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Animal Aid has long been concerned about the growing tendency to scapegoat various animal species for the vices and excesses of human beings.
Some species are being targeted because they are deemed to interfere with modern agricultural or 'game' bird production systems; others, because they are regarded as urban 'pests' or 'health risks'.
Wild animals are already facing immense challenges from climate change, habitat destruction, pesticide use, loss of hedgerows, the urbanisation of gardens, roads traversing their environments and the ever-increasing urban sprawl. And those who do survive are often blamed for encroaching on our space! From the politically motivated badger cull to the 'gene cleansing' ruddy duck cull, wild animals pay the price for human demands.
Animal Aid calls for tolerance, for compassion and for a willingness to concede space to the natural world, even if that means unpopular species thrive at the expense of more favoured ones. It is morally obnoxious to dictate which species can live where and to kill those that do not fit into the grand scheme, and yet this is how much modern conservation is conducted.
Animal Aid argues that we must face up to our own shortcomings and take constructive action that remedies the damage. Blaming animals is both morally obnoxious and self-defeating. It is literally a dead-end to imagine that ecological harmony can be restored through the barrel of a gun or through the use of body-crushing traps, snares and poisons.
Grey Squirrels
The grey squirrel is a figure of hatred among certain groups, notably those with shooting or forestry interests, and certain 'conservationists' who believe that the mass killing of greys is justifiable in their quest to boost the number of red squirrels.
In two English counties, badgers are being shot in a government-sanctioned cull. The wild animals are said to be a 'reservoir' for bovine TB – a disease that affects cows, and can be spread by farmers moving cows around the country and putting infected slurry on large tracts of land. The poor welfare conditions of cows, their cramped housing and lax biosecurity all add to the likelihood of the disease spreading. Instead of cleaning up their act, farmers blame badgers.
Ruddy Duck
The Department for the Environment, Farming and Rural Affairs – Defra – is attempting to wipe out the UK population of these beautiful birds because some are said to fly to Spain and mate with the endangered (through hunting) white headed duck. The result is an 'impure' hybrid, which won't be tolerated by top table conservation groups and Defra.
Humane Wildlife Deterrence
Animal Aid encourages tolerance but there are times when we may need to deter an animal from a particular area, such as a squirrel who has taken up residence in your attic. Thankfully, many unwanted visitors can be deterred quite easily.
Once you know what attracts an animal to your home or garden, it can be changed. Often, the problem is that we leave food out or bins unsecured, but it may just be that your garage or rooftop is a cosy place out of the rain. For more information about humanely deterring wildlife, download Alternatives to Culling and the associated factfiles on birds, squirrels, foxes or mice and rats.Download our Alternatives to Culling report Read the factfiles Order a hard copy
Recent Campaign News
Government kills parakeets (29-09-2014)
United Utilities Calls off the Cull! (19-09-2014)
Badger Killing has Begun (09-09-2014)
Culling badgers 'won't control bovine TB' (03-07-2014)
'They just want to cull badgers' (24-06-2014)
Animal Aid's Badger Battle Bus on Tour... and recruiting badger campaigners (17-04-2014)
Badger Cull Announcement (03-04-2014)
Media Circus in a Panda Prison (31-03-2014)
Good news for the Hunting Act (26-03-2014)
It's official: Badger culls were 'ineffective and failed humaneness test' (28-02-2014)
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Movie News - Our extensive online Hollywood film and classic DVD news page.
Top News Stories
UCLA Screens Anthony Mann Series - Jan. 31 to March 30
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New Books
Missing Reels
By Farran Smith Nehme
Combining a love of old movies with romance in New York City, Nehme creates a work of fiction that that is a valentine for movie fans.
It is the late 1980s and plucky Ceinwen Reilly has just moved from Yazoo City, Mississippi, to New York City. Though trying to hold down a job as a vintage store salesgirl and living in an Avenue C walk-up that hardly exudes glamour, her love of movies and NYC repertory cinemas provides all the glamour she seeks.
When Ceinwen discovers that her downstairs neighbor may have starred in a forgotten silent film that hasn't been seen for ages, she decides to track down the missing movie. She begins an epic quest that brings her in contact with a cast of eccentric characters, including a bumbling, awkward and impossibly dreamy English math professor who is as rational as she is dreamy.
Intrigued by the young woman's quest, they band together to search for the long forgotten missing reels and uncover the mesmerizing New York City silent film underworld and--possibly--a happy ending.
Farran Smith Nehme has been writing about classic film at her blog, Self-Styled Siren, since 2005. She also is currently a freelance movie reviewer for the New York Post, and her film writing has appeared in The New York Times, Barron's , Cineaste , The Baffler, and many other publications. In 2008 she was named Film Blogger of the Year by GQ's Tom Carson. She lives in New York City.
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Scandals of Classic Hollywood
By Anne Helen Petersen
Movie-goers have long been fascinated with the scandalous side of Hollywood. Long before Charlie Sheen's escapades, Mel Gibson's melt-down and hacked nude photos of young stars were making headlines in TMZ, film fans were kept informed of Hollywood's scandals by tabloids, gossip and movie magazines that kept the spotlight firmly on the burgeoning celebrity culture.
Hollywood scandals have a way of being passed down, and along the way it becomes harder and harder to follow the facts amid all the salacious details. Kenneth Anger first tapped into celebrity scandals with his Hollywood Babylon books and seemingly hit the mother lode when sales of the books rocketed to the top of best-seller lists. Over the years, the stories in those books have been told and retold as readers shared the juicy details with others, and too often, lost along the way were the real facts of these stories.
Petersen, a film professor, offers a different perspective on the subject of Hollywood stars and the bad behavior that created the controversies that swirled around them. From the scandal surrounding Roscoe "Fatty" Arbuckle to the "long suicide" of Montgomery Clift, she uses a variety of archives and newspaper articles to put the emphasis on the facts rather than the tawdry details that most remember.
The stories are all contextualized within the boundaries of film, cultural, political, and gender history, making for a read that is informative as well as entertaining.
Anne Helen Petersen is a professor of film and media studies at Whitman College in Walla Walla, Washington as well as a contributor to the popular site, The Hairpin. She lives in Washington state.
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American Titan: Searching for John Wayne
By Marc Eliot
Thirty five years after his death, John Wayne remains as popular as ever. He has been the focus of, or had a co-starring role in, several recent biographies, and biographer Eliot digs deep beneath of the myth of this legendary star of the silver screen in his latest biography.
John Wayne's life and career spanned almost all of the twentieth century. From growing up in the heartland and trying to break into the movies in the early days of the Great Depression, he finally found stardom just before the beginning of World War II. He became the persona of patriotism despite not enlisting and having a messy personal life that included divorces and suggestions of adultery. By the middle 1960s, with the country in the midst of tremendous upheaval, he was viewed as a polarizing figure by some but remained a box office champion until his death in 1979.
Audiences saw in his characters those traits that many truly believed made up the American character. Assuming that Wayne himself embodied those traits, they turned him not only into an American icon but a political touchstone. Forgotten along the way was John Wayne, the man and the actor.
Eliot pays tribute to the man and the myth, identifying and analyzing the many interesting contradictions that made John Wayne who he was: an Academy Award-winning actor associated with cowboys and soldiers who didn't like horses and never served in a war; a Republican icon who voted for Democratic nominees Roosevelt and Truman, and though he stumped for Ronald Reagan he also spoke eloquently at the inauguration of President Jimmy Carter. Also included are stories of the movies he made famous as well as tales of numerous friends and legendary colleagues such as John Ford, Maureen O'Hara, Natalie Wood, and Dean Martin.
Marc Eliot is a best-selling author of more than a dozen books on popular culture, including Cary Grant, Walt Disney: Hollywood's Dark Prince, and American Rebel: The Life of Clint Eastwood . He writes for a number of publications and frequently speaks about film to universities and film groups, and has given many radio and television interviews. He lives in New York City and Woodstock, New York.
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The Making of Gone With the Wind
By Steve Wilson
Seventy-five years ago, moviegoers watched a young heroine stand on a hillside in the early morning hours and swear she would never go hungry again. By that point in the movie, Scarlett O'Hara had already encountered love, loss and an invading army. Audiences were swept up in the epic story and the film has become an enduring classic.
To commemorate the milestone anniversary of this beloved film, author Steve Wilson scoured the archives of the David O. Selznick collection at the Harry Ransom Center at the University of Texas at Austin for this new book chronicling the making of the film.
This rarely-seen material offers fans and film historians a fascinating behind-the-scenes view of the challenges, trials, and successes related to the production of this timeless classic.
Before a single frame of film was shot, Gone With The Wind was embroiled in controversy. There were serious concerns about how the film would depict race and violence in the Old South during the Civil War and Reconstruction. And while Clark Gable was almost everyone's choice to play Rhett Butler, there was no clear favorite for Scarlett O'Hara which, stymied the legendary producer Selznick for some time.
