Horror Thoughts ‘14—The Walking Dead, season 4 (2013-2014) ****

TV-MA, 16 45-min. episodes

Developer: Frank Darabont

Directors: Greg Nicotero, Guy Furland, Dan Sackheim, Tricia Brock, David Boyd, Michael Uppendahl, Jeremy Podeswa, Ernest Dickerson, Seith Mann, Julius Ramsay, Michael E. Satrazemis, Michelle Maclaren

Writers: Frank Darabont, Robert Kirkman (also graphic novels), Tony Moore (graphic novels), Charlie Adlard (graphic novels), Scott M. Gimple, Angela Kang, Matthew Negrete, Channing Powell, Nichole Beattie, Curtis Gwinn, Seth Hoffman,

Starring: Andrew Lincoln, Norman Reedus, Steven Yeun, Lauren Cohen, Chandler Riggs, Danai Gurira, Melissa McBride, Scott Wilson, Emily Kinney, Chad L. Coleman, Sonequa Martin-Green, Lawrence Gilliard Jr., Alanna Masterson

Guest starring: Melissa Ponzio, Kerry Condon, Kyle Gallner, Vincent Martella, Sunkirsh Bala, Brighton Sharbino, Robin Lord Taylor, David Morrissey, Audrey Marie Anderson, Jose Pablo Cantillo, Meyrick Murphy, Kirk Acevedo, Enver Gjokaj, Kyla Kenedy, Juliana Harkavy, Sherry Richards, Aldis Hodge, Brendan Fobbs, Michael Cudlitz, Josh McDermitt, Christian Serratos, Jeff Kober, Marcus Hester, Denise Crosby, Andrew J. West

What could’ve been the season where “The Walking Dead” jumped the shark, the show runners pulled back on where they were headed and brought the series back to the basics of the zombie genre. Things got heated in season three with the introduction of The Governor, which was an interesting line of exploration but took focus away from what the zombie analogy is really about. Characters skittered on the edge of betraying everything they were about, but season four focused them in a deliberate manner.

ZAM Review—World War Z: Unrated Version (2013) **

This review was originally written for and published in Zombie Apocalypse Monthly.

UR, 122 min.

Director: Marc Forster

Writers: Matthew Michael Carnahan, Drew Goddard, Damon Lindelof, J. Michael Straczynski, Max Brooks (novel)

Starring: Brad Pitt, Mireille Enos, Daniella Kurtesz, James Badge Dale, Ludi Boeken, Fana Mokoena, David Morse, Matthew Fox, Peter Capaldi, Pierfrancesco Favino, Ruth Negga, Mortiz Bleibtreu, Sterling Jerins, Abigail Hargrove

In the year since the theatrical release of Brad Pitt’s big screen adaptation of Max Brooks’ zombie apocalypse fictionalized history novel “World War Z”, the general consensus on the film version has been that of disappointment. This is despite the fact that the film grossed over $200 million in the U.S. theatrically after an expensive reshoot of the film’s original ending. In fact, it was more like a reshoot of the entire last act of the film, which was totally rewritten.

ZAM Review—White Zombie (1932) ***

This review was originally written for and published at Zombie Apocalypse Monthly.

NR, 69 min.

Director: Victor Halperin

Writers: Garnet Weston (story & dialogue), William B. Seabrook (novel “The Magic Island”)

Starring: Bela Lugosi, Madge Bellamy, Joseph Cawthorn, Robert Frazier, John Harron

When I was in high school—way back in the late ‘80s—I was an avid comic book collector. Some of my favorite comics were those focusing on vintage crime heroes, like The Shadow. During their 10^th Anniversary, the independent comic book publisher Eclipse put out a Shadow type of one-shot based not only on the vintage crime hero The Prowler, but also on the cult classic horror movie “White Zombie” titled quite simply “The Prowler in White Zombie”.

It wasn’t a great comic book. The Prowler was such an obvious rip-off of The Shadow and didn’t carry half of The Shadow’s mysterious nature. The villain, however, was taken directly from the “White Zombie” movie’s Bela Lugosi character, who looked like one of the coolest of the actor’s career in B-horror flicks. I had never heard of the movie at the time and quickly looked it up.

