Barack to Gay Youth: 'It Gets Better'

'Hereafter' ***1/2

clint eastwood continues to amaze me. he never looks back. he takes on new material with every directorial effort. and he always seems to succeed. 'hereafter' is the newest success. i'm never ashamed to say i cried...ever! and this film had tears rolling down my face intermittently a number of times. why? not too sure. maybe it was just the cumulative effect of the number of deaths i've lived through my whole life packed into 2hours and 9 minutes. but i am not saying this is a sad film....it isn't. nor is it a joyous film in that we now know what the hereafter is as we don't know this any more after seeing the film than the moment before it began. but it touched something deep within me. that says a lot to me. i liked these moments and the feelings. i liked the film in it's entirety also.

matt damon just keeps on growing as an actor with each role. he and eastwood ('invictus") make a good team. the rest of the cast, mostly unknown to me, all delievered the goods. there was no weak link in the cast.

'hereafter' heads into my top 5 of 2010. is it brilliant? no. is it eastwood's best? no. but it is damn good and better than most releases. is it a masterpiece? no. but it is a minor masterpiece.

'hereafter' touched my spirit.

Song of the Day: 'Time Warp'

sneak peak

'time warp' from the 'glee' 'rocky horror show' halloween episode 10/26

Fall Film Releases With Oscar Hopes

October 22

Hereafter
Cast: Matt Damon, Cecile de France, Bryce Dallas Howard
Director: Clint Eastwood
Screenwriter: Peter Morgan
Distrib: WB

The Company Men
Cast: Ben Affleck, Kevin Costner, Maria Bello, Chris Cooper, Tommy Lee Jones, Craig T. Nelson, Rosemarie DeWitt
Director/Writer: John Wells
Distrib: The Weinstein Co.

November 5

127 Hours
Cast: James Franco
Director: Danny Boyle
Screenwriter: Danny Boyle, Simon Beaufoy (adaptation)
Distrib:Fox Searchlight

Fair Game
Cast: Naomi Watts, Sean Penn
Director: Doug Liman
Screenwriter: Jez Butterworth, John-Henry Butterworth (adaptation)
Distrib: Summit

For Colored Girls
Cast: Thandie Newton, Janet Jackson, Mariah Carey, Whoopi Goldberg, Phylicia Rashad, Jurnee Smollett, Kimberly Elise, Kerry Washington, Loretta Devine, Macy Gray, Isaiah Mustafa
Director/Writer: Tyler Perry
Distrib: LionsGate

MegaMind
Feat. Voices of: Will Ferrell, Brad Pitt, Tina Fey, Jonah Hill, Ben Stiller
Director: Cameron Hood, Kyle Jefferson
Screenwriter: Alan Schoolcraft, Brent Simons
Distrib: Dreamworks

Welcome to the Rileys
Cast: James Gandolfini, Melissa Leo, Kristen Stewart
Director: Jake Scott
Screenwriter: Ken Hixon
Distrib: Samuel Goldwyn

November 12

Morning Glory
Cast: Rachel McAdams, Harrison Ford, Diane Keaton
Director: Roger Michell
Screenwriter: Aline Brosh McKenna
Distrib: Paramount

November 19

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 1
Cast: Daniel Radcliffe, Rupert Grint, Emma Watson
Director: David Yates
Screenwriter: Steve Kloves
Script: Novel Adaptation
Distrib: WB

Made in Dagenham
Cast: Sally Hawkins, Miranda Richardson, Rosamund Pike, Geraldine James, Bob Hoskins
Director: Nigel Cole
Screenwriter: Billy Ivory
Distrib: Sony Classics
Next Three Days
Cast: Russell Crowe, ELizabeth Banks
Director/Screenwriter: Paul Haggis
Distrib: Lionsgate

November 24

Love and Other Drugs
Cast: Jake Gyllenhaal, Anne Hathaway, Judy Greer, Josh Gad
Director: Ed Zwick
Screenwriter: Charles Randolph
Script: Novel Adaptation
Distrib: Fox

The King's Speech
Cast: Colin Firth, Geoffrey Rush, Helena Bonham Carter
Director: Tom Hooper
Screenwriter: David Seidler
Distrib: Weinstein Co.

Tangled
Voices: Mandy Moore, Zachary Levi
Director: Byron Howard, Nathan Greno
Distrib: Walt Disney Pictures

November 26

The Fighter
Cast: Mark Wahlberg, Christian Bale
Director: David O'Russell
Distrib: Paramount

December 1

Black Swan
Cast: Natalie Portman, Winona Ryder Director: Darren Aronofsky
Script: Original Distrib: Fox Searchlight

December 10

The Chronicles of Narnia
Cast: Ben Barnes
Director: Michael Apted
Distrib: Fox

The Tourist
Cast: Angelina Jolie, Johnny Depp, Paul Bettany
Director: Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck
Screenwriter: Julian Fellowes, Christopher McQuarrie, Jeffrey Nachmanoff
Distrib: Sony Pictures