There was also the huge challenge of turning Margaret Mitchell's Pulitzer Prize-winning epic into a manageable screenplay and producing it at a reasonable cost. Various screenwriters tried to tame the story and Selznick himself kept the pressure up with his own notoriously detailed memos. George Cukor was hired and then fired before Selznick finally settled on Victor Fleming as the man most able to handle the scale of both the story and the production.
With a foreword by film historian and TCM Host Robert Osborne, the book includes on-set photographs, storyboards, correspondence, fan mail, production records, costumes and, of course, Selznick's own lengthy memos. The author writes effectively about how creative choices helped produce one of the most loved films of all time and why it remains so influential all these years later.
Steve Wilson is the curator of the film collection at the Harry Ransom Center at the University of Texas at Austin. He has curated several exhibitions at the Ransom Center, including Shooting Stars, a display of Hollywood glamour photography, and Making Movies, a major exhibition on film production.
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DVD Reviews
Point Blank on Blu-ray
When documentary filmmaker John Boorman made the leap to feature filmmaking with Catch Us If You Can (aka Having a Wild Weekend, 1965), a low-budget rock-n-roll vehicle for the Dave Clark Five, he transformed the quickie into a surprisingly biting satire of popular culture set to a bouncy soundtrack, displaying a remarkable sophistication and creativity unexpected from such a project. It was enough to land him his first American film, Point Blank, where he revealed an even greater ambition and talent.
Based on the novel The Hunter by Richard Stark (a pen name for Donald Westlake), Point Blank shuffles the lean, straight-forward story of a gunman named Walker (Lee Marvin), who is double crossed by his partner in crime and returns (seemingly from the dead) for revenge, into a surreal, abstracted crime drama. The plot is faithful to original novel, a hard-boiled piece of crime fiction reimagined for the underworld culture of the sixties, but Boorman and Marvin, who requested the young director and supported his unconventional vision for the film, refract it through a modern lens. Walker's odyssey from Alcatraz in San Francisco to the underworld of Los Angeles is splintered with short, sharp shards of memory that cut through his story, as if reflecting Walker's attempts to put the pieces of cause and effect together in his mind.
Boorman views L.A. through an alienated lens and edits it more like a European art film than an American crime thriller, but fills it with offbeat, ultra-stylized scenes of violence. It opens on a gunshot that should have killed him and he struggles to put it all together when he wakes up: "Cell. Prison cell. How did I get here?" Marvin is enigmatic, to say the least, as he tracks down his unfaithful, guilt-ridden wife (Sharon Acker), his wife's sister (Angie Dickinson), his old friend turned double-crossing heist partner Mal Reese (John Veron), and finally the syndicate bigwigs, all just to get his due: "I want my 93 grand."
This vision of urban Los Angeles is alternately crowded and noisy and urban, and austere and empty and dislocated. His footsteps echoing through an empty, anonymous hallway becomes the disembodied beat of his march of revenge. A scatting, screaming R&B singer at a chic night spot called The Film Club is the feral soundtrack of a brutal backstage fight, at once visceral and abstracted in the clutter of 35mm film cans and nightclub supplies. The aftermath of a suicide becomes a psychedelic vision of destruction, which disappears in a cut to the apartment suddenly empty, a ghost house with no evidence of life or death, just transition.
The dialogue is loaded with references to "a dream" and characters constant remind Walker that he's supposed to be dead. Keenan Wynn adds another level of remove as the devil whispering in Walker's ear, another unreal figure with a carefully concealed agenda who is preternaturally attuned to Walker's movements. More than an informant, he appears from nowhere to provide a name, an address, a piece of information on the trail to the top man in the Organization as Walker's debt keeps getting passed up the chain of command.
Walker is both an unstoppable sentinel who seems more than flesh and blood and a vulnerable man wounded by betrayal who has armored over his emotions with a mission. Marvin delivers both sides of the character without compromising either. There's a cold fury under his deliberate movements and his eyes betray a moment of regret and sadness when he finds his wife dead by her own hand, but it is all pushed down and kept in check by his single-minded focus. "I just want my money" is his mantra, not a matter of greed but a debt to be settled to balance the scales. Marvin is at once deliberate and relaxed, a veteran criminal soldier alert to everything, which makes his character even more fascinating. He doesn't demand attention on screen, he commands it through confidence and ability and cool focus.
That alone makes him more admirable than Mal, who is played by John Vernon as an oily, arrogant, amoral rat, selling out anyone and everyone to buy his way back into the Organization. The rest of the members of the cast don't play characters as much as cogs, functionaries in a criminal enterprise as a cutthroat corporation, simply doing their jobs as if Walker was a rival in a hostile takeover. Only Angie Dickinson's Chris has the passion and fury and emotional life of a human being, siding with Walker out of both loyalty and for payback against Mal ("He makes my flesh crawl") and the Organization that has taken over her business and her life. Sharon Acker, who plays Walker's wife, comes off less haunted than simply weak. She barely leaves an impression, which is fitting for her character but fails to offer any sense of tragedy to her story, and she's almost instantly forgotten after she exits the film. It's really the only weak element of the film, which otherwise is strong, confident, and sure from beginning to end.
Point Blank has been called a modern film noir but it has more in common with Performance, another crime thriller that fractures time, offers enigmatic and ambiguous characters, and equates organized crime with big business. Boorman delivers meticulously executed set pieces that are designed for the wide CinemaScope frame with a sure sense of space and a dispassionate perspective. He emphasizes intelligence over action and presents Walker as total professional, never flustered and always emotionally removed from the situation. And if Walker is an extreme incarnation of the revenge driven noir anti-hero, the modern syndicate has transformed the old school mob into a world of paper jungles and corporate businessmen, an alienating concept to a two-fisted, gun-wielding independent like Walker. "Profit is the only principle," is their motto. Almost 50 years later, it's more modernist than modern, a fascinating time capsule of an era when young directors brought nouvelle vague style to classic genres, and a cryptic crime thriller that turns Marvin into the most enigmatic criminal professional in the movies.
Boorman creates a hard, austere look for the film and the new Blu-ray delivers a sharp clarity to his vision of Los Angeles as an impersonal modern city. Apart from a few scenes, he strips the frame down to isolated figures in an empty urban landscape under the hard light of the California sun. It's an urban desert and the disc preserves that atmosphere of a ghost city by day and a shadowy underworld at night when the crowds gather on the streets and in the clubs. The impersonal palette of concrete surfaces and blank office interiors in the day gives way to the color of human habitation after dark, which oddly enough has a warmer atmosphere than the harsh light of day.
Carried over from the earlier DVD release is an audio commentary track with director John Boorman and fellow director Steven Soderbergh, a fan of the film who essentially hosts the commentary. He engages Boorman in conversations about the film's style, the use of color and camera lenses, working with Lee Marvin (who became close friends with Boorman), and making his Hollywood debut with a film that refused to play by the studio rules. Soderbergh's The Limey was clearly indebted to Point Blank in both its theme of revenge and in its fractured storytelling and unconventional use of flashbacks. Taking part in this commentary is like paying tribute to his inspiration.
Also features the vintage promotional featurette The Rock (in two parts), which looks at shooting the film on location in Alcatraz, and the original trailer.
by Sean Axmaker
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Ravenous on Blu-ray
Ravenous (1999) channels the story reminiscent of the Donner Party disaster and the legend of Alferd Packer (the only American ever convicted of cannibalism) into a gruesome survival thriller with a crimson-hued streak of black humor and an elemental hint of the supernatural. The resulting film takes top honors as the definitive frontier cannibal movie. Not that there's a long list to choose from, mind you, but this earns its position with honors, thanks to a gleefully weird and savagely bloodthirsty sensibility.
Guy Pearce is Captain John Boyd, whose battle cowardice during the Mexican-American war inadvertently results in making him an accidental hero. The ordeal of playing dead under the bleeding corpses of his fellow officers also puts him off meat, as the opening scenes so vividly illustrate. Director Antonia Bird cuts straight to the heart of the situation as she intercuts soldiers devouring bleeding-rare steaks at a military luncheon with the bloody casualties of battle stacked like cordwood: meat is meat, at least as far as this film is concerned. Boyd's commanding officer (John Spencer of The West Wing), who knows that his valor is a fraud, ships him out to the fringes of military reach: a fort in a California mountain pass, which runs with a minimal compliment during the impassable winter months. "This place thrives on tedium," smiles fort commander Colonel Hart (Jeffrey Jones), who takes everything with a bemused indulgence. How else to survive a company made up of a useless drunk second-in-command(Stephen Spinella), a giggling weed-head idiot (David Arquette), a twitchy, mumbling chaplain (Jeremy Davies), and a macho soldier boy (Neal McDonough) who holds the rest of the company in utter contempt?
The tedium is quickly dispersed when a bedraggled disaster survivor (Robert Carlyle) stumbles into camp. He spins a horrific story of a lost wagon train and an incompetent scout who strands them in the mountains, where as the winter snows traps them and desperation leads to feeding on human flesh. It's a tale right out of the Donner Party until it turns feral, but it's not even close to the real story of Carlyle's wild-eyed survivor. For a starving man, he looks remarkably fit when he doffs his shirt, and other clues suggest that this is no production gaffe. One night, while camping on the trail to his old camp to search for survivors, he's caught licking the bleeding wounds of an injured soldier. You know, tasting his next potential meal.
