned (1995); Powder; The Englishman Who Went Up a Hill but Came Down a Mountain; The Basketball Diaries; Crimson Tide; Sudden Death (1995); Venus Rising; Gold Diggers ~ The Secret of Bear Mountain; Jack and Sarah; First Knight; Desperado; Sudden Death (1995); Total Eclipse; Live Nude Girls (1995); The Sweeper (1995); The Hunchback of Notre-Dame (Disney; 1995); Waterworld; Party Girl (1995); The Doom Generation; Under Seige 2 ~ Dark Territory; Assassins (1995); Strange Days; Smoke (1995).
[OUTSTANDING MADE-FOR-TV MOVIE: Blue River.]
1994: Sirens (1994); Speed; Four Weddings and a Funeral; Ed Wood; Wolf; Naked; Heavenly Creatures; Timecop; Maverick (1994); Clean Slate (1994); True Lies; Natural Born Killers; My Girl 2; Fall from Grace (1994), The Passion of Darkly Noon; Leon (The Professional); Brainscan; The Road to Wellville; Bad Girls (1994); Wyatt Earp; Trading Mom; Go Fish; No Escape; The Santa Clause; Street Fighter; The Jungle Book (1994); S.F.W.
1993: Last Action Hero; Short Cuts; Super Mario Bros.; Ruby in Paradise; Basic Instinct; Cliffhanger; Carlito’s Way; A Few Good Men; Fearless (1993); A Far Off Place; Demolition Man; Free Willy; Paperhouse; Malice; Schindler's List; Fortress, Dave (1993); Groundhog Day; Tombstone (1993); Indian Summer; Jack the Bear; A Perfect World; Mac; Batman ~ Mask of the Phantasm; CB4; Fatal Charm (1990); Wide Sargasso Sea; Rising Sun; Matinee; The Piano; Orlando; Wes Craven's New Nightmare.
1992: Batman Returns; The Player; Toys; Dead Alive; Flirting; Wayne’s World; Mediterraneo; Twin Peaks ~ Fire Walk With Me; Aladdin (Disney; 1992); Strictly Ballroom; Death Becomes Her; Glengarry Glen Ross; Lorenzo's Oil; Final Analysis; Newsies; American Me; Mad at the Moon; Passenger 57; Buffy the Vampire Slayer; Stay Tuned; Rapid Fire (1992); The Hand that Rocks the Cradle; Harley Davidson & the Marlboro Man; Ironheart.
1991: Terminator 2: Judgment Day {one of the most subversive Hollywood movies ever made [by a Canadian, no less!] - Name one other film that this blatantly gets you cheering for the militant anti-establishmentarian terrorists, running around & blowing everything up for a cause which the rest of the world sees as delusional!}; The Man in the Moon; Ricochet; Hudson Hawk; My Girl; Highway to Hell (1991); An American Tail ~ Fievel Goes West; Beauty & the Beast (Disney; 1991); Barton Fink; New Jack City; The Last Boy Scout; Prospero's Books; City Slickers; The Prince of Tides; Fried Green Tomatoes; Hear My Song; Switch; Nothing But Trouble (1991) <[/b>AKA "Valkenvania"]; Oscar; Sex and Zen; Bugsy; The Naked Gun 2 1/2; The Doors; The Rocketeer; Bill & Ted's Bogus Journey; La Femme Nikita, L.A. Story, Jungle Fever; Run; JFK; Posing; Liebestraum.
[OUTSTANDING MADE-FOR-TV MOVIE: Wildflower.]
1990: Total Recall; Edward Scissorhands; Die Hard 2: Die Harder; Class of 1999; Dances with Wolves; Pretty Woman; House Party; Akira; Grafitti Bridge; Young Guns II; Gremlins 2: The New Batch; Narrow Margin; Closet Land; Jacob's Ladder; The Adventures of Ford Fairlane; The Tall Guy; Postcards from the Edge [featuring Blue Rodeo backing Meryl Streep in the closing number!]; Mack the Knife; The People Under the Stairs; Avalon; Pacific Heights; Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (1990); Death Warrant (1990); Tremors; Mr. Destiny; Revenge (1990); Marked for Death; Defending Your Life; Another 48 Hrs.; Pump Up the Volume; Jesus of Montreal.
[OUTSTANDING MADE-FOR-TV MOVIE: The Flash.]
1989: Batman (1989); License to Kill; The War of the Roses; Lethal Weapon 2; Dream a Little Dream; The Little Mermaid (Disney; 1989); Tango & Cash; Lock Up; Dead Calm; Born on the Fourth of July; The Fly II; Meet the Applegates; Back to the Future, Part II; Listen to Me; The Vanishing (1988 Dutch version); The Karate Kid, Part III; Fright Night II; Alphaville ~ Songlines; Meet the Feebles; The Killer; The 'Burbs; National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation; Romero (1989); Crimes & Misdemeanors; Fat Man & Little Boy; The Phantom of the Opera (1989); Apartment Zero; Harlem Nights; Troop Beverly Hills; The Wizard; Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure.
