Mike Flanagan has managed to become one of the most recurring auteurs for Stephen King’s adaptations, and “Doctor Sleep” is a particularly heavy undertaking. Even for the now seasoned filmmaker, “Doctor Sleep” is a tough artistic task that has to appeal to general audiences, while also tying in to Stanley Kubrick’s original masterpiece, and appeasing King, who went through every length to ensure “Doctor Sleep” was detached from Stanley Kubrick’s adaptation. It’s a shame the movie didn’t quite click with audiences and grab higher numbers, as it’s easily my favorite film of 2019, bar none.
Cinema Crazed’s Phil Hall nominated for Rondo Award
Cinema Crazed’s Phil Hall’s podcast “The Online Movie Show” was nominated for the Best Multimedia Site Award in the 2020 Rondo Awards competition! This is a fan-driven award, meaning that you need to vote to help get him up to the award podium. Votes can be emailed to taraco@aol.com by Sunday night at midnight, March 29.
When “Hansel & Gretel” were Ass kicking Witch Hunters
Hollywood loves to look for new angles on public domain fairy tales and intellectual properties. They’re always looking for a platform for a brand new franchise, and they either go the horror route or the action route. If one fails, they automatically revert to the other a few years later. “Cinderella” and “Snow White” have been brought to the big and small screen as pseudo-horror movies and action bonanzas, with varying degrees of success. The one fairy tale that hasn’t dodged the massive overhaul for a new generation is “Hansel and Gretel.”
The Bootleg Files: The Box
BOOTLEG FILES 718: “The Box” (1981 short film starring Terry Jones and Michael Palin, directed by Micky Dolenz).
LAST SEEN: On YouTube.
AMERICAN HOME VIDEO: None.
REASON FOR BOOTLEG STATUS: It seems to have fallen through the proverbial cracks.
CHANCES OF SEEING A COMMERCIAL DVD RELEASE: Unlikely.
Terry Jones’ death on January 22 brought forth a wave of warm and cherished memories of the Welsh funnyman’s classic moments with Monty Python. Jones’ passing also encouraged some die-hard Python fans to unearth a genuine rarity: a little-seen short film that Jones and fellow Python Michael Palin co-wrote and co-starred together under the direction of ex-Monkee Micky Dolenz. One could imagine these three distinctive talents would have created something truly remarkable, but they strangely came up with a weird little bore.
Jasper Mall (2020) [Slamdance Film Festival 2020]
When Victor Gruen invented the mall, it’s explained that he envisioned them being small metropolitans allowing people to commune and live. They became tax shelters and giant symbols of American consumerism until finally suffering slow deaths in the aughts. “Jasper Mall” is a somber and engaging tale of one of the last dying mega malls in America that is suffering a slow, painful death and is resuscitated, ironically, by the loyalty of its patrons and the sense of community that’s attracted to what was once a pantheon of consumerism.
The Douglas MacLean Collection (DVD)
During the late 1910s and through 1920s, Douglas MacLean enjoyed stardom in a series of light comic films. Most of his cinematic output has been lost and his surviving work is almost never revived.
Animation Outlaws (2019) [Slamdance Film Festival 2020]
I’ve been an animation nut ever since I was a kid, and it was tough to find varieties of animation since in the nineties it was a steady diet of Disney and Disney only. I was never really aware of the vast possibilities of the medium well into my early adulthood. “Spike & Mike’s Sick & Twisted Festival of Animation” is an event I would have loved to attend early in to my teens, if only to verify that there’s so much more you can do with the medium beyond singing animals, and fairy tales. “Animation Outlaws” is a very niche documentary but an outstanding film that will also speak to all kinds of fans of film and animation.