That's when the film takes its twist into weird and wild horror, a bizarre plot that doesn't really make much logical sense but sure makes for a wicked mix of psychodrama and visceral body horror. The Native American Wendigo myth is referenced to explain madness, but you could say it's a vampire tale without the supernatural dimension--it turns out human flesh is addictive, and it helps to have a nest of fellow flesh-eaters to keep the diet coming--or call it a particularly gruesome metaphor for manifest destiny. However you label it, it is off-the-charts crazy, an eat-or-be-eaten thriller served very, very rare.
British director Antonia Bird seems like an odd match for this material. She honed her craft on TV drama and made her reputation with the tough, wrenching dramas Priest and Face, two films with complex characters and socially conscious themes. What they have in common with Ravenous is star Robert Carlyle, who recommended Bird after the film's original director Milcho Manchevski was let go after three weeks and the producer's chosen replacement, Raja Gosnell, was rejected by the cast. Bird (who passed away last year at the relatively young age of 62 after a battle with thyroid cancer) was frustrated by the conditions of the production and the oversight of the producers and she complained that her cut was compromised in post-production. That may explain the awkward pace, jarring turns, and a climax that feels tossed together--an uninspired way to end such a devious film--but she is clearly the architect of the odd, offbeat key of the film's blackly comic tone and surreal atmosphere and Carlyle is her partner in outsized madness. He leads the cast in playing their eccentricities big, though next to Carlyle's juicy performance, Arquette and Davies come off more like actor's studio sketches in twitchy weirdness or fidgety indecision than actual characters. Guy Pearce provides the contrast, creating a character fighting to maintain control and keep his emotions and his reflexive revulsion in check as everyone else lets their freak flag fly. It oddly enough makes him the most intense character on screen. As all that fear and disgust and anxiety just bottles up behind his desperate eyes and increasingly battered body, Pearce shows us the toll this ordeal exacts on him. In this survival drama, he's the one in true survival mode.
Scream Factory's Blu-ray features a solid new HD transfer that preserves the dynamic contrast between the white-out daylight scenes of snow and the ominous shadows of the deep forest and the dark rough-hewn quarters of the frontier fort. Night doesn't have to fall for the darkness to seep into the image. Given the elemental quality of the imagery--much of the film takes place in the snowbound wilderness, with the Tatra Mountains of Slovakia standing in for California--the transfer has a satisfying level of grain that not only preserves the texture of the film but gives the entire atmosphere an added level of authenticity. These images feel like they were carved into the film.
The film was previously released on DVD over a decade ago with three separate commentary tracks. Director Antonia Bird and composer Damon Albarn team up for the most informative track, with Bird talking in detail about the physical challenges of the production. Screenwriter Ted Griffin and co-star Jeffrey Jones tend to lapse into silences in their track and actor Robert Carlyle is even more intermittent in his the solo track. Also carried over from the earlier disc is a collection of deleted scenes (many of them in rough-cut form) with optional commentary by Bird and a gallery of stills. New to this edition is a 20-minute interview with Jeffrey Jones, who looks back on the themes of the film.
by Sean Axmaker
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Southern Comfort on Blu-ray
A motley crew of Louisiana National Guardsman wade out into the swamps for weekend maneuvers. It's 1973, as the war in Vietnam is grinding away the soul of America and the heart of the military, and this platoon of weekend warriors--a volatile collection of rednecks, hotheads, jokers, and guys who probably signed up to steer clear of the draft--are like fresh recruits going into battle for the first time. They've got the fatigues and the cocky attitude but dubious discipline and training and their machine guns are loaded with blanks as they head into the bayou. To the Cajun swamp folk, the trappers and hunters living on the fringes of society, these men are invaders who trample their camps and steal their boats. And when one of the soldiers lets loose a burst from his weapon, laughing like the class bully after humiliating the new kid, these shadowy swamp dwellers defend themselves, becoming a guerilla strike force waging a war of terror on the utterly unprepared toy soldiers. They don't know that it's just blanks in those guns but it likely wouldn't matter if they did. They've been attacked and they will respond. These city dwellers are out their element and after their commanding officer (Peter Coyote) is gone, the first casualty in the war of attrition, they are out of their depth, flailing around with a panic that dumps their radio, compass, map, and pretty much everything else that was supposed to keep them alive.
Southern Comfort will never be mistaken for a Nation Guard recruitment tool. Call it an anti-platoon movie. Hill gives the squad the outward accoutrements of a real fighting force, down to the uniforms and weapons, but this is a military unit in name only. Beyond the swaggering banter of the soldiers and self-deprecating comments of Spencer (Keith Carradine), the self-appointed company joker, they have no real training, no experience under fire, and no commitment to one another. These guys are more like barroom buddies playing soldier than a disciplined force.
There are two voices of restraint in the wilderness, Spencer and new guy Hardin (Powers Booth), a transfer from Texas who doesn't know anyone in the company but sizes up their weaknesses quickly and realizes that they haven't much a chance as long as wild cards like Reece (Fred Ward) and Stuckey (Lewis Smith) go charging through the swamps looking for payback. Casper (Les Lannom) takes command by virtue of an essentially meaningless detail of rank and bumbles around quoting regulations and making speeches, doggedly following the book because he hasn't a clue what to do next. The filmmakers don't make him a figure of ridicule, mind you, just a guy falling back on the only thing he knows. In fact, none of them are necessarily "bad guys," though like any Hill ensemble, it has its share of jerks, bullies, racists, and anger management candidates and the pressure brings out their worst instincts.
So yes, it's a story of American soldiers in an alien land, lost in an unfamiliar landscape and outmaneuvered by a guerrilla army at home in the jungle. Director / screenwriter Walter Hill and producer / co-screenwriter David Giler insist to this day that Southern Comfort was never intended to be an allegory for Vietnam, simply a survival tale in an overwhelming and unfamiliar environment. It's hard to take them at face value but it is easy to forget the allegory in the heat of the drama. It also shares DNA with Deliverance, another film about city boys with guns who take their sense of ownership and entitlement into the wilderness, threaten the locals, and end up hunted by them. But where John Boorman's primal thriller turns his Appalachian backwoods men into brutal outlaws who take pleasure in stalking the city invaders, Hill and Giler keep their Cajun soldiers hidden, seen as figures in the distance or blurs running behind the trees, ghosts on the fringes of sight. They treat the would-be soldier like wild game, silently shadowing their progress and whipping them into a state of panic to steer them into their traps. And whatever the short-fused guys in the platoon think, this is no cultural conspiracy to wipe out the invaders. Their enemy consists of a handful of isolated hunters who didn't start the war but by God are determined to finish it. The rest of the Cajun folks they meet don't seem to be a part of it, though after a couple of days in the swamps, the paranoia is powerful enough to make every sidelong glance look ominous. Ry Cooder's eerie and haunting score only intensifies the paranoia.
What ultimately differentiates them from the soldiers of a classical platoon drama is that they haven't bonded under fire and have never had to put their trust in one another. This group unravels and tears itself apart from fear and panic and unfocused rage. And in classic Hill manner, there are no philosophical musings or existential conversations. The closest the film comes to putting its theme into words is from the mantra of a terrified Simms (Franklyn Seales), who finds himself cut off from the group and suddenly aware of just how vulnerable he is. "I'm not supposed to be here," he repeats, as if begging the universe to correct some cosmic planning error. And then he's no longer there.
While this band of infighting brothers wades blindly through the swamp without a clue as to their bearings or direction, Hill's direction never falters. He has always had a sure hand as a storyteller, keeping his plots uncluttered and letting the details of character, conflict, and the world around them define the story. Southern Comfort limits the world to the middle of the swamp, where we (like the soldiers) are unable to find any point of reference, and observes how the discomfort of the environment and the constant disorientation takes its toll on what little good sense the characters bring with them to the mission. It exacerbates the already dysfunctional dynamics of this platoon of battle virgins and is as deadly on its own as the native hunters who use the environment as a weapon in their arsenal. It's not necessarily skill or even luck that saves the guardsmen who survive the ordeal. In classic Hill fashion, it is a matter of intelligence, awareness, teamwork, and the commitment to do what is necessary to survive. There's no sense of victory in survival, merely relief.
Blu-ray / DVD Combo Pack. Both discs feature the new HD master but the Blu-ray of course features superior clarity and richness of color. Both are clean, strong images while the Blu-ray shows off excellent detail. The Dolby Digital Mono soundtrack puts the mix right up front. A couple of scenes of chaos and confusion overwhelm the dialogue with background sound, which is surely intentional but still seems a little out of balance to my ears.
