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After the release of In Bruges in 2008, Martin Mcdonagh had a couple of scripts written and ready to go, but decided to take a couple years off to travel. He already had one in mind, and was planning on making his screenplay Seven Psychopaths into his next film. Production on Seven Psychopaths started sometime in early to mid 2011, and was released in North America on October 12th, 2012. The film stars Colin Farrell, Sam Rockwell, Woody Harrelson, Christopher Walken, and Tom Waits.

Colin Farrell plays Marty, a screenwriter trying to finish, or even start his script entitled Seven Psychopaths. One might wonder if Marty…

Next week, we celebrate the re-opening of our Secret Movie Club Theater after 15 months of Covid shutdown with a 35mm screening of Steven Spielberg’s 1971 debut feature film Duel.

Before anyone takes us on with the totally valid point that Duel was originally a 75 minute made for TV movie and was only later expanded by 15 minutes to a feature film (released abroad), this Programmer humbly submits that for all intents and purposes, it really should be considered a feature film.

It’s extremely special to this Programmer because it has all the hallmarks…

Now that the movie theaters are opening again, and I’m vaccinated and feel comfortable going, they’re kind of scrambling a little for actual movies to put in the theaters!

So there are re-releases going on, and this week they were kind enough to re-release Scott Pilgrim vs. The World, a movie I loved when it first came out, but I had forgotten just how much. I’d say this is a nearly perfect…

"Maybe that's what hell is, the entire rest of eternity spent in Bruges"

Before venturing into film, Martin McDonagh began his career as a playwright. His plays being described as humorous, tragic, and sometimes downright disturbing. Feeling like theater lacked the edge he was really looking for, Martin decided to dip his toes into filmmaking with a short film entitled Six Shooter, which ended up winning an academy award. After it's success, Focus Features agreed to produce a feature film based on McDonagh's screenplay, to be directed by himself called In Bruges.

After a job goes south…

To say that this Programmer has had a conflicted relationship with Quentin Tarantino’s body of work would be an understatement.

On one hand, every Tarantino movie is an exciting event and ALL of his movies have delivered on some and on occasion ALL levels. His love of cinema is monumental and inspiring. His commitment to bat for the fences EACH and EVERY time he makes a movie is THE model most moviemakers should aspire to.

Beyond that, Quentin Tarantino just makes good movies. Period. Full stop. And his evident sharp intelligence in understanding how to guide his career may be one of the best the movie industry has ever seen.

On the other hand, this Programmer occasionally wonders if maybe Tarantino’s movies are TOO MUCH about movies. Too self-aware.

Yet all this being acknowledged as a means of full (or too much) disclosure, there are three Tarantinos this Programmer loves and thinks are truly great: Reservoir Dogs, Jackie Brown, and Once Upon A Time in Hollywood.

And after having seen them all again this past month, it is Jackie Brown which still feels like…

Centered around LaKeith Stanfield’s incredibly empathetic performance as Cassius Green, a man caught in a battle between success and compromise, Sorry to Bother You is a remarkably consistent first film (!) from writer / director, Boots Riley. That’s been said many times about this movie but it bears repeating. It’s extremely rare for something with this level of confidence in its execution to appear under any circumstance, much less as a debut. Not to diminish his efforts as a filmmaker at all, but I wonder if the genre characteristics inherent to absurdity are best suited to a non-traditionalist’s approach. Does relative inexperience (considered as a positive) stop a creator from second-guessing their most unconventional ideas. . .

This is another installment of my Versus series. My first one was where I compared the original and rebooted versions of Saved by the Bell. For this piece, I am going to be reviewing The Suite Life of Karan and Kabir to see how it reflects the original (The Suite Life of Zack and Cody).

Zack and Cody are two twin boys who live in the Tipton Hotel and create chaos every episode. Karan and Kabir is the Indian adaptation…

The movie going experience has been under attack for quite sometime. The rise of streaming services with high quality original content as well as access to fan favorite and classic titles from the comfort of our homes has made going to the theatre seem more and more like a chore. Larger and clearer screens coupled with high quality transfers and 4K releases has faded the allure of seeing works of art on the big screen. And finally, the skyrocketing cost of ticket prices has led to a growing class divide at the box office; with a Friday night movie becoming a pastime reserved only for the elite in some communities. For film lovers we could see these problems on the horizon but they never seemed closer than that. Then COVID-19 happened and the ticking clock on movie theatres jumped ahead about 12 hours.

Experiments in film are nothing new, usually done from a marketing perspective to draw more attendees to the box office, Avatar is the most recent example utilizing the minds of incredibly talented visual effects artists to create the world of Pandora, with it’s lush foliage and almost smellable flowers. In Mr. Cameron’s case that gamble paid off. Avarar became the second highest grossing film of all time at that point. Other experiments haven’t been so lucky. Walt Disney’s Fantasia a symphony of sights and sounds like no other failed to find an audience for decades. Earthquake’s ‘sensurround’ damaged theatres and was too expensive for many theatres but helped lead to a revolution in the way sound was utilized in filmmaking. Then there’s Jonathan Lynn’s Clue a film whose plot…

"It was Hegel who said that all the greatest world events happen twice. And then, Karl Marx added, the first time it was a tragedy and the second time it was a farce."

It's been a long week, you're stressed, and you need to wind down. Hey, why not rent a movie? Pop that bad boy in, sit back, and relax. You're about halfway through the movie, it's not bad, nothing really to complain about. Wait, what was that? Rewind. That person, they look familiar. It was too fast, rewind again. Pause. What the hell? Why does that background actor look exactly like you? It's not just uncanny, it's you, but of course it's not you, you don't remember ever being an actor, but it's you, but it's not you.

This is exactly what happens…

A group of Calcutta Nuns headed by newly promoted Sister Claudaugh (Deborah Kerr, all controlled passion) take over a Himalayan Palace (formerly used to house the local General’s mistresses/consorts) high in the mountains with the intention of bringing reform and Christianity to the locals. Instead, the Nuns are undone by the overwhelming life forces, uncorseted by western society, that pulsate all around them.

Thus begins this programmer’s paltry attempt to summarize Black Narcissus, a 1947 British production written & directed by the wildly creative team, The Archers (Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger).

Black Narcissus is one of those movies that is

I hadn’t seen a movie in a movie theatre in 400 days exactly, but the theatres are re-opening safely and I have been vaccinated, so I went to see the brand spanking new remake: Godzilla vs. Kong!

It's no masterpiece, but it's big dumb fun, and definitely…