Penny Thoughts ‘14—Welcome to Sweden, season 1 (2014) ***

TV-14, 10 21-min. episodes

Creator: Greg Poehler

Director: Carl Åstrand

Writers: Greg Poehler, Josephine Bornebusch, Niclas Carlsson, Peter Arrhenius, Jesper Harrie, Martin Soneby

Starring: Greg Poehler, Josephine Bornebusch, Lena Olin, Claes Månsson, Christopher Wagelin

Guest starring: Per Svensson, Amy Poehler, Basim Sabah Albasim, Will Ferrell, Aubrey Plaza, Madeleine Martin, Hanna Ahlström, Claudia Galli, Illeana Douglas, Patrick Duffy, Björn Ulvaeus, Björn Ranelid, Marques Ray, Malin Åkerman, Gustav Roth, Pam Murphy, Matt Oberg

When I was about 10, my family hosted an exchange student from Sweden. It was like having an alien coming to live with you. Well, it was for a ten-year-old. He was tall, devastatingly handsome. He played futball. He had no idea how to play football. He listened to strange music (Pink Floyd). He smelled funny (cologne). And, by the time he left some nine months later, he was a member of the family. He attended my wedding. He’s held an open invitation for any of us to visit him in Sweden. Like the fools we are, we’ve never made good on this. Perhaps now I will.

Penny Thoughts ‘14—World’s Greatest Dad (2009) ***½

R, 99 min.

Director/Writer: Bobcat Goldthwait

Starring: Robin Williams, Daryl Sabara, Alexie Gilmore, Evan Martin, Henry Simmons, Geoff Pierson, Lorraine Nicholson, Mitzi McCall, Tony V., Naomi Glick, Zach Sanchez, Ellie Jamison, Michael Moore, Jermaine Williams

OK. First of all, it’s important that we get a hold of ourselves. Just because we’re worked up that a beloved comedian has been taken away from us, let’s not just jump to the conclusion that a three and a half star review of a movie of his that we’ve never heard of means that we’re going to get an actual good version of “Patch Adams”. “World’s Greatest Dad” is a very dark comedy. It isn’t Robin Williams running around in a dress and a wig putting out the fire on his fake grandma boobs. It isn’t the manic straight man making it seem OK to other straight people that gay people exist, because they’re funny. It isn’t another Mork from Ork teaching us the greeting “Nanu, nanu.” This is a movie that may inform us as to the dark nature of the thoughts that might’ve fueled the genius we all lost.

Penny Thoughts ‘14—The World’s End (2013) ****

R, 109 min.

Director: Edgar Wright

Writers: Simon Pegg, Edgar Wright

Starring: Simon Pegg, Nick Frost, Paddy Considine, Martin Freeman, Eddie Marsan, Rosamund Pike, Pierce Brosnan, David Bradley, Michael Smiley, Steve Oram

Voice: Bill Nighy

“The World’s End” was one of my favorite movies from 2013. I think some people might look at it and wonder why. It’s a strange British movie. It’s part of the Cornetto Trilogy by filmmakers Edgar Wright, Simon Pegg and Nick Frost. The two previous films were “Shaun of the Dead” and “Hot Fuzz”. The only three things that really tie them together are these three artists, the fact that the ice cream treat called a cornetto appears at some point in each film and each is a spoof of a decade specific genre.

Penny Thoughts ‘14—The Wolverine (2013) ***

PG-13, 126 min.

Director: James Mangold

Writers: Mark Bomback, Scott Frank

Starring: Hugh Jackman, Tao Okamoto, Rila Fukushima, Hiroyuki Sanada, Svetlana Khodchenkova, Brian Tee, Haruhiko Yamanouchi, Will Yun Lee, Famke Janssen

I feel like I’ve been spinning around in circles looking up at the sky after having spent the last week or so watching the six X-Men movies leading up to the new “X-Men: Days of Future Past”. What with starting in the “not too distant future” of the first film, the flashbacks that permeate all of them, then bouncing back to the early 70s for the first Wolverine movie, then back another decade for “First Class”, then back to the present (or is it still the not too distant future?) for “The Wolverine”. I imagine considering the time traveling nature of “Days of Future Past” that feeling won’t be going away when I go to see it tomorrow.

Ebert Thoughts ‘14—Wadjda (2013) ****

PG, 98 min.