New to this release in an original 27-minute featurette with new interviews with actors Keith Carradine, Powers Boothe, Lewis Smith, and Peter Coyote and, on low-resolution video via Skype, director Walter Hill and producer David Giler, who collaborated on the script with Hill. The actors share stories of shooting in the Louisiana swamps in February with wet suits under their uniforms, six weeks of working in the cold and damp, and they remind us that they were all in it together. The crew endured the same conditions so no one had the right to complain. More interesting is the discussion around the themes of the film. Hill and Giler maintain that while they did not intentionally set out to make a Vietnam allegory they were aware that audiences would make that connection, while the actors admit that they knew it was an allegory from the moment they read the script. Keith Carradine's reading is particularly detailed and interesting. Curiously, none of the six participants mention Deliverance.
Carried over from the old DVD release is a brief collection of outtakes and the original trailer. All of the supplements are featured in both the Blu-ray and DVD discs of the Combo Pack.
By Sean Axmaker
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Tess on Blu-ray
Tess (1979), Roman Polanski's film adaptation of Thomas Hardy's 1890 novel Tess of the D'Urbervilles, has in 2014 received a sublime Blu-Ray and DVD release from Criterion. Restored by Pathe under the direct supervision of Polanski himself, the movie looks and sounds magnificent. At first glance, the lushly beautiful Tess is a seemingly unusual work for Polanski, whose films we tend to associate with horror and sex, but this was actually a highly personal project for the master filmmaker. It was his first picture after fleeing the United States in 1977, and also a project that his wife, Sharon Tate, had suggested he make as a vehicle for herself -- just before she was murdered by the Manson gang in 1969. Polanski read the novel after her death and realized it was indeed right up his alley, and he dedicated the eventual film to her with an on-screen inscription.
Hardy's tale, to which the film is very faithful, is about a poor English girl, Tess, whose father learns he is a distant descendant of a once prominent, rich family, the D'Urbervilles. He sends Tess to the home of a remaining D'Urberville to find employment (or at least a handout), but Tess winds up being seduced by the ne'er-do-well Alec D'Urberville (Leigh Lawson), who becomes obsessed with her. Fleeing Alec, she eventually finds work at a dairy farm and starts a passionate relationship with a young farmer named Angel Clare (Peter Firth). But in this society, the revelation of the sins of her past, even if they were not her fault, could doom Tess to shame, ostracism and worse. Ultimately, Tess is about a woman struggling to make her way in the world, looking for happiness, or at least survival, but finding that a judgmental society, timing and even luck are all working against her.
Polanski explores this theme vividly, sympathetically and cinematically. Costumes, speech and physical mannerisms of the actors all convince the audience of the time period and of the distinctions among the social classes, and the film's pictorial beauty does much to stress the contrasting cruelty of some of the characters. The movie is not "pretty" for prettiness' sake. Most important, one really feels the isolation of Tess throughout the film, which is at once sprawling and intimate. The plot itself, while important, feels less vital here than the depiction of Tess' emotional experience of the world she is forced to inhabit, and as a result, the long running time feels entirely appropriate and never tedious.
Tess was shot entirely in France, mostly on locations in Normandy and Brittany, because Polanski worried that if he traveled to England he would be extradited to the United States. Polanski later wrote, "To tell the story at all, it was essential to find the proper setting, a twentieth-century equivalent of Hardy's nineteenth-century Dorset. The only way to convey the rhythm of his epic was to use that setting as an integral part of the film, signaling the passage of time and the change in Tess herself by means of a visible, almost palpable change in seasons. Once our rural locations were chosen, we would have to film throughout the year from early spring, through high summer, to the depths of winter." With such a shooting strategy, filming wound up lasting nine months over 80 separate locations, and Tess became, at $12 million, the most expensive film ever made in France to that point. Freak weather and labor strikes only added to the overall time and expense.
If Tess is atypical of Polanski, it's in the way that The Age of Innocence (1993) is atypical of director Martin Scorsese. But in fact, both films are completely emblematic of their directors' concerns and are indeed suffused with violence. It's just that the violence is emotional, an undercurrent beneath a pristine surface -- exactly like the societies the films depict.
That being said, it's hard to shake some of Tess's most exquisitely beautiful imagery, such as the lovely natural light of an outdoor dance, or the riders and dogs on a fox hunt who appear out of a sublime mist, or the face of Nastassia Kinski, who is heart-stoppingly gorgeous (a quality, incidentally, that is vital to the story). Cinematographer Geoffrey Unsworth, who had shot such films as Becket (1964) and Cabaret (1972), died a few weeks into production and was replaced by Ghislain Cloquet, who sadly would himself pass away two years later. They shared the Oscar for Best Cinematography. The film also won for Best Art Direction and Best Costume Design and was nominated for Best Picture, Best Director and Best Original Score.
Criterion's dual-format release contains one Blu-ray disc and two DVDs, with both formats containing the film and identical extras. And there are plenty, starting with three short documentaries about the film's making (originally included in Columbia's 2004 DVD release), directed by Laurent Bouzereau and totaling 73 minutes in length. Bouzereau expertly interviews key players like Polanski, producers Claude Berri and Timothy Burrill, co-writer John Brownjohn, actors Nastassia Kinski and Leigh Lawson, set decorator Pierre Guffroy, costume designer Anthony Powell, hair and makeup artists, the crew electrician, the assistant editor and others. The artists discuss fascinating details of production, like the challenge of getting the "strawberry seduction" scene between Kinski and Lawson just right (which astonishingly was shot on a rainy day despite looking on-screen like the height of warm summer), the creation of the Stonehenge set outside of Paris, and the design of the costumes to be authentic and truly expressive of character -- beautiful without being decorative. Powell is fascinating as he discusses his approach, and also about the little splotch of blood he put on the hem of Tess' dress at a key point in the story, which Polanski shot for maximum impact.
Burrill recalls that on location the filmmakers were only able to see the rushes days after shooting, rather than the next day, and not always under the best conditions. But gradually, he says, "we started to see what was happening, the magic that was coming off the screen, and the extraordinary professionalism of Nastassia.... I don't think there was ever one day when she fluffed a line. She was word-perfect, always."
Second is a 52-minute documentary from 2006 by Daniel Ablin and Serge July entitled Once Upon a Time... Tess. This is also interesting, but it covers much of the same material as the Bouzereau pieces, with many of the same interviewees telling the same stories. It's also not as smoothly edited. But unlike the Bouzereau film, it includes composer Philippe Sarde, and delves more into Polanski's pre-Tess life and career. It also recounts the difficulties in Tess's post-production, particularly concerning the running time. Francis Coppola was brought in by producer Claude Berri to trim the film, which was deemed overlong, but Polanski hated the result, leading to a falling-out between Berri and Polanski and between Polanski and Sarde. Polanski himself eventually trimmed the film by about 20 minutes, resulting in the current running time of 171 minutes.
Third, there's a 1979 episode of the French TV program Cine Regards, running 48 minutes, that looks at the making of Tess and interviews Polanski during the film's production. The interviews with Polanski are revealing, but the real strengths of the piece are the long, uninterrupted slices of life on the set as Polanski directs and thinks through scenes, conducting his orchestra of crewmembers. These sequences go on long enough to make us feel as if we are there.
Fourth is a 1979 episode of the British TV program The South Bank Show, 50 minutes in length, in which host Melvyn Bragg interviews Polanski. And Criterion rounds things out with the film's trailer as well as a handsome printed booklet containing a fine essay by Colin MacCabe and crisp, colorful photos from the film, almost all of which feature the entrancing Nastassia Kinski. It's a beautiful package and motion picture, all very highly recommended.
By Jeremy Arnold
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Used Cars on Blu-ray
The opening of Used Cars (1980) has the ominous, wind-scoured character of a modern crime film in a desperate southwest town where a Sergio Leone western wouldn't be out of place. The camera cranes down from a high shot over a struggling used car dealership, where a few pathetic beaters line the lot, and slowly glides over to one car with someone is crammed under the dashboard. The only sound is the lonely wind--the kind of strangled, desolate howl you get in dustbowl dramas and desert survival thrillers--and the grunts of the man struggling with the mechanics under the dash. And then we see the odometer turn back, shaving some 40,000 or so miles from the record. The title hits the screen, a brass band jumps in with "Stars and Stripes Forever," and the unidentified mechanic wriggles out to reveal Kurt Russell in a cheap, loud suit making his rounds to mask the sorry condition of the cars on the lot. It turns out that this is a crime movie after all, or at least a film of multiple misdemeanors and bald-faced misrepresentation, and the perpetrators are the good guys.
The second feature from director Robert Zemeckis and co-writer and producer Bob Gale, Used Cars comes right out of the screen comedy culture of the late 1970s and early 1980s, when the underdogs snubbed their collective noses at authority, propriety, property and privacy laws and anything else that crossed their paths in slobs vs. snobs comedies like Animal House (1978), Caddyshack (1980) and Ghostbusters (1984). Used Cars is raucous and reckless and far more gleefully corrupt than any of its brothers in rebellion, embracing the confidence games and illegal stunts pulled by the skeleton crew that works for Luke Fuchs (Jack Warden), who is the closest thing that the film has to an honest man. The devotion of salesmen Rudy (Russell) and Jeff (Gerrit Graham) and mechanic Jim (Frank McRae) to Luke is really all that separates them from Luke's rapacious brother and across-the-street rival Roy L. Fuchs (Warden again) and his slick sales force. That and the fun they have ripping off the rubes who wander on to their lot.
