Without question, the most celebrated bad director is Ed Wood. He is the portal through which so many people discover the joys of the terrible film. He stands out from so many contenders because his films are not ordinarily bad. They are deeply felt, deeply earnest. He meant what he was saying, whatever that was. And his style, particularly his screenwriting style, is unmistakeable. Insanely purple, banal, and incomprehensible, it cannot be mistaken for anyone else’s work. It is as individual as the writing of the Co...

Reader Brian asks:

What happened to the HUDSON HAWK: 15TH ANNIVERSARY EDITION dvd? It was supposed to come out on July 25th and now it doesn't appear to be available anywhere ... Including Amazon.com. Can you research it and let me know as I seriously (seriously) would like to get it.

Synopsis

Robin Williams is struggling to keep his job, and struggling to keep his sanity in the face of his teenage children (particularly daughter Joanna “JoJo” Levesque). This all becomes more difficult when his boss forces him to cancel a trip to Hawaii and head off to Colorado instead. Williams rents an RV, packs his family in, and hits the road for misadventures and hijinx.

And everything plays out much as one would expect it to. The film looks slick enough, but it might just as well h...

Discussing the old school DVD’s that still sound and look great in the era of Blu-Ray and HD-DVD technology.

Ang Lee’s Hulk got a bad wrap.

When it was originally released in 2003, it was endlessly criticized for replacing action with a "boring" psychoanalysis of Bruce Banner.

I think there was a mutated poodle in there somewhere, too. But I could be wrong.

Despite all of its flaws -- and it has quite a lot of them -- I always enjoyed Hulk. I foun...

Synopsis

Well, Mark Dancer’s review of Season Two of Bridezillas pretty much echoes my general thoughts on the show. Now, for those of you who haven’t read his review, go there. Come back, and see what I do with it.

Now again, I basically agree with Mark’s comments. Bridezillas is another in a growing list of shows featuring women (or young girls, as is the case with MTV’s Sweet Sixteen) that are either in upper-middle class relationships or in a very safe position in life tha...

Rising from Your Grave, You're about to Die, and E3 coming to an end, Welcome to the the family pet corpse that you keep buried in the backyard known as Dare to Play the Game.

Welcome to another edition of Dare to Play the Game. I'm your host that knows Stone Sour is a condition that you encounter with eating gummi worms while you are smoking pot. Seriously, go get their new cd this week, its called Come What(ever) may. Supposed to be pretty good. I tried win...

Kathy Bates and the late Jessica Tandy star in Fried Green Tomatoes, a wonderfully surprising film about four strong women finding friendship, loyalty, and strength in each other. Sounds boring, right? I thought so, too, until I actually sat down and gave the extended anniversary edition a chance. The film, based on Fannie Flagg's novel Fried Green Tomatoes at the Whistle Stop Cafe, is really two stories in one. Bates plays an unhappy Southern woman stuck in a marriage routine, which doesn't favor her n...

Synopsis

In 1930, the animation department at Warner creates three characters: the Warner Brothers and their sister, Dot. The siblings run riot, however, and are finally caught and imprisoned in the Warner water tower. Flash-forward to today, when they escape to once more wreak havoc.

From the opening song and credit sequence (which echoes The Bugs Bunny Road Runner Hour) on, this is an affectionate look back to the golden age of the Warner Looney Tunes, and mixes postmodern humour w...

We Were Soldiers unfortunately, was a film that didn’t really find its audience, and was also a casualty of the 9/11 attacks. Whereas Black Hawk Down was released in late December 2001/early January 2002 and made almost $110 million, We Were Soldiers was released six months later, and made $30 million less. Figure in the then-recent surge of big studio films of that genre in recent years, notably Saving Private Ryan and Band of Brothers, perhaps We Were Soldiers was the film ...

What’s that thing on your shoulder? Oh yeah, it’s almost the end of fricken summer, go out and play already!!!

Well, after my proverbial guts had been spilled on the floor last week, let’s look at news and notes on the HD-DVD and Blu-Ray fronts, shall we?

Warner Brothers teased HD supporters by promising a release of Good Night and Good Luck on the same day as it’s Blu cousin, but is holding off for now, for reasons unbeknownst to be as of this writing. At least there will be a Blu-R...