Director/Writer: Haifaa Al Mansour

Starring: Waad Mohammed, Reem Abdullah, Abdullrahman Algohani, Ahd, Sultan Al Assaf

In the early days of Ebertfest—when it was called the Overlooked Film Festival—they used to have a free family matinee on Saturdays. I don’t belive the first film of the day is still called a family matinee, and I don’t believe it is free any more. Of course, it may be. I haven’t been there in five years. Anyway, It was usually a film like “Wadjda”. Sometimes a foreign film, always a strong story about a child, the 1^st Saturday matinee was a movie you might expect children to struggle with, but it always held great fascination for them because it involved children.

Penny Thoughts ‘14—The Wolf of Wall Street (2013) ***½

R, 180 min.

Director: Martin Scorsese

Writers: Terence Winter, Jordan Belfort (book)

Starring: Leonardo DiCaprio, Jonah Hill, Margot Robbie, Kyle Chandler, Jon Bernthal, Jean Dujardin, Christin Milioti, P.J. Byrne, Kenneth Choi, Brian Sacca, Henry Zebrowski, Ethan Suplee, Rob Reiner, Joanna Lumley, Jon Favreau, Matthew McConaghey

In his age, Martin Scorsese has become content to observe rather than propelling his characters down the rabbit hole with terse story structure. There are scenes in “The Wolf of Wall Street” where it seems as if Scorsese just lets his characters be. This works well for the kind of laid-back comedy he’s going for. Not that the lives of the characters are laid back, just the film’s approach to observing them.

Penny Thoughts ‘13—The Way Way Back (2013) ***½

PG-13, 103 min.

Directors/Writers: Nat Faxon, Jim Rash

Starring: Liam James, Sam Rockwell, Toni Collette, Steve Carell, Allison Janney, AnnaSophia Robb, Maya Rudolph, Rob Corddry, Amanda Peet, River Alexander, Zoe Levin, Nat Faxon, Jim Rash

I asked my boys if they had any special word for the back row of seats in the minivan. They didn’t, and I felt the sense of loss that the summer movie “The Way Way Back” conveys at times. When I was a youth, “the way way back” referred to the back section of the station wagon—the minivans of the day. The back section held all the luggage, but many of them also contained a third seat row that faced the back of the car. The way way back was alternately the best place to travel and the worst. Since there was no well for your legs in the back, it was really a place only suitable for small children. Of course, safety tests eventually proved it wasn’t actually suitable for anyone. If you requested the way way back, it was the best place to be because you could just be in your own world where the road went backwards. However, if you were sent to the way way back, it was a condemnation. You weren’t fit to travel with the rest of the family.

The Web is Alive with a Difference of Opinion

Ever since NBC broadcast its grand experiment “The Sound of Music Live”, the Internet has been abuzz with both the naysayers and those who have embraced the production as a new holiday monument. It is the most polarizing TV event I can remember in recent years. Initially, I had no plans to cover it on this blog, but when I found myself catching about half of it during the live broadcast and with the strong immediate reaction audiences were having toward it, I felt I had to weigh in, for my own sake if no one else’s.

Since I posted my negative review, which did not pull punches about my opinion on Carrie Underwood’s performance as the iconic character of Maria Von Trapp, I’ve seen a great many of my friends post reproaches against the negative reception of Underwood. One particular post that was written by one of the many who took to Twitter to bash Underwood live during the broadcast contained an about face of her negative views of the production and compared the critical hazing of Underwood to cyber bullying.

The World’s End / **** (R)

Gary King: Simon Pegg

Andy Knightly: Nick Frost

Steven Prince: Paddy Considine

Peter Page: Eddie Marsan

Oliver Chamberlin: Martin Freeman

Sam Chamberlin: Rosamund Pike

Guy Shephard: Pierce Brosnan

Voice of The Network: Bill Nighy

Focus Features presents a film directed by Edgar Wright. Written by Simon Pegg & Edgar Wright. Running time: 109 min. Rated R (for pervasive language including sexual references).

“The World’s End”—the supposed third film in the “The Three Flavours Cornetto” trilogy by filmmakers Edgar Wright, Simon Pegg, and Nick Frost—is bloody brilliant. There’s no better way to say it; and I just don’t feel like beating around the bush about it. It’s bleedin’ aces, Bob’s your uncle! That’s no codswallup. You aren’t going to see a funnier movie this year. You’ll laugh your arse off. It’s truly the dog’s bollocks. It takes the piss out of 50s/60s science fiction/alien invasion films, and yet it is one at the same time. It’s just bloody brilliant.

