I first picked up Philip Pullman’s novel, The Golden Compass, for the typical reason: I was looking for something to fill the void between Harry Potter books. This movie adaptation was likely made with similar motives, but I think viewers expecting a Potter-esque fun-ride might be a bit disappointed or confused by Compass’s extra complexity….
Category: Reviews
Battlestar Galactica: Razor + a funny post for BSG fans
So, I watched the 2-hour morsel of BSG (aka Battlestar Galactica: Razor) to keep us hungry until whenever season 4 finally airs. It was a pretty good extended-episode, flashing back to the story of what happened on board the Pegasus after the Cylons attacked, as well as a separate story of a rescue mission during…
Enchanted – Movie Review
When you see how easily an animated fairy tale morphs into a contemporary romantic comedy, you’ll wonder why it’s taken so long for Disney to come up with this movie. Most romantic comedies are essentially tales of storybook love dressed in modern clothing anyway. Enchanted is just a whimsically literal take on that connection. Animated…
Beowulf – Movie Review
What can we expect from a fully-computer-animated movie without Pixar in the credits or a green ogre in the lead? With Beowulf, hit director Robert Zemekis improves upon the motion-capture techniques used in his Polar Express to bring an ancient, legendary monster-slayer to vivid, digital life. Seeing it in IMAX 3-D, I was subjected to…
August Rush – Movie Review
It’s been quite some time since I decided that I just don’t get music movies. When a character becomes so inspired by music that he will sacrifice anything to express it, I don’t understand what’s going on in there. Movies like Shine, My Immortal Beloved, and Amadeus all confound me a bit. Along comes August…
Halloween 2007 – Sci-Fi TV Scare-athon
Inspired by a recent post on SyFy Portal (The 10 Scariest Episodes On Sci-Fi TV), I wanted to spend this Halloween enjoying back-to-back episodes of the scariest sci-fi television. Generally, television is not scary: they’ve got to be sensitive to the kiddies in the audience, plus the standards for content are much stricter. You’re not…
Fall TV 2007 Pt. 3 – More Shows
I don’t give up on new shows until after at least watching 2 episodes (but last week’s Moonlight is really pushing my tolerance in that regard), but the rest of the new and returning shows that I watched were a bit disappointing. Pushing Daisies This highly-anticipated new show is very quirky in that Tim-Burton-esque, magic-realism…
Fall TV 2007 Pt. 2 – New Shows
The new shows that caught my eye this year are mostly those with a little bit of oddness to them. This season there are a few shows that try to add a bit of specialness to otherwise “ordinary” characters (I guess that’s the Heroes influence). Bionic Woman Easily my most anticipated, this latest “reinvention” from…
Fall TV 2007 Pt. 1 – Returning Shows
Everyone starts with the new shows, but since I watched the old shows first, that’s where I’m going to begin: Heroes I’m assuming you all watched the return of last year’s hot new show, so let’s get to it. I’m still not convinced that Hiro’s time-trip back to feudal Japan isn’t a premature shark-jumping, but…
