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The M Report
The M Report with Marlon Wallace is Delmarva's local source of what's hot and what's not at the movies and in the media. There are many films playing at your local multiplex. Hundreds more are marinating on local video store shelves or waiting to be downloaded from a myriad of online sources. Which ones are worth your money? Which are worth mewling about? The M Report will help take away some of the confusion. For hip, topical and insightful commentary, check out The M Report. |
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Top Story |
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TV Reviews |
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TV Review: Vampire Diaries
Kevin Williamson created the teen drama Dawson's Creek. He wrote the very satirical, horror film Scream (1996). This new series would seem to be a combination of the two. Williamson is definitely treading through familiar territory, too familiar as not to be innovative but rather boring.
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TV Review: Castle
Castle started its second season with a case of a dead body that gets kidnapped on route to the morgue, which leads to Russian mobsters and a very scary poker game.
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TV Review: The Beautiful Life
The first casualty of the fall TV season has fallen. The Beautiful Life on the CW has been canceled. Here's my reasoning as to why.
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TV Review: Grey Gardens
Of all the TV movies produced in 2009, this one is by far the best I've seen. It's nominated for 17 Emmys. Two of those Emmys go to the movie's female stars, Drew Barrymore and Jessica Lange, who richly deserve them. Lange, is of course, always amazing whereas Barrymore perhaps gives the best performance of her career.
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TV Review: Melrose Place
Since the CW resurrected the hit TV series Beverly Hills 90210, about a group of teenagers in the aforementioned city and zip code, it was only obvious that the resurrection of the early 90s spin-off Melrose Place would follow. So far, the show seems poised to follow the same path of its predecessor. If so, it may take until 2010 before Melrose becomes interesting.
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TV Review: At the Movies
Last year, two new cast members joined the syndicated TV series where two film critics review movies and debate them. After one year though, both of those members have been fired and replaced.
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TV Review: Glee
The first episode of this series originally aired in May after American Idol, a singing competition show, and it was a perfect fit. It was perfect because this series is similarly about young people pursuing their vocal abilities and performing skills.
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TV Review: Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog
I can't really call this a TV review because this program was never broadcast on television. That fact, however, didn't stop the Emmy Awards from nominating it for one of its prime-time prizes. Up until now, for the year in question, the only requirement for Emmy nomination is that the program must be broadcast on TV. Apparently, not anymore!
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TV Review: House of Saddam
A longer and more appropriate title could have been the Fall of the House of Saddam. The four episode series, which originally aired last year on the BBC and HBO, depicts the coup that brought Saddam Hussein into power in Iraq and the eventual American invasion that led to his demise.
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TV Review: Kings
In many films and television shows, you'll find Biblical undertones, themes, and references. After all, the Bible is thee most popular book ever printed. There have been quite a few features and programs that have tried to translate or interpret various events and stories from the Good Book. This NBC series can be added to that list.
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Movie Reviews |
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Movie Review: Paranormal Activity
Yes, for those who don't know by now, Paranormal Activity is this year's Blair Witch Project.
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Movie Review: Bright Star
I love John Keats just as much as the next English major, but I'm sorry- I don't think there was enough here to justify making a film. Yes, he was a great poet, but he did not do anything in his life personally that would warrant a movie. Yes, he had a love affair, but it wasn't that great. It actually turns out to be one of the most boring love affairs I've ever seen on screen.
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Movie Review: The Informant!
This is a satirical biography, a comedy based on a real person's life. Matt Damon stars as Mark Whitacre, a man who made headlines in the mid-1990s when it was revealed that he was an FBI informant, a whistle-blower. However, it becomes increasingly apparent that Whitacre is not the best informant that the FBI ever had. In fact, he's in the running as the worst.
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Movie Review: (500) Days of Summer
Joseph Gordon-Levitt first made a name for himself on the hit TV series 3rd Rock from the Sun when he was just 15-years-old. Since the series ended in 2001, he's gotten rave reviews for roles in various
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Movie Review: Orphan
What's strange is not the skill and strength with which Esther, the seemingly, 9-year-old, adopted daughter, murders and maims. What's strange is that Vera Farmiga who plays Esther's adopted mother was in a film two years ago that was exactly like this one. It was called Joshua (2007).
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Movie Review: $9.99
Israeli filmmaker Tatia Rosenthal's adaptation of Etgar Keret's short stories is a refreshing and surprising, piece of stop-motion animation. This is not a children's tale, as from the opening scene where we see one of the characters trade coffee and cigarettes for bullets and blood.
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Movie Review: The Hurt Locker
When it comes to movies about George W. Bush's 2003 war in Iraq, none have been focused on actual battles or ground action. Recent Iraq war movies have been about the emotional effects on the soldiers
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Movie Review: District 9
There are too many things wrong with this movie, too many loopholes, too many questions. I understand what it was trying to do, but it had too many nagging things happening that didn't allow me to go with it.
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Movie Review: Away We Go
TV actors John Krasinski (The Office) and Maya Rudolph (Saturday Night Live) star as Bert and Verona, two, unwed, expecting parents who are both excited and anxious at the prospects. The two decide to travel to six cities across North America, visiting various friends and relatives in an almost desperate attempt to determine where they will ultimately dwell.