The Tempest
Cast: Helen Mirren, Chris Cooper, Jeremy Irons, Reeve Carney, Djimon Hounsou, Russell Brand, Alfred Molina, Ben Wishaw, Felicity Jones, Geoffrey Rush
Director: Julie Taymor
Screenwriter: Julie Taymor
Distrib: Miramax

December 17

Everything You've Got
Cast: Reese Witherspoon, Owen Wilson, Paul Rudd, Jack Nicholson
Director: James L. Brooks
Screenwriter: James L. Brooks

December 22

Somewhere
Cast: Elle Fanning, Stephen Dorff
Director/Screenwriter: Sofia Coppola
Distrib: Focus

December 25

True Grit
Cast: Jeff Bridges, Matt Damon, Josh Brolin
Director: Joel Coen, Ethan Coen
Screenwriter: Joel Coen, Ethan Coen
Script: Novel Adaptation

December 29

Another Year
Cast: Lesley Manville, Ruth Sheen, Jim Broadbent
Director/Screenwriter: Mike Leigh
Distrib: Sony Classics

The Debt
Cast: Sam Worthington, Helen Mirren
Director: John Madden
Distrib: Miramax

December 31

Blue Valentine
Cast: Ryan Gosling, Michelle Williams
Director: Derek Cianfrance
Screenwriter: Derek Cianfrance et al
Script: Original
Distrib: Weinstein Co.

Crime Fiction in the news and on the 'Net: Weekly Round-up

There have been some more great crime fiction stories on the Web this past week - from newspapers, magazines, and fellow bloggers. Hopefully you will all like finding an interesting article or two linked here, that you enjoy reading. Of course several of the blog posts and stories from early in the week related to the terrific Bouchercon by the Bay crime writing festival held in San Francisco last weeked. It sure looked like a fantastic time, and I hope to make it to a Bouchercon one day myself.

Onto the round-up.

Crime Watch Weekly Round-Up: In the News and on the 'Net

• John Barber of the Globe and Mail looks at the strengthening crime fiction cohort at the upcoming Toronto Festival of Authors (where IFOA Noir has become something of the 'centrepoint'), asking if this is the year when 'murder got respectable', after Canadian crime writers suffered blatant snobbery by other authors in years past.
• The Hollywood Reporter takes a look at the TV retelling of the classic Sherlock Holmes character, starring Benedict Cumberbatch as a modern-day Holmes and Martin Freeman as Watson, calling it "superior sleuth TV".
• In an interesting interview with BBC News, Welsh author and Gold Dagger recipient Belinda Bauer (the first person to win the top award with a debut novel in 40 years) talks about enjoying horror fiction before writing crime (like our own rising star Paul Cleave), unexpected success, and the writing of BLACKLANDS.
• The Sowetan has an article on South African crime writer Diale Tlholwe, who will be appearing for the Miriam Tlali Reading and Book Club session at the African Literary Bookshop in Johannesburg today (Saturday).
• In good news for the crime fiction world, The Bookseller reports that Titan Books has acquired worldwide distribution rights to paperback series Hard Case Crime, whose former publisher Dorchester Publishing ceased mass market paperback publishing in August.
• Bob Patterson of OpEdNews.com gives one fan's perspective of the happenings at the recent Bouchercon festival. You can also read some other thoughts on Bouchercon from Ruth Jordan of Crimespree magazine here, from J.Kingston Pierce of The Rap Sheet here, from Jen Forbus of Jen's Book Thoughts here, and from Peter Rozovsky of Detectives Beyond Borders here.
• In an interesting interview with a new author, The Anchorage Daily News takes a look at a new crime novel written by Juneau Fisheries Biologist Scott Kelley.
• In a long-ish article, Peter Craven in The Australian takes a broader look at crime fiction, particularly Scandinavian crime fiction, on TV and in books, including comments about art and trash, popularity and quality, as he examines the second Swedish-language film instalment in Stieg Larsson's trilogy, which is now showing in Australian cinemas.

Have you (or will you) read Bauer's Gold Dagger-winning debut BLACKLANDS? Do you think the literary world is starting to respect crime fiction more? What do you think of the modern-day Sherlock Holmes? Have you been to Bouchercon? Thoughts and comments welcome.

Song of the Day Prempted by Annette

Happy Birthday Annette

annette's been out of the public eye for some time now as she battles ms. annette single handedly is credited with putting a certain generation of pre pubescent boys on the road to early manhood. if you have to ask it's best you don't.

we wish her well on her birthday.

annette recorded a few albums in her teens and released a few singles from them. here are a few of the mostly known.

annette became the most popular of the original mouseketeers so disney decided to write a 'serialized' segment simply titled 'annette'. the following song was introduced and charted on billboard within weeks of the serialized airing.


how will i know my love'

'tall paul'

'first name initial'

annette became a disney favorite and was given a guest shot role on the then prime time series 'zorro'


naturally by that point they wrote a song for her character called 'lonely guitar'