Let’s just admit it: the Star Wars actors are a part of our national consciousness.  For whatever reason, George Lucas’s original trilogy resonated with audiences so powerfully that nearly three decades after their release, the …

From The Last Samurai and Memoirs of a Geisha to Babel and even Godzilla, many of Hollywood’s greatest hits and most treasured classics have been set in Japan.  But setting has been only one reason …

By Richard von Busack
Dana Brown is the son of the man I’ve heard described as the only really financially successful independent filmmaker in history, Bruce Brown (Endless Summer, et al). Happily the guava didn’t fall …

Let’s just be honest: there are some ugly actors in Hollywood who have made it quite big – bigger, in fact, than their more physically appealing contemporaries.  Now, lest you think we are being unduly …

Our Favorite Australian Actors
We, as all fans of cinema do, love to take time to reflect on our favorite Australian actors.  Anyone familiar with Hollywood knows that the industry loves its Aussies, having made many …

By Richard von Busack
An animator who helped shrink Julia Roberts to Tinkerbelle size for Hook told me “Even six inches of her is too much.” This seemed too mean a comment to repeat until …

by Richard von Busack
Even without the explanatory title at the end of the film, it’s clear that the Banco Chinchorro—site of the film Alamar—is one of the rarest places on Earth.
Already a marine sanctuary, this …

by Richard von Busack
The worst creeps are the most self-righteous ones, and the creepy Middle Men specializes in justifications. In the ee cummings phrase, it stinks of excuse. As he rigorously emulates the Goodfellas flash …

by Richard von Busack
The beauty of I Am Love is perplexing; it’s as bewildering as the beauty of its star, the lean Scottish redhead Tilda Swinton. Like Julianne Moore, Swinton is a congenitally brave actress …

LISBETH Salander is back. That fact may be more important than the sometimes eyebrow-raising plot of The Girl Who Played With Fire. At a certain point, Hitchcock’s Excuse (“Nobody calls the police, because it wouldn’t …