The premise of film - two used car outfits at war with one another - was hatched by John Milius, who was one of the executive producers (along with Steven Spielberg), but the script is pure Zemeckis and Gale. The rivals are twin brothers, the Cain and Abel of used car dealers. When impending freeway construction threatens to destroy bad brother Roy's dealership and make the good brother Luke rich, Roy finds a way to speed the demise of Luke's bad heart and Rudy makes good on his promise to keep Roy from taking over the lot. Rudy has his own, more immediate motivation, of course--he's trying to buy his way into the local political machine and he's still a little short on the down payment--but it's also personal. Luke is something of a father figure to the crew, which makes them the mischievous sons who break the rules whenever dad's back is turned. After Luke dies, their antics more outrageous, from secretly burying Luke on the lot (his beloved convertible fittingly serves as his casket) to jamming satellite signals with wild pirate commercials replete with gratuitous nudity and senseless destruction of private property. The plot seems to careen from one comic collision to another but there's a nicely-constructed plan under it all, simple but ingenious enough that you don't actually see how the pieces are laid in place until it all comes together in the ragged spectacle of final act.
It's not really a satire of American business so much as a wicked lampoon: lie, cheat and steal as the American way, as long as you do it with a sense of fun. Kurt Russell was just breaking out of his clean-cut post-Disney persona when he took on the role and he sinks his teeth into Rudy, turning the brash characters into the epitome of the smiling mercenary selling lemons to suckers with dirty tricks and phony promises. Gerrit Graham is his partner in commercial piracy, unfazed by anything but harbingers of bad luck, notably red. Deborah Harmon is both romantic interest and plot complication as Luke's long lost daughter, who shows up just after dad's death. Jack Warden has a field day playing twin brothers and Frank McRae is hilarious as the giant adrenaline-pumped mechanic. The crotch-grabbing Mexican junk car wholesaler is ubiquitous character actor and future director Alfonso Arau in his first great comic role in an American film (Romancing the Stone and Three Amigos soon followed). But the entire cast is in danger of being upstaged by the adorable dog Toby, who has his own role to play in the sale stunts. This pooch's hilarious performance makes him one of the greatest movie dogs.
Zemeckis matured into a polished filmmaker and an ambitious storyteller and went on to make more sophisticated, more provocative, and certainly more subtle films, but he never made anything as savagely funny as Used Cars. Its banged-up ingenuity and rough-and-tumble energy and warped mirror reflection of the American Dream as a snatch and grab free-for-all is wickedly funny. Everyone is a crook here and the epilogue even enshrines mendacity as a virtue, at least when it comes to stepping into the used car game.
Used Cars has a remarkably tidy visual aesthetic for a film about a seedy, shabby culture, with a screen that is uncluttered and flooded with desert sunlight in day scenes and blasted with floodlights as bold as a football stadium night game for the after-dark stunts. The new HD transfer shows a well-preserved print and is sharp and clear. Simply put, it looks superb.
The commentary track with Zemeckis, Gale, and Russell, carried over from the 2002 DVD reelease, is almost as fun as the movie. "We wanted Jimmy Stewart in It's A Wonderful Life, except he's totally corrupt," is how Zemeckis explains the genesis of Rudy. Kurt Russell laughs back: "So you cast me!" These guys are having a blast laughing their way through their remembrances, but they manage to stay on track and keep the production stories coming. Few commentaries manage to balance the information and entertainment so well.
There's a four-minute reel of outtakes (apparently taken from surviving video dub; it's all quite hazy), a radio interview with Russell, a car commercial featuring Russell, galleries of art and stills, and not one but two isolated score tracks: along with Patrick Williams' musical score heard in the film is an alternate, unused score by Ernest Gold. We don't quite get it in the context of the film (at least not with dialogue and sound effects) but it's a more conventional, less satirical approach. The accompanying 8-page booklet features another fine essay by Julie Kirgo.
By Sean Axmaker
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Press Release
THE BAND WAGON on stage
Previously announced Tony Award winner Brian Stokes Mitchell will be joined by seven-time Emmy Award winner Tracey Ullman, Academy Award nominee Michael McKean, Tony Award nominee Tony Sheldon, Tony Award nominee Laura Osnes, Tony Award nominee Michael Berresse, and Don Stephenson in The Band Wagon, an Encores! Special Event from November 6 - 16, 2014 at City Center. Based on the classic MGM film of the same title, the show has a book by Douglas Carter Beane adapted from the screenplay by Betty Comden and Adolph Green, with music by Arthur Schwartz and lyrics by Howard Dietz. The Band Wagon will be directed and choreographed by three-time Tony Award winner Kathleen Marshall with music direction by Todd Ellison. The Band Wagon will run for 12 performances, by special arrangement with Warner Bros. Theatre Ventures.
A classic backstage musical, The Band Wagon tells the story of a washed-up Hollywood star (Brian Stokes Mitchell) who attempts to make a comeback by doing a Broadway show, and encounters an assortment of colorful characters: a British director who is a genius but has no business directing a musical (Tony Sheldon), a leading lady who's never done a show before (Laura Osnes), and a composer and a lyricist who are at each other's throats (Michael McKean and Tracey Ullman). All the things that could never happen in the New York theater today.
Written by Broadway's ultimate insiders, Betty Comden and Adolph Green, the 1953 film used Arthur Schwartz and Howard Dietz's wonderful songs to tell their story and took its title from the famed 1931 Broadway revue written by Schwartz, Dietz, and George S. Kaufman. Now five-time Tony nominee Douglas Carter Beane will use the original Comden and Green screenplay (including scenes never filmed) as a basis for this Encores! Special Event, with a glorious score that includes "Dancing in the Dark," "By Myself," "I Guess I'll Have to Change My Plan," "A Shine on My Shoes," and that great anthem for all of show business, "That's Entertainment."
The Band Wagon will feature sets by Tony Award winner Derek McLane, costumes by six-time Tony Award winner William Ivey Long, lighting by Tony Award winner Peter Kaczorowski, and sound design by two-time Tony Award winner Brian Ronan.
Brian Stokes Mitchell (Tony Hunter)'s many theater credits include the Broadway productions of Man of La Mancha (Tony nomination, Helen Hayes Award); Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown (Drama Desk nomination); Kiss Me, Kate (Tony, Drama Desk and Outer Critics Circle Awards); Ragtime (Tony nomination); August Wilson's King Hedley II (Tony nomination); Kiss of the Spider Woman; Jelly's Last Jam; David Merrick's Oh, Kay!; and Mail, which earned him a Theatre World Award for Outstanding Broadway Debut. He headlined the Carnegie Hall concert presentation of Rodgers and Hammerstein's South Pacific with Reba McEntire, which aired on PBS in the spring of 2006. This summer he was seen as Don Pedro in the Public Theater's Much Ado About Nothing at the Delacorte Theater in Central Park. His Encores! credits include Do Re Mi, Carnival, and Kismet. His album "Simply Broadway" was named one of USA Today's Best CDs of 2013.
Tracey Ullman (Lily Martin) is perhaps best known in America for "The Tracey Ullman Show," which aired on Fox from 1987 to 1990 and established the English-born comedienne as one of prime time's major comic talents, earning several Emmy Awards, two for Ullman herself. Her many films include David Hare's Plenty, co-starring Meryl Streep; Robert Altman's Pret-a-Porter; I Love You to Death, opposite Kevin Kline; Mel Brooks's Robin Hood: Men in Tights; John Waters's A Dirty Shame; and Woody Allen's Bullets Over Broadway and Small Time Crooks. Her HBO specials include "Tracey Ullman Takes on New York," "Tracey Ullman: A Class Act," "Tracey Ullman in the Trailer Tales," "Tracey Ullman: Live and Exposed," and the spin-off series "Tracey Takes On...", which ran for four years. She starred as Kate opposite Morgan Freeman in the 1990 Shakespeare in the Park production of The Taming of the Shrew, and on Broadway in her one-woman show, The Big Love, in 1991. Tracey will play Jack's Mother in the upcoming film version of Into the Woods.
Michael McKean (Lester Martin) is a multi-talented actor, writer, and director who is associated with some of the most iconic film and television shows of the last three decades. His many New York credits include the role of J. Edgar Hoover in All The Way; Gore Vidal's The Best Man; Superior Donuts; The Homecoming; The Pajama Game; Hairspray; Accomplice (Theatre World Award); Our Town; and A Second Hand Memory. His Los Angeles stage credits include Yes, Prime Minister and Randy Newman's Harps & Angels. Michael played Lenny on "Laverne and Shirley," and was a regular cast member on "Saturday Night Live." His many film credits include This is Spinal Tap, Clue, Best in Show, and A Mighty Wind (Grammy Award for title track, written with Christopher Guest and Eugene Levy). He received an Oscar nomination for "A Kiss at the End of the Rainbow" (written with Annette O'Toole) from the same film. Michael will star in the new AMC series "Better Call Saul."