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Movie Review: Moon
David Bowie's son, Duncan Jones, wrote this story, specifically for actor Sam Rockwell who stars as Sam Bell, a lone astronaut in the future who operates a lunar mining base. An accident reveals an insidious plot that threatens the astronaut's sanity, as well as his life, in this eerie, sci-fi thriller.
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DVD Reviews |
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DVD Review: New York City Serenade
Independent, New York City filmmaker Frank Whaley develops a semi-autobiographical story about two friends whose friendship comes to its conclusion.
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DVD Review: Explicit Ills
This independent film was photographed in my hometown of Philadelphia, which was what sparked my interest. Typically, I wouldn't go with or enjoy a film like this. It doesn't have your typical story structure. There's no real narrative. It's basically a group of random scenes in the lives of a handful of poor people in the city.
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DVD Review: American Zombie
The summer of 2008 saw the new HBO series True Blood run with the premise of having the typically scary, supernatural beings, known as vampires, be a part of normal, everyday life. This independent comedy, released July 8, 2008, on DVD, basically did the same thing, only with zombies.
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DVD Review: August the First
Directed by Lanre Olabisi, this story of a postponed graduation party, which takes place all in one day, the titular date in fact, was shot with a lot of handheld camera angles, if only to signify the shakiness of the graduate's family.
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DVD Review: American Teen
Oscar-nominated documentarian Nanette Burstein follows a group of students in Warsaw, Ind., during their last year in high school. This is not a unique or original idea. There have been so many films and TV series dedicated to studying high school students. With nothing really bold or controversial to study here, this becomes another trifle.
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DVD Review: Azur & Asmar
Literature and cinema have been rife with stories about two people from opposing forces coming together either in friendship or romance like Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet or Mark Twain's Huckleberry Finn. From Sidney Poitier in The Defiant Ones to Eddie Murphy in Trading Places, Hollywood has exemplified how often it's necessary for odd couples, especially those of opposite ethnicities, to unite.
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DVD Review: Towelhead
I found the extras on this DVD more interesting than the actual movie. Not that the movie wasn't interesting.
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DVD Review: Happy-Go-Lucky
What's first striking is the musical score. Music can set such a mood. The score of Gary Yershon sets you up to be in a happy mood. As you watch the main character of Poppy, played by Golden Globe winner Sally Hawkins, cruising on her bike down a city street, the wind through her hair, the glee on her face, it makes you happy-go-lucky too.
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DVD Review: Standard Operating Procedure
On the DVD commentary, director Errol Morris confirmed my conclusion that this isn't just another recap of what happened at Abu Ghraib in 2003. This is a full and uncensored analysis of the most damning photographs taken in the new millennium, outside of those on Sept. 11, 2001.
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DVD Review: The Duchess
Nominated for two Oscars, the British period piece will likely lose to The Curious Case of Benjamin Button in both categories of Art Direction and Costumes. But the film, which boasts flourishing colors and clothes, will certainly give the competition a run for its money.
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Rehoboth Beach Film Society's Art House Completes a 4-Year Run
The Rehoboth Beach Film Society announces the suspension of the Art House Theater at Movies at Midway as of Nov. 10, 2009.
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Attack of the Cougars
According to Grant Barrett, a lexicographer who published an article about it two years ago, the term cougar, as it refers to women over 40 sexually pursuing men 10 to 20 years younger, was popularized by Valerie Gibson's 2001 book. It originated in 1999 by the woman who founded the Web site known as CougarDate.com, a dating service for older women.
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By special guest columnist Carlos Holmes
Movie Review: Taking Woodstock-An Exercise in Subjective Romanticism
Anyone's reaction to Ang Lee's Taking Woodstock will rely in part on one's generational background. Any viewer who is currently between the age of 50 and 80 is old enough to have heard of the generation-defining concert and might be more likely to find themselves caught up in the romanticism of it.
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Written by Guest Reviewer Carlos Holmes
Inglourious Basterds: A Cinematic Treat of Revisionist Wishful Thinking
When the fiery climatic end to the audacious undercover operation takes place toward the end of Inglourious Basterds, history purists are simply going to have to lighten up. Hopefully, all that takes place before the end of the movie - coupled with this forewarning - should generate enough forgiveness for Quentin Tarantino for the glaring historical inaccuracy.
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For weekend of 11/13/09 | Rank | Title | Weekend Gross | Weeks In
Release | | | 1 | 2012 | $65,000,000 | 1 | | 2 | Disney's A Christmas Carol | $22,325,000 | 2 | | 3 | Men Who Stare at Goats | $6,200,000 | 2 | | 4 | Precious: Based on the Novel Push by Sapphire | $6,090,000 | 2 | | 5 | Michael Jackson's This Is It | $5,100,000 | 3 | | 6 | The Fourth Kind | $4,743,750 | 2 | | 7 | Couples Retreat | $4,252,755 | 6 | | 8 | Paranormal Activity | $4,200,000 | 8 | | 9 | Law Abiding Citizen | $3,932,000 | 5 | | 10 | The Box | $3,185,000 | 2 |
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Action
