"2002"

Humphrey Bogart was once asked if he had any difficulty putting aside his tough image to play a romantic leading man in “Casablanca” (1942). He said it was easy. “It helps,” Bogie said, “if you’re looking into the eyes of Ingrid Bergman.”

The movies' much beloved Everyman, Tom Hanks, turns 59 today, and he seems to be mellowing beautifully.

 Life is full of weird coincidences: The first time Brad Pitt’s star power really hit me was in a film directed by...Robert Redford. The movie, of course, was Brad’s big breakthrough, 1992’s “A River Runs Through It”, in which Brad plays the more rebellious of two brothers growing up in 1920’s Montana. Watching it over twenty years ago, I vividly remember thinking that Redford was directing a younger version of himself. Think about it: they look alike, they talk alike, and a generation apart, each would be considered for the same kind of roles. Each in their younger days had the fair, clean-cut quality commonly referred to as “All-American”.

I can vividly recall the first moment I saw Meryl Streep on-screen. The film was “The Deer Hunter” (1978). Her part was relatively small — she played the stateside love interest of two men shipped off to Vietnam — but I was immediately struck by her presence. 

Seemingly more machine than man, Churchill lived to see his 90th birthday, smoking and tippling pretty much the whole way, getting by on the occasional cat nap.

We’ve got a special streaming suggestion for you weekend warriors: it’s Samurai Saturday. Samurai movies, known in Japan as “chambara” (literally, “sword fighting movies”), were originally associated with dramatic rather than action movies (think 1954’s “Seven Samurai”). The tendency towards more action-oriented films didn’t occur until later, when a slew of violent samurai films (some laughably cheesy and obvious) downgraded the genre to “B-Movie” status in the ‘70s and ‘80s with enough bright-red paint "blood" spraying each battle set to repaint the Golden Gate Bridge.  Nevertheless, numerous “chambara” from the 1960’s had a massive effect on audiences (some of whom went home to practice spearing each other) as well as filmmakers. You can see the influence of pioneering “Samurai” directors like Akira Kurosawa, Hiroshi Inagaki, and Masaki Kobayashi in the work of filmmakers Sergio Leone, George Lucas, David Mamet, and Quentin Tarantino, among others. 

I’ve written before about my particular love for mysteries and suspense films. When done well, they tease the mind and quicken the pulse. In a world bursting with distractions, you suddenly find yourself totally focused, hooked, transported.

French cinema is alive and well in the 21st century, as evidenced by these twelve titles, all made since the millennium. They are all…magnifique!

You need not be a world traveler to appreciate the rich and exotic cultures to be found in Asia. No matter where you are, it’s always fascinating to examine the myriad ways East differs from West.