I am honored and proud to be a voting member of The Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences that nominates and then votes each year for the Oscars. I have said often, however, that I have absolutely no idea how to judge a "Best" film or actor or screenplay or anything else. To attempt to do so seems akin to going into the Louvre and picking out the "best" painting. So the Van Gogh is "better" than the Renoir or Gauguin or any other painting? Oh, please! In addition, movie politics (as … [Read more...]

As always, my list includes my own personal favorites, not the films I consider best, a classification I find to be both impossible and absurd. I have no idea what the "best film" is. I only know the films I enjoyed the most. Happy 2010! 1...The Blind Side. One of the most touching, charming, wondrous, uplifting and miraculous movies of the last several years. Sandra Bullock was born to play the lead role and has never been better. Hollywood has to stop equating dark, cynical and dreary with … [Read more...]

Remember what it was like to go to a movie and cry and laugh and applaud and feel great about just being alive when you walk out of the theater? I do. And you will too when you run as fast as you can to a neighborhood theater to see The Blind Side, one of the most touching, wondrous, uplifting and miraculous movies of the last several years. And, what makes the experience even more delicious is that the film is based on a true story. Michael Oher was a homeless teenager in Memphis, TN. His … [Read more...]

It feels so good to have a movie to write about again. For those of you who have followed this column for the last seven years, please know that, as long as films like Cold Souls are released, I will continue this column, even though it will be on an irregular basis. Now, to the film. Cold Souls is a jaw-dropping, original film, with the only possible comparison being to Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, one of my favorite films in Spiritual Cinema. In Cold Souls, the gifted actor … [Read more...]

You know the kind of person who always seems angry at or disgusted by the world and all the people around him? The kind of guy who seems to wear a big sign around his neck that says, "Don't bother me for any reason at any time." Ever wonder about why that kind of person is the way he is...or do we just try to avoid him? What about the guy who is married to what seems to be, and actually is, a wonderful woman who loves him, treats him well, but he cheats on her anyway? What goes on … [Read more...]