Tony Sheldon (Jeffrey Cordoba) is a native of Australia, where his many starring roles include Dirty Rotten Scoundrels, The Producers, Private Lives, I Hate Hamlet, Noises Off, Into The Woods, and Torch Song Trilogy. Tony won a Theatre World Award and was nominated for Tony and Drama Desk Awards for his Broadway debut in Priscilla, Queen Of The Desert. He recently appeared as Pickering in My Fair Lady at the Guthrie, as Horace Vandergelder in Hello Dolly! at the Goodspeed Opera House, as Toddy in Victor Victoria at TUTS, and as Merlyn and Pellinore in Camelot at the Kennedy Center with Brian Stokes Mitchell.
Laura Osnes (Gabrielle Gerard) recently starred the Encores! Off-Center production of Randy Newman's Faust: The Concert, and in the off-Broadway revival of The Threepenny Opera, directed by Martha Clarke. Her Broadway credits include the title role in Rogers + Hammerstein's Cinderella (Drama Desk Award), Bonnie in Bonnie and Clyde, Hope Harcourt in the Tony-winning revival of Anything Goes, Nellie Forbush in Lincoln Center's South Pacific, and Sandy in the most recent revival of Grease. Other New York credits include the Encores! production of Pipe Dream and a one-night-only concert of The Sound of Music at Carnegie Hall. Laura made her cabaret debut at the Café Carlyle in 2012, resulting in her first solo CD, Dream A Little Dream: Live at The Carlyle. She followed that appearance with an evening of Maury Yeston's music at 54 Below, which led to her second solo CD, If I Tell You: The Songs Of Maury Yeston.
Michael Berresse (Paul Byrd)'s Broadway credits include Kiss Me, Kate (Tony, Astaire, Olivier nominations), The Light in the Piazza, A Chorus Line, Chicago, Damn Yankees, Carousel, Guys & Dolls, Fascinating Rhythm, and Fiddler on the Roof. Off-Broadway, he was seen in Forever Plaid and The Coconuts. Regionally, he was seen in The Normal Heart (Arena/ACT), Parade (Taper), and The Dybbuk. Michael's director-choreographer credits include the Broadway and Off-Broadway production of Now. Here. This. His Encores! credits include No, No, Nanette; Chicago; One Touch of Venus; and Call Me Madam.
Don Stephenson (Hal Meadows) starred as Leo Bloom in the Broadway production of The Producers. Other Broadway credits: A Gentleman's Guide to Love & Murder, Rock of Ages, Dracula, Private Lives, Titanic, Parade, and By Jeeves. Off-Broadway: Death Takes a Holiday, Take Me Along, and Two Gentlemen of Verona. Don appeared in the Encores! production of Pardon My English. Television: "The Good Wife," "30 Rock," "Glee," "Ugly Betty," "Curb Your Enthusiasm," "Law & Order." Directing credits: Kennedy Center, Paper Mill Playhouse, Bay Street Theatre, Bucks County Playhouse, MUNY, Syracuse Stage, and Flat Rock Playhouse.
Douglas Carter Beane (Book)'s credits on Broadway include Rodgers + Hammerstein's Cinderella (Tony Award nomination), The Nance (nominated for five Tony Awards and two Drama Desk Awards), Lysistrata Jones (Tony Award nomination), Sister Act (Tony Award nomination), the stage adaptation of the film Xanadu (Outer Critics Circle & HX Awards for Best Musical, Drama Desk Award for Best Book, and four Tony nominations including Best Musical), and The Little Dog Laughed (Tony Award, Olivier Award nomination). His other plays include As Bees in Honey Drown (Outer Critics Circle John Gassner Award), Mr. and Mrs. Fitch, Music From a Sparkling Planet, The Country Club, Advice From a Caterpillar, The Cartells, and Mondo Drama. He has written the libretto for the Metropolitan Opera's Die Fledermaus, and his ballet Artists and Models, 1929 is a part of the dance show In Your Arms. He wrote the film adaptation of his play Advice From a Caterpillar as well as the screenplay of To Wong Foo, Thanks For Everything, Julie Newmar. Douglas is currently writing a movie for Fox Searchlight and creating a series for HBO. His next play, Shows For Days, will be produced this spring by Lincoln Center Theater, and he is developing a play in verse, Fairycakes, which he will both write and direct.
Arthur Schwartz and Howard Dietz (Music and Lyrics), one of the greatest American songwriting teams, wrote some of Broadway and Hollywood's biggest hits of the 1930s, '40s, and '50s, including "Dancing in the Dark," "That's Entertainment," "You and the Night and the Music," "I Guess I'll Have To Change My Plan," "I See Your Face Before Me," "Alone Together," and "Love Is a Dancing Thing." Dietz and Schwartz collaborated on 11 Broadway shows over the course of 34 years; their many credits include The Little Show (1929), Three's a Crowd (1930), The Band Wagon (1931), Flying Colors (1932), At Home Abroad (1935), Between the Devil (1937), The Gay Life (1961), and Jenny (1963).
Todd Ellison (Music Director)'s many Broadway credits include the recent revival of Annie, Monty Python's Spamalot, La Cage Aux Folles, 42nd Street, Elton John's Lestat, Michel Legrand's Amour, The Wild Party, On the Town, Once Upon a Mattress (starring Sarah Jessica Parker), How To Succeed... (starring Matthew Broderick), She Loves Me, Taller Than a Dwarf, and A Class Act. He was the music director of the Radio City Christmas Spectacular for several seasons. As Marvin Hamlisch's music director, he worked on The Nutty Professor (directed by Jerry Lewis) and Ballroom. As a Pops conductor he has conducted The Pittsburgh Symphony, as well as Long Beach, New Haven, and York Symphonies. Todd conducted the Encores! production of On the Town and was a guest pianist for No, No, Nanette.
Kathleen Marshall (Director/Choreographer) returns to City Center, where she directed and choreographed the Encores! Off-Center production of Getting My Act Together... and the Encores! productions of Bells Are Ringing, Applause, Carnival, and Hair, among others, and served as artistic director for four seasons. Her Broadway credits include Nice Work If You Can Get It, Anything Goes, The Pajama Game, Wonderful Town, Grease, Little Shop of Horrors, Follies, and Kiss Me, Kate. She recently directed Joe DiPietro's Living on Love at the Williamstown Theatre Festival starring Renée Fleming. She has received three Tony Awards (out of nine nominations), three Drama Desk Awards, and three Outer Critics Circle Awards.
New York City Center (Arlene Shuler, President & CEO) has played a defining role in the cultural life of the city since 1943. It was Manhattan's first performing arts center, dedicated by Mayor Fiorello La Guardia with a mission to make the best in music, theater, and dance accessible to all audiences. Today, City Center is home to many distinguished companies, including Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater, City Center's Principal Dance Company, as well as Manhattan Theatre Club; a roster of renowned national and international visiting artists; and its own critically acclaimed and popular programs. The Tony-honored Encores! musical theater series has been hailed as "one of the very best reasons to be alive in New York." In summer 2013, City Center launched Encores! Off-Center, a series that features landmark Off Broadway musicals filtered through the lens of today's most innovative artists. Dance has been integral to the theater's mission from the start -- and dance programs, including the annual Fall for Dance Festival, remain central to City Center's identity. Vital partnerships with arts organizations including Jazz at Lincoln Center and London's Sadler's Wells Theatre enhance City Center's programmatic offerings. City Center is dedicated to providing educational opportunities to New York City students and teachers through programs such as Encores! In Schools and the Young People's Dance Series. Special workshops cater to families, seniors, and other groups, while events such as the Fall for Dance DanceTalk series offer learning opportunities to the general public. In October 2011, City Center completed an extensive renovation project to revitalize and modernize its historic theater.
The Band Wagon will run for 12 performances, November 6 - 16. Tickets are available at the New York City Center Box Office (West 55th Street between 6th and 7th Avenues), through CityTix® at 212-581-1212, and online at www.NYCityCenter.org. Further information is available at www.NYCityCenter.org.
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Joslyn Art Museum in Omaha Screens THE BIRDS on 11/7!
On Friday, November 7 Omaha Film Historian Bruce Crawford will host his 35th tribute to classic films with a screening of Alfred Hitchcock's The Birds, with special guest Tippi Hedren. The screening will also include an unveiling of the commemorative U.S. Postal Envelope honoring the film, created by artist Nicolosi. Both Miss Hedren and Nicolosi will sign autographs at the event.