We’re the Millers / *** (R)

David Clark: Jason Sudeikis

Rose O’Reilly: Jennifer Aniston

Kenny Rossmore: Will Poulter

Casey Mathis: Emma Roberts

Brad Gurdlinger: Ed Helms

Don Fitzgerald: Nick Offerman

Edie Fitzgerald: Kathryn Hahn

Melissa Fitzgerald: Molly Quinn

Warner Bros. Pictures and New Line Cinema present a film directed by Rawson Marshall Thurber. Written by Bob Fisher & Steve Faber and Sean Anders & John Morris. Running time: 110 min. Rated R (for crude sexual content, pervasive language, drug content, and brief graphic nudity).

There’s an old entertainment adage that states that comedy is hard. It’s always assumed that means it’s hard to perform, or direct, or just pull off in general. In my acting days—which hopefully aren’t entirely behind me—I found comedy to be rather easy to pull off. It came naturally to me. I was good at acting goofy, and it didn’t always require those “real” emotions that, for me were always a little harder to connect with inside. I suppose this is also the case for many comedic actors, most especially actors like the ones that inhabit the cast of the movie “We’re the Millers”.

The Wolverine / *** (PG-13)

Logan/Wolverine: Hugh Jackman

Mariko: Tao Okamoto

Yukio: Rila Fukushima

Shingen: Hiroyuki Sanada

Viper: Svetlana Khodchenkova

Noburo: Brian Tee

Yashima: Haruhiko Yamanouchi

Harada: Will Yun Lee

Jean Grey: Famke Janssen

20^th Century Fox presents a film directed by James Mangold. Written by Mark Bomback and Scott Frank. Based on the Marvel Comics character. Running time: 126 min. Rated PG-13 (for sequences of intense sci-fi action and violence, some sexuality and language).

Before it opened, the best thing “The Wolverine” had going for it was that it couldn’t be worse than 2009’s “X-Men Origins: Wolverine”. That film might’ve been a sign of over-eagerness on the studio’s part to continue the X-Men franchise about the Marvel Comics mutant superhero team. They tapped a visionary director in Gavin Hood, but he was inexperienced in Hollywood and may have allowed the executives too much input in the final product. It was also confusing for audiences to delve into the origin of the team’s most popular member, Wolverine, since the secrecy of his origin has always been one of the character’s appealing qualities. His mutant healing factor means that he may be hundreds of years old, and few writers have been willing to lift the cloud of mystery about his actual origins. So the film was a patchwork version of violence with a large number of new mutants introduced that made it a jumbled mess of special effects and nonsense.

Penny Thoughts ’13—Wrong (2013) **½

NR, 94 min.

Director/Writer: Quentin Dupieux

Starring: Jack Plotnick, Eric Judor, Alexis Dziena, Steve Little, William Fichtner, Regan Burns, Mark Burnham, Arden Myrin, Kuma

“Wrong” is the sophomore picture from the man who brought us all what we wanted to see in the film “Rubber”, a film about a tire that terrorized people with its telepathic powers. That’s right. You read correctly, “a tire that terrorized people with its telepathic powers.” It was a surprisingly brilliant film in its simplicity and absurdness.

World War Z / **½ (PG-13)

Gerry Lane: Brad Pitt

Karin Lane: Mireille Enos

Thierry Umutoni: Fana Mokoena

Segen: Daniella Kertesz

Captain Speke: James Badge Dale

Paramount Pictures presents a film directed by Marc Forster. Written by Matthew Michael Carnahan and Drew Goddard & Damon Lindelof, and J. Michael Straczynski. Based on the novel by Max Brooks. Running time: 116 min. Rated PG-13 (for intense frightening zombie sequences, violence and disturbing images).

I’m beginning to feel a little schizophrenic about the zombie subgenre of horror movies. On the one hand, I’ve seen so many zombie movies—especially over the last decade—that I’m beginning to feel zombied out. On the other, it’s the one horror subgenre that continually produces something original and intriguing to the genre no matter how overdone it is. So, along comes the film adaptation of a novel that has proven to be one of those zombie event stories that people are responding to in a way that suggests there are still avenues to pursue in the zombiverse.

