In searching relentlessly through the trash can of film history, I tracked down three music-related films that were so cracked I needed to write about them: Young Toscanini is a 1988 film by Franco Zeffirelli starring C. Thomas Howell…
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What can you say about a 1972 film concerning a pretty, blonde L.A. socialite (who’s secretly a necrophiliac) which also co-stars Lyle Waggoner (of The Carol Burnett Show fame)? Well that’s what you get, and more, in the gloriously deranged…
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I recently re-watched the Blu-rays of Psych-Out and The Trip and was instantly plunged back into the era of free love, bell bottoms, sandals, love beads and frugging in a disco under a strobe light. It also made me realize…
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Kids know there are monsters in the world. They see it constantly on TV that there are dark forces at work out there. And now, with the rash of school shootings, it’s upsetting to imagine children spending their entire youth…
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Two great series are streaming now on Netflix- The Forest, a wonderfully atmospheric French 6-episode series about the police investigation of some missing girls. And The Five, a 10 -episode British series created by mystery writer Harlan Coben about the…
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I saw an angel once. It was in the 1970’s- my first summer in Provincetown, on Cape Cod. I consumed several bad clams, got hepatitis and turned the color of a stick of Land O’Lakes butter. One morning, half-crazed with…
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If ever there was a director who deserves critical reevaluation it’s the Czech-born Hugo Haas who wrote, produced, directed and starred in over a dozen movies in the 1950s. Very few are available on home video. In Leonard Maltin’s Movie…
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Dietrich & Von Sternberg In Hollywood (Criterion) A staggering box set of director Josef von Sternberg’s six films with his muse- Marlene Dietrich. There’s Morocco (1930), where the gorgeous Dietrich is singing in a Moroccan club in male drag and…
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When times get hard some people reach for the bottle for comfort. Others shop extravagantly to dull their depression. But for me, I always reach for a movie to find solace. There are certain key films that can always cheer…
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The first stages of dating are always perilous. That awkward “getting to know you” period is constantly fraught with all sorts of dangers. So, what do you do to be more comfortable with your new companion? Go for a meal…
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