1988: Die Hard; D.O.A. (1988); Beetlejuice; Heartbreak Hotel (1988); The Kiss (1988); The Accused; Scrooged; Dead Heat; Miracle Mile; A Night in the Life of Jimmy Reardon; Hellbound ~ Hellraiser II; Shakedown (1988); The Naked Gun; Working Girl; Salome's Last Dance; Lair of the White Worm; Drowning by Numbers; Big Top Pee Wee; Hard Boiled; Dirty Rotten Scoundrels; License to Drive; The Presidio; U2 ~ Rattle & Hum (although the videos for their far superior ZOO-TV and PopMart tours are what you really want to see...!)
1987: Robocop; Fatal Attraction; Angel Heart; Eddie Murphy: Raw <[i>which, on a double bill with Chris Rock's Bring the Pain, comprises the most incendiary and provocative lol stand-up ever committed to film]; The Lost Boys; Predator; Prince ~ Sign o' the Times; Evil Dead II; The Big Easy; Near Dark; Beverly Hills Cop II; Bad Taste; Lethal Weapon; Three Amigos; The Running Man; Planes, Trains & Automobiles; She's Having a Baby; A Nightmare on Elm Street 3 ~ The Dream Warriors; White Mischief; Over the Top; Can't Buy Me Love; A Zed & Two Noughts; Real Men; Innerspace; Spaceballs; Extreme Prejudice.
1986: The Fly (1986); Ferris Bueller’s Day Off; Cobra; Highlander; Little Shop of Horrors (1986); Blue Velvet; The Quiet Earth; Howard the Duck; Top Gun; Big Trouble in Little China; The Decline of the American Empire; Manhunter (1986); The Karate Kid, Part II; Absolute Beginners; Hannah & Her Sisters; Running Scared (1986).
1985: Brazil (1985); A Chorus Line; The Breakfast Club; Blood Simple; The Journey of Natty Gann; Pee Wee’s Big Adventure; Weird Science; Cocoon; Fright Night; Agnes of God; Fandango; Return of the Living Dead; To Live and Die in L.A.; The Toxic Avenger; The Purple Rose of Cairo; Ran; Certain Fury; Santa Clause: The Movie; Rambo: First Blood, Part II (Also written by James Cameron, this is one other movie aside from T2 which essentially has you "rooting for the anti-establishment terrorists!" ...Although we also would have accepted any of Star Wars, Episodes IV-VI. ;~)
1984: The 4th. Man; Ghostbusters; Purple Rain; Gremlins; Indiana Jones & the Temple of Doom; Greystoke ~ The Legend of Tarzan, Lord of the Apes; Streets of Fire; Starman; Dune (1984); Supergirl; Dreamscape; Revenge of the Nerds; Top Secret!; Body Double; The Karate Kid; All of Me; Beverly Hills Cop; 1984 (1984) The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai; Footloose; A Nightmare on Elm Street; Star Trek III: The Search for Spock; This Is Spinal Tap; Repo Man; Cloak and Dagger (1984); Runaway (1984); Flashpoint.
1983: Terms of Endearment; Return of the Jedi; National Lampoon’s Vacation; The Big Chill; Octopussy; Rocky III; Flashdance; The Right Stuff; Videodrome; Brainstorm; Risky Business; All the Right Moves; Wargames; Star 80; The Dark Crystal; The Star Chamber; Blue Thunder; Yentl; Scarface (1983); Krull; The Man with Two Brains; Liquid Sky; Monty Python's The Meaning of Life.
1982: Tootsie; Porky’s; Pink Floyd: The Wall; The Verdict; The Thing (1982); Conan the Barbarian; Poltergeist; Class of 1984; 48 Hrs.; Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan; Evil Dead; Frances; Brimstone and Treacle; An Officer & a Gentleman; National Lampoon’s Class Reunion; Blade Runner; Tron; High Road to China; Starstruck; Two of a Kind; Annie (1982); Diner.
1981: Raiders of the Lost Ark; Superman II (Be sure to also see the "Richard Donner Cut," now on DVD!); Shock Treatment; For Your Eyes Only; Heavy Metal; Reds; Excalibur; Escape from New York; The Road Warrior; The Cannonball Run; Das Boot; Outland; Body Heat; Stripes; S.O.B.; Scanners; Altered States.