Penny Thoughts ‘13—The Walking Dead, season 3 (2012-2013) ****

TV-14, 16 45-min. episodes

Creators: Frank Darabont, Robert Kirkman (graphic novels), Tony Moore (graphic novels), Charlie Adlard (graphic novels)

Directors: Ernest Dickerson, Bill Gierhart, Guy Ferland, Gregory Nicotero, Dan Attias, Daniel Sackheim, Lesli Linka Glatter, Seith Mann, Tricia Brock, David Boyd, Stefan Schwartz

Writers: Frank Darabont, Robert Kirkman, Tony Moore, Charlie Adlard, Glen Mazzara, Nichole Beattie, Evan T. Reilly, Sang Kyu Kim, Angela Kang, Scott M. Gimple, Frank Renzulli, Ryan C. Coleman

Starring: Andrew Lincoln, Sarah Wayne Callies, Laurie Holden, Norman Reedus, Steve Yeun, Lauren Cohan, Chandler Riggs, Danai Gurira, Melissa McBride, Emily Kenny, Scott Wilson, Michael Rooker, David Morrisey, Dallas Roberts

Guest starring: Irone Singleton, Lew Temple, Theodus Crane, Nick Gomez, Markice Moore, Vincent Ward, Jose Pablo Cantillo, Julio Cesar Cedillo, Alexa Nikolas, Lawrence Kao, Chad L. Coleman, Sonequa Martin-Green, Donzaleigh Abernathy, Tyler Chase, Daniel Thomas May, Melissa Ponzio, Travis Love, Lennie James, Jon Bernthal

Season three of the AMC phenomenon series “The Walking Dead” is the longest and most devastating yet. Is this what we would come to during the zombie apocalypse? Probably more likely than we’d like to admit.

Penny Thoughts ‘13—Who Framed Roger Rabbit (1988) ***

PG, 104 min.

Director: Robert Zemeckis

Writers: Jeffrey Price, Peter S. Seaman, Gary K. Wolf (novel)

Starring: Bob Hoskins, Christopher Lloyd, Joanna Cassidy, Stubby Kaye, Alan Tilvern

Voices: Charles Fleischer, Kathleen Turner, Lou Hirsch, Mae Questel, Mel Blanc, Tony Anselmo, Mary T. Radford, Joe Alaskey, David Lander, June Foray, Russi Taylor, Richard Williams, Wayne Allwine, Tony Pope, Frank Sinatra

I was never as taken with “Who Framed Roger Rabbit” as many others seemed to be. I always felt it was loud and messy. It is, but I’m not so sure that’s a flaw anymore. I don’t think the zaniness of cartoons like Looney Tunes are necessarily successful because of those traits, however. Robert Zemeckis seemed to think that was the essence of cartoons in his 1988 live action/cartoon hybrid.

Penny Thoughts ‘13—We Have a Pope (2011) ***

NR, 102 min.

Director: Nanni Moretti

Writers: Nanni Moretti, Francesco Piccolo, Frederica Pontremoli

Starring: Michel Piccoli, Jerzy Stuhr, Renato Scarpa, Nanni Moretti, Franco Graziosi, Camillo Milli, Roberto Nobile, Ulrich von Dobschütz, Gianlucca Gobbi, Margherita Buy

The world was shocked this morning when it was reported that Pope Benedict XVI would become the first Pope to resign the post in over 700 years. Eight years ago, I learned more about the papacy than I ever knew when the Conclave selected Benedict as John Paul’s successor. Not being a Catholic, I can have no concept of what a big deal a development like this is, but I will go into this selection process knowing the difference between black smoke and white smoke.

Penny Thoughts ‘13—White Heat (1949) ****

NR, 114 min.

Director: Raoul Walsh

Writers: Ivan Goff, Ben Roberts, Virginia Kellogg (story)

Starring: James Cagney, Virginia Mayo, Edmond O’Brien, Margaret Wycherly, Steve Cochran, John Archer, Wally Cassell, Fred Clark

Since TCM’s 31 Days of Oscar began again this year, my DVR seems to be collecting an amazing array of classic films. The first that I’ve taken time to sit down with is the classic crime flick “White Heat” starring James Cagney. This is one of the great criminal portraits in American cinematic history.