Tickets are $23 and go on sale October 15 at all Omaha Hy Vee food store customer service counters. The event will take place Friday, November 7, 7pm at the Joslyn Art Museum, 2200 Dodge St., Omaha NE. 68102, and will benefit the Nebraska Kidney Association. For more information please call 402-932-7200 or visit www.omahafilmevent.com
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DICK DINMAN SALUTES LEGENDARY VOCALIST VIC DAMONE (PART THREE): Iconic vocalist Vic Damone shares some fascinating stories about his years as an MGM star with producer/host Dick Dinman and also reveals why he ultimately turned down an important role in THE GODFATHER. Among the songs included in this show are Vic's rarely heard outtake number that was not used in ATHENA as well as an exclusive presentation of Jane Powell and Vic's never before heard musical audition (with piano accompaniment only) for THE STUDENT PRINCE/DEEP IN MY HEART.
DICK DINMAN SALUTES LEGENDARY VOCALIST VIC DAMONE (PART FOUR): Vic Damone candidly reveals to producer/host Dick Dinman how the callous behavior of acclaimed director Vincente Minnelli made his experience costarring in MGM's mega-budget musical extravaganza KISMET so relentlessly unpleasant. Among the songs included in this show are Vic's rarely heard duet of "This Is My Beloved" with Judy Garland.
The award-winning DICK DINMAN'S DVD CLASSICS CORNER ON THE AIR is the only weekly half hour show devoted to Golden Age Movie Classics as they become available on DVD. Your producer/host Dick Dinman includes a generous selection of classic scenes, classic film music and one-on-one interviews with stars, producers, and directors. To hear these as well as other DVD CLASSICS CORNER ON THE AIR shows please go to www.dvdclassicscorner.com or www.dvdclassicscorner.net.
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"The Making of GONE WITH THE WIND" Exhibition
The exhibition "The Making of 'Gone With The Wind'" commemorates the 75th anniversary of one of the most popular films ever created by exploring its history and legacy. The exhibition runs from Sept. 9 to Jan. 4, 2015, at the Harry Ransom Center, a humanities research library and museum at The University of Texas at Austin.
Featuring more than 300 items, the exhibition is drawn entirely from the Ransom Center's collections and includes on-set photographs, storyboards, makeup stills, costume sketches, concept art, correspondence and fan mail, production records, audition footage and producer David O. Selznick's own extensive memos. Three original gowns worn by Vivien Leigh as Scarlett O'Hara, including the iconic green curtain dress, will be exhibited together for the first time in more than 25 years. In 2010 donors from around the world contributed more than $30,000 to support conservation work for these costumes. Replicas of two gowns will also be on view.
From the time Selznick purchased the rights to the book, it took more than three years to bring the film to the screen. The materials in the exhibition document the challenges of turning Margaret Mitchell's Pulitzer Prize-winning book into a manageable screenplay and producing it at a reasonable cost.
Before a single frame was shot, "Gone With The Wind" was embroiled in controversy. There were serious concerns about how the film would depict race and violence in the South during the Civil War and Reconstruction. While Clark Gable was a popular choice to play Rhett Butler, there was no clear favorite for Scarlett O'Hara, and there was a nationwide search before British actress Leigh was cast in the role.
"'The Making of 'Gone With The Wind'" is the largest and most comprehensive exhibition on this film," said Steve Wilson, exhibition curator and the Ransom Center's curator of film. "The David O. Selznick archive, which is the Center's largest collection, forms the backbone of the exhibition, placing the Ransom Center in a unique position to tell the story of the making of this epic film."
The chronologically organized exhibition will reveal the challenges involved in the making of this quintessential film from Hollywood's Golden Age and illustrate why it remains influential and controversial 75 years after it was released. Visitors will get an insider's perspective on the search for an actress to play Scarlett, the film's iconic scenes, the influence of the African-American press on filmmakers' decisions and the enthusiastic reception of the film by fans.
A fully illustrated exhibition catalog of the same title will be co-published by the Harry Ransom Center and University of Texas Press in September with a foreword written by Turner Classic Movies (TCM) host and film historian Robert Osborne. Generous support for the exhibition has been provided by TCM.
The David O. Selznick holdings comprise the core of the Ransom Center's film collection, which also includes the archives of silent film star Gloria Swanson, screenwriters Ernest Lehman and Paul Schrader, director Nicholas Ray and actor, director and producer Robert DeNiro.
"The Making of 'Gone With The Wind'" can be seen starting Sept. 9 in the Ransom Center Galleries on Monday through Friday from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., with extended Thursday hours until 7 p.m. On Saturdays and Sundays the galleries are open from noon to 5 p.m. Member-only hours are offered on Saturday and Sunday from 10 a.m. to noon.
Public tours are offered every day at noon, as well as Thursdays at 6 p.m. and Saturdays and Sundays at 2 p.m. "Gone With The Wind" screentests will be shown in the Ransom Center's first-floor theater at 1:30 p.m. and 3:30 p.m. on weekends, immediately following the public tour.
In conjunction with the exhibition, the Ransom Center will host the 2014 Flair Symposium, "Cultural Life During Wartime, 1861-1865," from Sept. 18 to 20. The symposium will look back to the 19th century to examine the cultural world of Union and Confederate painters, photographers, musicians, theater companies and writers. The songs, images, poems, books and plays that appeared between 1861 and 1865 offer a nuanced perspective on the Civil War that challenges later narratives, both fictional and historical.
Complementing the physical exhibition is the web exhibition "Producing Gone With The Wind," which explores producing the film, including rarely seen fan mail from individuals who sought auditions, solicited employment and protested the production. Visitors can also see teletypes from Selznick's production company that detail the casting of Leigh as Scarlett O'Hara and explore the costumes, hair and makeup that contributed to the film's vibrant imagery. The web exhibition launches Sept. 9 at www.hrc.utexas.edu/webgwtw.
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DICK DINMAN SALUTES LEGENDARY VOCALIST VIC DAMONE (PART ONE): Producer/host Dick Dinman commences his six-show tribute to iconic vocalist Vic Damone as guest Vic Damone shares his reminiscences of his upbringing in a rough section of Brooklyn, the early influence of his idol Frank Sinatra, his first break and first of many hit recordings, and the generous help and encouragement of stars Perry Como and Milton Berle.
DICK DINMAN SALUTES LEGENDARY VOCALIST VIC DAMONE (PART TWO): Producer/host Dick Dinman continues his tribute to ever-popular song stylist Vic Damone as Vic chats about his first screen test courtesy of MGM producer Joe Pasternak and reveals the identity of the silver screen superstar who saved the day by guiding him through it, his stint in the Army that temporarily interrupted his rise to screen stardom, and his marriage ceremony to the troubled MGM star Pier Angeli as Angeli's ex-beau James Dean looks on mournfully.
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Wednesday, March 20, 2011
Removed: 10:00pm Springfield Rifle 12:00pm Casablanca Added: 1:00pm Virginia City 12:15pm Casablanca
Wednesday, March 20, 2011
Removed: 10:00pm Springfield Rifle 12:00pm Casablanca Added: 1:00pm Virginia City 12:15pm Casablanca
Wednesday, March 20, 2011
Removed: 10:00pm Springfield Rifle 12:00pm Casablanca Added: 1:00pm Virginia City 12:15pm Casablanca


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Whoever "youngin7" is, they are completely wrong about this ring. It is extremely eye-catching and I get so many compliments ALL the time. Whether I'm at a restaurant, at work with customers, standing in line at the grocery store, or spending time with friends, someone always notices how bright, shiny, and sparkling my ring is. The most common reaction I have is "Wow, your ring is so gorgeous!" Plus, it has a unique design with wrapped diamonds that adds to the beauty. And what woman couldn't love 40 diamonds on her finger?! Whoever said it was too small must be a spoiled, ungrateful person because this ring makes me feel like a queen!
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Saracens opened their LV=Cup campaign with a narrow win over Bath while Leicester comfortably beat the Ospreys.
Scarlets won the an all-Welsh derby with the Dragons, Worcester claimed a morale-boosting victory at home to Cardiff while Bath won away to Sale.
London Wasps 21-24 Saracens
Cardiff Blues 16-21 Worcester Warriors
Scarlets 21-13 Dragons
Worcester 21-16 Cardiff Blues
Leicester Tigers 39 - 16 Ospreys
Sale Sharks 20-27 Bath
London Wasps 21-24 Saracens
Saracens began their campaign with a nail-biting bonus-point victory but were made to resist a thrilling comeback from Wasps.
The first 25 minutes was an even contest before Saracens hit their opponents with 24 unanswered points to lead 24-7 with only 17 minutes remaining.
Wasps fought back to striking distance and were it not for a last-gasp tackle on Tom Howe in the final play of the match, the hosts would have completed a remarkable turnaround.
The scorers:
For Wasps:
Tries: Everard, Cochrane, Jacobs
Cons: Carlisle 3
For Saracens:
Tries: Ransom, Tompkins, Barrington, Wilson
Cons: Spencer 2
Yellow card: Wilson
Wasps: 15 Tommy Bell, 14 Jonah Homes, 13 Elliot Daly, 12 Charlie Hayter, 11 Josh Bassett, 10 Joe Carlisle, 9 Charlie Davies, 8 Guy Thompson, 7 Matt Everard, 6 James Haskell (c), 5 James Cannon, 4 Tom Palmer, 3 Will Taylor, 2 Tom Lindsay, 1 Ricky Reeves.
