I really have no reason to post this other than the fact that I just finished watching Death Comes to Town, the very funny murder mystery mini-series by The Kids in the Hall. Like most people my age, I have a special place in my heart for the absurdist, cross-dressing humor of the troupe and […]
Screenplay by Larry Cohen Before he was a prolific spec screenwriter, he was a prolific independent filmmaker, and before he was a prolific independent filmmaker, Larry Cohen was a prolific television writer. In the ‘60s alone, he created four series and wrote episodes of thirteen other series, including such popular programs as The Defenders and […]
Only enormously talented people could have made Death to Smoochy. Those with lesser gifts would have lacked the nerve to make a film so bad, so miscalculated, so lacking any connection with any possible audience. To make a film this awful, you have to have enormous ambition and confidence, and dream big dreams. –– Roger […]
Based on the 1974 film written and directed by Larry Cohen, Screenplay co-written by Larry Cohen When I started this blog, I made a promise in the first post: I know for certain that two recurring items will make appearances: First, I plan to watch and write about all the films of the immensely talented […]
I first watched Restrepo about seven months ago. The acclaimed documentary had just come out on DVD and I found it to be a stunning piece of work. That week, I talked about it on the podcast I was co-hosting for The Parallax Review. Unfortunately, D.B. had not seen the film, so it was just […]
Written, Produced, and Directed by Larry Cohen Larry Cohen has the ability to take himself seriously at times. For most filmmakers who traffic in genre pictures and satire, this can be a recipe for disaster. In Cohen’s case, this led to arguably his two best films: God Told Me To and It’s Alive. Where God […]
Executive Produced, Written, and Directed by Larry Cohen Sometimes Larry Cohen’s penchant for genre films mixed with social satire leads him into situations where those elements fail to gel. Such is the case with The Stuff. But despite the fact that the film doesn’t fully work as a satisfying whole, it’s still very entertaining and well […]
There is a common misperception that film critics enjoy bashing movies–salivating at the chance to collectively jump on the next blockbuster and declare it trash while we judge it from our ivory towers. The idea that I might enjoy watching, analyzing, and writing about a bad movie strikes me as incredibly asinine. Even if I […]
Story by Larry Cohen The rules of the WGA can be rather arbitrary when assigning credit for a film that was worked on by multiple writers. This can lead to a writer who contributed heavily to what wound up on screen not receiving any credit on the finished product. More often, a writer who did […]
Depending on your point of view, 13 Assassins is either very familiar or very unusual. For those with even a casual knowledge of Japanese cinema, the film is immediately recognizable as a remake of the better than average The Thirteen Assassins, a film that was a lesser riff on Seven Samurai. As a remake of […]
Obsessive Movie Nerd 