Topsy-Turvy: Criterion Collection
March 31, 2011
You have to hand it to Mike Leigh, a filmmaker who has the confidence to make a $20 million period musical with limited commercial appeal. In 1999, he released Topsy-Turvy, a musical drama chronicling W.S. Gilbert and Arthur Sullivan’s creation of The...
Kingdom of Heaven: Director’s Cut
May 23, 2006
Kingdom of Heaven (2005) was Ridley Scott’s costly epic about the Crusades that promptly flopped at the box office in North America. Clearly, the studio and Scott were hoping for another zeitgeist galvanizing response to this film like with Gladiator...
Kingdom of Heaven
January 13, 2006
There’s a moment in Kingdom of Heaven where our hero Balian asks his enemy Saladin what the city of Jerusalem is worth to him. “Nothing,” he replies. “Everything.” This paradox is the prevailing problem with the film itself;...
Dog Soldiers
November 6, 2003
Being a huge fan of the John Landis horror An American Werewolf in London I was very keen to see Dog Soldiers. Another werewolf movie shot in the UK using quality English actors was a prospect too good to miss. It would be gritty, dark and not afraid...
Trainspotting: Director’s Cut
February 19, 2003
When Trainspotting was released in 1996, it took the world by storm and caused a sensation not only in its homeland of England, but in the United States as well. Audiences couldn’t get enough of this gritty, funny tale of Scottish heroin addicts. The...