1980: Airplane!; Ordinary People; The Empire Strikes Back; 9 to 5; Somewhere in Time; Fame; The Stunt Man; Popeye; Xanadu; My Bodyguard; Urban Cowboy; The World According to Garp; Bad Timing ~ A Sensual Obsession; A Small Circle of Friends; American Gigolo; The Mirror Crack'd; Flash Gordon (1980); Foxes; Americathon 1990; Alligator; Times Square; The Pirate Movie.
1979: Alien; Apocalypse Now; Star Trek: The Motion Picture; Moonraker; The Warriors; The Changeling; Monty Python's The Life of Brian; Being There; All That Jazz; Dracula (1979); Kramer vs. Kramer; The Tin Drum; The Bugs Bunny/Road Runner Movie; The Legacy (1979); Meatballs; The China Syndrome; Hanover Street; Nightwing; Fast Break; The Black Hole; Buck Rogers in the 25th Century (Original Theatrical Release, 1979); The Muppet Movie.
[OUTSTANDING MADE-FOR-TV MOVIES: Orphan Train and Riel.]
1978: Superman (1978); Jaws 2; Capricorn One; Damnation Alley; Halloweeen (1978), Foul Play; F.I.S.T.; Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1978); Rocky II; Battlestar Galactica (Original Theatrtical Release, 1978); Grease; Tentacles; National Lampoon's Animal House; Return from Witch Mountain; Coma; Death on the Nile; Midnight Express; The Deer Hunter; Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band; Thank God It's Friday; Things to Come (1978); The Betsy.
1977: Star Wars (esp. before it was ever "Episode IV!"); Close Encounters of the Third Kind (Original 1977 Theatrical Release); The Spy Who Loved Me; The Cassandra Crossing; Saturday Night Fever; Kentucky Fried Movie; The Deep (1977), Oh, God; Airport '77; Orca; Rabid; Smokey & the Bandit; Looking for Mr. Goodbar; Annie Hall; Black Sunday (1977); Day of the Animals; The Island of Dr. Moreau (1977); Why Shoot the Teacher?
1976: Logan's Run; Grizzly; Rocky; The Omen (1976); A Star Is Born (1976); Treasure of Matecumbe; Murder on the Orient Express; Network; Carrie (1976); The Littlest Horse Thieves; The 7th Voyage of Sinbad; The Seventh Seal; King Kong (1976); Obsession (1976); Squirm; Silver Streak; Swashbuckler (1976).
1975: Jaws; The Rocky Horror Picture Show; Dog Day Afternoon; Rollerball; Nashville; One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest; Escape from Witch Mountain; The Shaggy D.A.; Dark Star; The French Connection II; Black Christmas (1975).
“MUST SEES“ B.L. (from “Before I Started Keeping Lists”): Jesus Christ Superstar; A Night at the Opera; It's a Wonderful Life; 2001: A Space Odyssey; Fiddler on the Roof; Psycho (1960); West Side Story; Touch of Evil; Oliver! (1968); The Godfather; F for Fake; 36 Hours; The French Connection; Charlotte's Web (1973); The Great Dictator; Wild Strawberries; The Seventh Seal; Persona; Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf; Singin' in the Rain; Gold Diggers of 1935; South Pacific (1958); Splendor in the Grass; Charlotte's Web (1973); A Clockwork Orange; Monty Python & the Holy Grail; The Subject Was Roses; The Apprenticeship of Duddy Kravitz; Frankenstein (1931); Dracula (1931); King Kong (1933); Miss Julie; Gigi; Soylent Green; Silent Running; Rashomon; The Great Escape; The Hidden Fortress; Sleuth (1972); The Ten Commandments; The 39 Steps (1935); Zardoz; Rear Window; Gone with the Wind; Peter Pan (1953); Alice in Wonderland (1951); Freaks (Browning); Suspiria; Bonnie & Clyde; Spetters; Soldier of Orange; Turkish Delight; Walkabout; Carnal Knowledge; Beneath the... & Escape from the Planet of the Apes; A Boy & His Dog; One of Our Dinosaurs Is Missing; The Graduate; Sullivan's Travels; Spellbound (1945), The Searchers; Stagecoach (1945); High Noon; Romance with a Double Bass; On Her Majesty's Secret Service; Play Misty for Me; A Hard Day's Night; Help!; Nosferatu; The Maltese Falcon; Casablanca; Citizen Kane; The Magnificent Ambersons; Rope; Lifeboat; The Wild Bunch; Stagecoach; Three Days of the Condor; 36 Hours; The Parallax View; The Exorcist; Phantom of the Paradise; Un Chien Andalou; Weekend (1967); Day for Night; Black Christmas (1972); Cisco Pike and Children Shouldn't Play with Death Things.

