This episode of “The Online Movie Show with Phil Hall” celebrates the Oscar-winning DePatie-Freleng Enterprises, the animation studio responsible for such beloved characters as The Pink Panther, The Ant and the Aardvark, Tijuana Toads and The Dogfather. Mark Arnold, author of “Think Pink: The DePatie-Freleng Story,” discusses the little-known history of the innovative artists behind these beloved animated shorts.
This program is produced at Platinum Wolfe Studios.
If you hate zombie movies, and think there’s nothing left in the sub-genre, you’ll be surprised with Yeon Sang-ho’s “Train to Busan” and what it does with big budget zombie movies. Director Yeon Sang-ho practices the tradition of George Romero’s horror movies with thick social commentary, while also tapping in to the blockbuster crowds and proves you can have one without losing the value of the other. “Train to Busan” came completely out of left field for me back in 2016, and was not only the best horror movie of the summer, but one of the best movies of the year, easily. Yeon Sang-ho explores how a massive society is destroyed by flesh eating, rabid zombies, all of whom are relentless and charge rapid fire at their victims from around corners.
It’s been twenty years since “Batman & Robin” was unleashed in theaters, prompting a lot of folks that were there in 1997 to think back on what is easily one of the most unwatchable movies ever made. And I don’t mean unwatchable in that you can see it with a laugh, or unwatchable in that it hurts so good. I mean it’s unwatchable. The last time I popped in a Blu-Ray for “Batman & Robin” I had a very difficult time making it through the first half hour, and I admittedly shut the movie down right when Barbara finds the conveniently placed suit Alfred made for her.
1997 was a big year for me, and one of the most memorable of my life, it was a year of big movies, big music, and big changes and “Batman & Robin” is that movie that’s remembered for being so unbearably awful. What was once a childhood favorite is a movie that hasn’t aged well. At all. It’s putrid. But in honor of the twentieth anniversary of Joel Schumacher’s toy commercial, I thought I’d ponder on five questions the movie’s badly written script left me asking.
In the 1970s, Jan-Michael Vincent was a young and handsome actor that seemed on the verge of movie superstardom. But personal demons and professional disappointments derailed his life.
On this episode of the SoundCloud podcast “The Online Movie Show with Phil Hall,” film historian David Grove, author of “Jan-Michael Vincent: Edge of Greatness,” details the meteoric rise and painful fall of this remarkable personality.
Most horror fans agree by now that most creative minds have pretty much tapped the zombie well dry, but that doesn’t mean there aren’t a lot of filmmakers still trying to reinvent the wheel. “Attack of the Lederhosen Zombies” does not re-invent the wheel and probably won’t change anyone’s mind on zombie movies, but for devotees of the sub-genre, there’s a lot of fun to be had. There’s some good music, a brisk pace, and a different setting beyond the typical country farm house or city back drop. Two snowboarders head out to the Swiss Alps with their manager Branka to film a publicity video for their corporate sponsor. When snowboarder and slacker Steve botch’s the filming altogether, the trio are left on the mountain, stranded.
In concept, the 1970 endeavor to enable Japanese daredevil skier Yuchiro Miura to become the first athlete in his sport to descend Mount Everest seemed like an expensive folly: a $3 million budget that initially involved 850 men and 27 tons of equipment. And documentary footage covering this adventure seemed destined to become a standard-issue travelogue, at least in its initial journeys through too-picturesque stretches Nepal.
Director Amy Grappell digs deep in to her childhood and touches upon a part of her young life that normally might hurt others or inspire discomfort. In 1969, Amy Grappell moves from Brooklyn to Long Island with her mother and further. Both parents were struggling with their own marriage and were working hard to stay together. After meeting another couple at a local beach club, both her mother and father Paul and Deanna eventually found kindred spirits in Eleanor and Robert, both of whom were also struggling with their own marriage at the time.