James Cameron’s 1997 blockbuster movie Titanic broke box office records and garnered bushels of awards; it remains one of the top-grossing films of all times. A large part of its appeal lay in the central (fictional) story of the doomed young lovers, London socialite Rose DeWitt Decatur (Kate Winslet) and impoverished American artist Jack Dawson…
“I saw a man on a stage scream, “Put me back in my cage!” I saw him hanged by his tie; I saw enough to make me cry.” — “Planet Earth,” Devo As a young child, I had a pronounced morbid streak (much to my mother’s dismay), devouring anthologies of ghost/horror stories from the library,…
Past, present and future are literally in the cards for the characters that populate Charles Williams‘ 1932 novel The Greater Trumps. Curmudgeonly, perpetually dissatisfied Lothair Coningsby, a Warden of Lunacy having a bit of a mid-life crisis, has inherited a collection of rare decks of cards from a late close friend. Among them is a…
Everyone seems to be abuzz these days about Apocalypto, the latest directorial effort by Mel Gibson. Gibson’s suffered a bit of beating in the press of late for his drunken anti-semitic rants, but never let it be said that the man can’t tell a good story. Apocalypto is Braveheart with a Mayan twist, and just…
“Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live.” — Exodus 22:18 It’s that time of year again, one short week before Halloween, when a refreshing crispness begins to creep into the air and the leaves begin to turn. It’s also the season when the religious wingnuts raise their usual objections to…
The much-anticipated film version of The Devil Wears Prada sparked numerous heated debates (and the occasional bloggorific rant) about its underlying themes and the potentially damaging subconscious “messages” it might be conveying to impressionable young girls. But the scene that caused the most howls of outrage was an exchange between Andy Sachs (Anne Hathaway) and…
Single women have a dreadful propensity for being poor, which is one very strong argument in favour of matrimony. — Jane Austen, in a letter dated March 13, 1816 There’s been a great deal of heated discussion in the blogosphere this past week about that infamous Forbes column by Michael Noer. You know the one.…
“No man can be said to know anything, until he learns that every day is doomsday,” Ralph Waldo Emerson once famously observed. By that standard, there is no one more knowledgeable than Jack Chick, the controversial founder of Chick Publications, purveyor of fine evangelical propaganda since the 1960s. For decades, Chick has been a one-man…
While most of the world has been fixated on the ongoing FIFA World Cup tournament, a Hollywood film crew has been gallivanting around the globe shooting the next installment of the hugely successful James Bond movie franchise: Casino Royale, a remake of the 1967 classic spy spoof, based on Ian Fleming’s very first Bond move.…
While a large part of mainstream America was blissfully enjoying their long Memorial Day weekend, fans of the Ultimate Fighting Championship franchise were glued to their Pay-Per-View TV sets, watching the end of an era. In the pinnacle event of UFC-60, the reigning welterweight champion, Matt Hughes, faced off against UFC legend Royce Gracie —…
[Author’s Note: Some of you may have received an earlier, unfinished version of this particular column. It was not, as one reader suggested, an avant-garde literary choice — Behold! The Half-Finished Post! — but a sad case of an inexperienced blogger accidentally hitting “Publish Now” when she really meant to save it in “Draft” mode.…
I’m a huge fan of the Japanese anime series Fullmetal Alchemist, a bizarre, multi-faceted mix of screwball comedy, heartfelt pathos, and gut-wrenching tragedy — not to mention rich metaphorical textures. It’s the story of two brothers, Edward and Alphonse Elric, who lead an idyllic existence, despite their alchemist/father’s prolonged absence because of an ongoing war.…