Television:

Family Guy. Heroes. Bionic Woman. Pushing Daisies. Veronica Mars (ONE BIG R.I.P.! SHAME, THE CW, SHAME!). Hidden Palms (Another very peeved R.I.P.!).] American Dad. The Colbert Report. Dirty Sexy Money. The Simpsons. The Tracey Ullman Show. Deadwood. One Tree Hill. Lost. WKRP in Cincinnati (the hands-down, funniest live-action sitcom ever - an unmatched ensemble of priceless charaters!). Hill Street Blues (singlehandedly changed the face of television forever). The Six Million Dollar Man & The Bionic Woman. The Fall Guy. Welcome Back, Kotter. Scooby Doo, Where Are You?. Dawson's Creek. The Practice. Sabrina the Teenage Witch. [Its HIGHLIGHT SEASON 2 was just released on DVD and holds up incredibly well after 10 years! This is great television!] The Critic. South Park. Duckman. Ren & Stimpy. Weeds. Six Feet Under. Police Squad. [BEST LINE!: "Who are you and how did you get in here?" Leslie Nielsen: "I'm the locksmith... and I'm the locksmith."] A great number of made-for-cable (HBO, Showtime) originals. Match Game '74-'79. Brother's Keeper (criminally overlooked!). Titus. The West Wing. Sports Night. Fifteen (featuring the debuts of Just Friends' Ryan Reynolds and the stunningly fearless (and sorely under-used) actress, Laura Harris). Clarissa Explains It All(Melissa Joan Hart's first great series!). The X-Files. The Winds of War (mini-series). Alias. Tales of the Gold Monkey. The Adventures of Brisco County, Jr. Dark Angel. CSI (the original one). Star Trek (the original one). Jimmy Kimmel Live! (my fave current talk show!). The Daily Show w/Jon Stuart (and Craig Kilborn before him!). The Late Late Show with Craig Kilborn. (What happened there? One minute: Great; the next minute: Gone!). Late Night with Conan O'Brien (esp. 1990's ~ and if for no other reason than unleashing "Triumph the Insult Comic Dog" on the world! Kudos!!). Late Night with David Letterman (esp. 1980s). The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson. Michael Moore's TV Nation. Live with Regis and Kelly. The X-Files. The View. (Oh, c'mon ~ it's a really fun watch!) Operation: Petticoat (first season). A Gift to Last (Canadian late-'70s, 21-part mini-series that grew from a lone Christmas special ~ Absolutely awesome!!). The Colbert Report. ABC Friday Night Movie (1970s-1980s). Friday Night Videos. Shock Theatre (Bangor, Maine-based "Fright Night"-type horror movie show from 1970s/80s). The Weakest Link. (How can you NOT love Ann??) The Rockford Files. Quincy. Cop Rock. (Seriously. For real...) S.W.A.T. M*A*S*H (esp. all the weird surreal later Alan Alda stuff!). Fantasy Island. All in the Family. Family. Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman. Hawaii: Five-O. Lou Grant. The Mary Tyler Moore Show. Three's Company. Delta House. Soap. The Donnie and Marie Show. Logan's Run, Fame and Planet of the Apes - the series-es-es.
Personally, I love the recent spate of DVD box sets of complete series seasons and experiencing my favorite shows in this way. For an "lol-a-nanosecond" hypermanic comedy like Family Guy, you get the chance to catch all the gags you were laughing through on first viewing, while for elaborately-plotted and carefully laid-out masterpieces like Veronica Mars, it's just like the rush that comes from curling up with a phenomenal page-turner novel you just can't put down. (Don't believe me? Check out Veronica Mars, Season 2!)
AND ~ AT LONG, LONG LAST ON DVD...! THE FIRST VOLUME OF THE FUNNIEST SITCOM EVER!
WKRP IN CINCINNATI ~ SEASON 1:
And if I were a South Park character... (they wouldn't let me make a skinny one...!) ;~)
[There's a "Simpsonized" version that's a whole lot slimmer - and more accurately representative! - under "My Pics" -
Cartoons, cartoons, cartoons...!]

Books:

LITERARY:
Frederik Pohl ("Gateway" - the single best book I have ever encountered; I revisit it every five years and discover something new every time!), Larry Niven ("Dream Park," "Ringworld"), Gerard Soeteman (anything I can find translated!), Madeleine L'Engle ("A Wrinkle in Time"), Ethan Canin ("Blue River"), Agatha Christie ("Ten Little Indians," "Death on the Nile"), Melanie Little ("Confidence" - the most stunning and captivating tapestry of a book that's ever spoken directly to my heart; specifically, "Little Disappearances" and a story from a compilation called Nerves Out Loud: "After the Flood"), Steven Peters ("The Fourth War," the brilliant screenplay for Wild Things), Dan Brown ("The Da Vinci Code"), Roger Zelazny ("Damnation Alley"), Alan Dean Foster (for sheer productivity; esp. his Alien novelization and "Splinter of the Mind's Eye"), William Diehl ("Primal Fear"), Paul Zindel ("My Darling, My Hamburger"), Charles P. Crawford ("Bad Fall," "Three-Legged Race"), Peter Benchley ("Jaws," "The Deep" & "The Island"), Hank Searles ("Jaws 2"), Carl Gottlieb, Bill Maher, Nick Hornby, Jules Verne, H.G. Wells, Diane Ackerman ("A Natural History of the Senses"), Neptune Noir: Unauthorized Investigations into Veronica Mars (a series of critical essays, edited by Rob Thomas himself!), Alice Munro, Margaret Atwood, Deborah Tannen ("You Just Don't Understand"), Rick Warren ("The Purpose-Driven Life") and Joe Eszterhas (seriously! - read his novelization of F.I.S.T.)
PLAYWRIGHTS:
Aaron Sorkin ("A Few Good Men," "Malice" or any of his "West Wing" or "Sports Night" scripts), Patrick Marber ("Closer"), David Mamet ("Glengarry Glen Ross" & "American Buffalo"), Michael Cooney ("The I Inside" and the screenplay for "Identity"), Norm Foster ("Sinners"), Jean-Paul Sartre, Samuel Beckett, Bertold Brecht, Tim Rice, Richard Stilgoe, Neil LaBute, Brian Nelson (his best work is arguably the screenplay for Hard Candy - which is, for all intents and purposes, an incredibly challenging, well-made "theatrical" piece. Ditto goes for screenwriter Kevin Williamson's inimitable style.)
COMIC BOOK WRITERS & ARTISTS - I'm sorry... GRAPHIC NOVELISTS: Bob Kane ("Batman"), Denny O'Neill (the dark, complex and very dangerous late-'60s and '70s-era Batman), Alan Moore ("Watchmen"), Frank Miller ("The Dark Knight Returns"), Matt Groening ("Life in Hell," "The Simpsons"), Stan Lee ("Spider-Man" would have to be his greatest creation), Dave McKean ("Watchmen"), Kevin Smith (currently enjoying one of the world's coolest career paths), Neil Gaiman ("Sandman"), Jeph Loeb (Batman: Long Halloween), Bill Mantlo ("The Micronauts").
POETS/LYRICISTS:
Leonard Cohen, T.S. Eliot, Dr. Seuss, Tim Rice, Alanis Morissette, John Lennon, Jim Steinman, Roger Waters, Bono, Brett Anderson, Amy Lee, Howard Ashman, Kevin Murphy, Richard O'Brien, St. Paul the apostle, Neil Tennant, Karen Finley, Simon Toulson-Clarke, Martin Briley, Eminem, Roland Orzabal, Chuck D., Richard Stilgoe, Charles Hart, Don Black, Will Jennings, Billy MacKenzie.
CRITICS (WHO'VE GREATLY INFLUENCED MY OWN WRITINGS):
Dave Marsh, Chuck Eddy, Garry Mulholland, Phil Dilleo, Bob Lefsetz, Greil Marcus, Owen Gleiberman & Lisa Schwarzbaum, Robert Hilburn, Chris Heath, Jon Bream, Chris Heath, Ken Tucker, Kate Sullivan. And my favorite cover-to-cover read: Entertainment Weekly and Q - far and away the greatest magazines to hit planet earth: witty, smart, knowledgable, well-written, informative and endlessly entertaining, cover to cover! And a big R.I.P. to SPY and Grafitti (Canadian) Magazines.

Heroes:

(artistic, practical and spiritual all interwoven): Paul Verhoeven, Bono, Jesus, Andrew Lloyd Webber, Jim Steinman, Prince, Tim Burton, Neil Tennant & Chris Lowe, George Lucas, Brett Anderson, Peter Jackson, Wes Craven, Kevin Williamson, Paul the apostle, Neve Campbell, Kristen Bell, Frederik Pohl, Robin Williams, Rachel Hurd-Wood, Martin Briley, Tim Rice, Greg Keelor, Bazil Donovan, Matt Groening, James L. Brooks, Bruce Willis, Alan Parker, Robert Rodriguez, Mike Patton, Sam Raimi, Leonardo DiCaprio, Walt Disney, Trevor Horn & ZTT, Roger Waters, Pink Floyd, Sarah Brightman, Steven Spielberg, Cameron Mackintosh, Hal Prince, Tim Curry, Richard O'Brien, Jim Sharman, Michael Douglas, Antonio Banderas, Kevin Smith, Michelle Pfeiffer, Bill Maher, Jon Stuart, Chris Rock, Billy MacKenzie, David Cronenberg, Darren Aronofsky, Denys Arcand, Meredith Salenger, Warren Beatty, Billy MacKenzie, Todd Rundgren, Andy Fickman, Neale Donald Walsch, Max Martin, George Martin, Christopher Nolan, David S. Goyer, Robert Smigel, Bob Clark, Kelly Ripa, John Denver, Dave Marsh and all the people whose paths I've intersected at just the right time for exactly the right reasons: Mike Brown, Nathalie Bourgouin, Sheldon Serkin, Tim Hillier, Christie Coho & the family, Amanda Stanfield & the IMPACT family, Shaaron Murphy, Kim Estlund, Dennis Letterman (While David Letterman is a hero too, I did actually mean to write "Dennis"), Man-Hee Chang, Dusty Hill, Christin Davis & the Songsters, the Pasadena Tabernacle family, Regina Athnos, Alta Dustin, Erin O'Malley, Jennifer Robin Miller, Melanie Little (my twin); my eternal respect and gratitude to Steve Cherman (one of the few people who can genuinely understand your perspective, then give you endless new possibilities to consider) - HUGE thanks and respect to ALL of you for helping me along life's long and winding path! And, my greatest heroes: my best friends, artistic collaborators and bandmates for the past 20 years - Trevor Rhodes & Ross Dunkerley - and my spiritual beacon (that rare human being who honestly practices what he preaches and who embodies true integrity), my uncle - Pastor Dick Anderson.

My Blog

Rendition AKA REESE RETURNS !!

AFTER A TWO-YEAR ABSENCE, REESE RETURNS IN RENDITION... AND I COULDN'T BE HAPPIER!REMEMBER, THIS IS THE ACTRESS WHOSE DEBUT IN 1991's THE MAN IN THE MOON SHOULD HAVE GARNERED HER FIRST OF WHAT I COUNT...
Posted by Tom on Sun, 07 Oct 2007 03:41:00 PST

IF ITS OCTOBER... IT MUST BE SAW (IV) !!

I'M NOT SURE WHERE THIS IS GOING TO GO SINCE EVERY MAJOR CHARACTER FROM THE FIRST THREE ENDED UP DEAD BY THE END OF PART III... BUT HASN'T THAT BEEN THE TRUE THRILL OF THE FIRST THREE OF THESE MODERN...
Posted by Tom on Wed, 03 Oct 2007 01:50:00 PST

Andy Fickmans THE GAME PLAN A Comic Masterpiece for the Whole Family!

Now that it's finally coming out, I can actually talk about how great The Game Plan really is. And if there were ever a film that was meant to be entertaining for the whole family, thisis it!Credit f...
Posted by Tom on Fri, 28 Sep 2007 11:38:00 PST

RESIDENT EVIL: EXTINCTION ~ THIRD TIMES THE KICK-ASS CHARM!

HERE'S ONE MORE DEFINITE "MUST SEE" YOU WON'T WANT TO MISS ~ !: ...THE THIRD TIME'S THE KICK-ASS CHARM IN THIS RELIABLY ENTERTAINING SCIENCE FICTION MYTHOLOGY FRANCHISE...~ AND COMING ON THE HEELS OF ...
Posted by Tom on Mon, 10 Sep 2007 12:02:00 PST

POST-"VERONICA MARS" DEPRESSION! ~ BUT JAMIE SOMMERS & SARAH CONNOR ARE ON THEIR WAY!

THIS FALL HAS TWO POTENTIAL NEW "MUST SEE"s FOR MY MONEY:  the ultra-dark reinvention of THE BIONIC WOMAN and the "Thank-goodness-it-looks-like T2 than T3!", THE ADVENTURES OF SARAH CONNOR. ...
Posted by Tom on Mon, 06 Aug 2007 02:20:00 PST

The Simpsons Movie - Rated PG-13 "For Irreverent Humor Throughout!"

I have to admit a personal love for - of all things - the MPAA Parental Advisory warning on The Simpsons Movie, which - as anyone with their heads not stuck in the sand is well-aware - opens THIS FRID...
Posted by Tom on Mon, 23 Jul 2007 02:56:00 PST

And a quick side note on the progressive "Modern Musical..."

And on a quick side not pertaining to the progressive "Modern (pop-rock) Musical... Why hasn't anyone yet offered Miss Saigon and Aspects of Love to Alan Parker ~ or Cats and Les Miz to Tim Burton? O...
Posted by Tom on Wed, 18 Jul 2007 07:53:00 PST

HAIRSPRAY ~ The B-Movie to Broadway to A-Musical Formula's Proving Surprisingly Successful !

The first time I was aware of the idea was hearing the stupendous Broadway cast album for Little Shop of Horrors back in high school. I mean, the idea that an essentially forgettable B-movie Roger Co...
Posted by Tom on Wed, 18 Jul 2007 07:29:00 PST

Harry, Hermione & Hogwarts ~ Heading Here Hwednesday!

WELL... I'M NOT SURE THERE'S MUCH TO SAY ABOUT THE NEXT "MUST SEE" SUMMER FLICK ~ ***HARRY POTTER & THE ORDER OF THE PHOENIX***ALTHOUGH MY ONE WISH WAS THAT THE BRILLIANT MIKE NEWELL WOULD STILL BE DI...
Posted by Tom on Sun, 08 Jul 2007 02:42:00 PST

**TONIGHT's "HIDDEN PALMS" ~ THIS IS THE END ALREADY??

FOR THE PAST MONTH OF WEDNESDAY NIGHTS @ 8:00 PM ON THE CW...**HIDDEN PALMS** HAS BEEN BLASTING ITS WAY ONTO OUR SCREENS AND FILLING THE VOID OF BETRAYAL THAT THE NETWORK'S MERCILESS SLAUGHTER OF ITS ...
Posted by Tom on Wed, 04 Jul 2007 01:08:00 PST