Replacements: 16 Neil Cochrane, 17 Alex Lunderg, 18 Phil Swainston, 19 Esteban Lozada, 20 Sam Jones, 21 Jack Moates, 22 Ben Jacobs, 23 Tom Howe.
Saracens: 15 Ben Ransom, 14 Michael Tagicakibau, 13 Tim Streather, 12 Nick Tompkins, 11 Jack Wilson, 10 Nils Mordt (c), 9 Ben Spencer, 8 Jackson Wray, 7 Will Fraser, 6 Justin Melck, 5 Mouritz Botha, 4 George Kruis, 3 Petrus Du Plessis, 2 Jared Saunders, 1 Richard Barrington.
Replacements: 16 Max Crumpton, 17 Nick Auterac, 18 Biyi Alo, 19 Eoin Sheriff, 20 Matt Hankin, 21 Neil de Kock, 22 Charlie Hodgson, 23 James Short.
Referee: Neil Hennessy (Wales)
Scarlets 21-13 Dragons
Tries from skipper Rob McCusker and rookie wing Chris Knightin the final quarter proved the telling blows that handed Scarlets victory on home soil.
Scarlets led 6-0 at the break before Dragons flanker Scott Matthews was yellow carded for killing ball inside his 22 and the home side used the extra man advantage to full effect, scoring two tries in the space of five minutes.
Dragons fly-half Kris Burton did get a try back but it was too late for the visitors.
The scorers:
For Scarlets:
Tries: Knight, McCusker
Con: Lewis
Pens: A. Thomas 2, Lewis
Yellow cards: Maule
For Dragons:
Try: Burton
Con: Burton
Pens: Burton, GR Jones
Yellow card: Matthews
Scarlets: 15 Gareth Owen, 14 Jordan Williams, 13 Gareth Maule, 12 Adam Warren, 11 Chris Knight, 10 Aled Thomas, 9 Aled Davies, 8 Rob McCusker (capt), 7 Dan Thomas, 6 Craig Price, 5 Richard Kelly, 4 Johan Synman, 3 Rhodri Jones, 2 Kirby Myhill, 1 Shaun Hopkins.
Replacements: 16 Darran Harris, 17 Gareth Thomas, 18 Ben Leung, 19 Carwyn Jones, 20 James Davies, 21 Gareth Davies, 22 Josh Lewis, 23 Kristian Phillips.
Dragons: 15 Dan Evans, 14 Will Harries, 13 Tyler Morgan, 12 Ashley Smith, 11 Matthew Pewtner, 10 Kris Burton, 9 Wayne Evans, 8 Ieuan Jones, 7 Scott Matthews, 6 Jevon Groves, 5 Adam Jones (c), 4 Joe Davies, 3 Francisco Chaparro, 2 Elliot Dee, 1 Aaron Coundley.
Replacements: 16 Hugh Gustafson, 17 Nathan Williams, 18 Nathan Buck, 19 Rob Sidoli, 20 Netani Talei, 21 Luc Jones, 22 Rhys Jones, 23 Ashton Hewitt.
Referee: Matthew Carley (England)
Worcester Warriors 21-16 Cardiff Blues
Worcester Warriors recorded a 21-16 victory over the Cardiff Blues outscoring the visiting side three tries to one.
Warriors banked their first victory of the season thanks to second-half rearguard action.
The Blues were dealt a heavy blow just before the break when pivot Gareth Davies limped-off. Davies looked in good form with the boot and was replaced by debutant Simon Humberstone.
Worcester were reduced to 14 men just before the team's turned for the break when lock Chris Jones binned for killing the ball. The Blues managed to close the gap though a Thomas Young try in the second stanza, but the Worcester defence remained firm right up to the final whistle.
The scorers:
Cardiff Blues:
Try: Young
Con: Humberstone
Pens: Davies, Humberstone
Worcester Warriors:
Tries: O'Donnel, Stephenson, Stelling
Cons: Mieres
Yellow card: C. Jones
Cardiff Blues: 15 Dan Fish, 14 Tom Williams, 13 Richard Smith, 12 Dafydd Hewitt, 11 Chris Czekaj, 10 Gareth Davies, 9 Lewis Jones, 8 Andries Pretorius (c), 7 Thomas Young, 6 Macauley Cook, 5 James Down, 4 Miles Normandale, 3 Benoit Bourrust, 2 Kristian Dacey, 1 Tom Davies.
Replacements: 16 Rhys Williams, 17 Sam Hobbs, 18 Taufa'ao Filise, 19 Luke Hamilton, 20 Rory Watts-Jones, 21 Alex Walker, 22 Simon Humberstone, 23 Gavin Evans.
Worcester: 15 Ben Howard, 14 Josh Drauniniu, 13 Jon Clarke, 12 Max Stelling, 11 James Stephenson, 10 Ignacio Mieres, 9 Paul Hodgson (c), 8 Leonardo Senatore, 7 Jake Abbott, 6 Sam Betty, 5 Chris Jones, 4 Mike Williams, 3 Rob O'Donnell, 2 Ed Shervington, 1 Jeremy Becasseau.
Replacements: 16 Nick Seymour, 17 George Porter, 18 Ofa Fainga'anuku, 19 Dean Schofield, 20 Jonathan Thomas, 21 George de Cothi, 22 Paul Warwick, 23 Andy Symons.
Venue: Arms Park
Referee: Gwyn Morris (Wales)
Leicester Tigers 39-16 Ospreys
Tigers got their season back on track with their first in six matches in all competitions.
21-year-old Welsh fly-half Owen Williams scored 19 points, kicking five penalties and two conversions to add to Leicester's four tries.
Leicester led from start to finish, building on their 14-9 lead at the break with three second-half tries.
The scorers:
For: Leicester Tigers
Tries: Waldrom, Harrison, Wells
Con: Williams
Pens: Williams (5)
For: Ospreys
Try: Williams
Con: Davies
Pens: Davies (3)
Yellow cards: Lloyd Peers
The teams:
Leicester Tigers: 15 Scott Hamilton, 14 Blaine Scully, 13 George Catchpole, 12 Javiah Pohe, 11 Miles Benjamin, 10 Owen Williams, 9 Sam Harrison, 8 Thomas Waldrom, 7 Jamie Gibson, 6 Michael Noone, 5 Sebastian de Chaves, 4 Joe Cain, 3 Fraser Balmain, 2 Harry Thacker, 1 Boris Stankovich (c).
Replacements: 16 George Chuter, 17 Tom Bristow, 18 Tiziano Pasquali, 19 Tom Price, 20 Harry Wells, 21 David M�l�, 22 Perry Humphreys, 23 Henry Purdy.
Ospreys: 15 Ross Jones, 14 Hanno Dirksen, 13 Tom Isaacs, 12 Matthew Jenkins, 11 Tom Grabham, 10 Sam Davies, 9 Tom Habberfield, 8 Morgan Allen, 7 Arthur Ellis, 6 Graham Knoop, 5 Rhodri Hughes, 4 Lloyd Peers (capt), 3 Joe Rees, 2 Matthew Dwyer, 1 Marc Thomas.
Replacements: 16 Rhys Hutchinson, 17 Nicky Smith, 18 Dan Suter, 19 Sam Williams, 20 Jack Jones, 21 Jake Cole, 22 Nathan Edwards, 23 Aisea Natoga.
Venue: Welford Road
Referee: David Rose (England)
Sale Sharks 20-27 Bath
Dave Attwood scored a dramatic last-minute try to snatch victory for Bath at the AJ Bell Stadium.
The teams went into the break level at 10-10 with Michael Paterson touching down for Sale and Anthony Perenise responding for the visitors.
Tom Heathcote kciked his second penalty after the break before Matt Banahan scored for what looked be the game-winning try.
But the hosts then hit back through Nick Macleod's penalty and Mike Haley's try before Attwood was the hero for Bath when he scampered clear.
The scorers:
For Sale Sharks:
Tries:Paterson, Haley
Cons:Ford, Macleod
Pens:Ford, Macleod
Yellow cards:Michael Paterson
For Bath:
Tries:Perenise, Banahan, Attwood
Cons:Heathcote (3)
Drops:HeathcoteThe teams:
Sale: 15 Mike Haley, 14 Tom Arscott, 13 Andy Forsyth, 12 Mark Jennings, 11 Tom Brady, 10 Joe Ford, 9 Will Cliff, 8 Michael Paterson, 7 Dan Braid, 6 Jonathan Mills, 5 Tom Holmes, 4 Andrei Ostrikov, 3 Tony Buckley, 2 Marc Jones, 1 Ross Harrison.
Replacements: 16 Tommy Taylor, 17 Eifion Lewis Roberts, 18 Henry Thomas, 19 Kirill Kulemin, 20 Mark Easter, 21 Dwayne Peel, 22 Nick Macleod, 23 Rob Miller
Bath: 15 Nick Abendanon (c), 14 Richard Lane, 13 Ollie Devoto, 12 Kyle Eastmond, 11 Tom Biggs, 10 Tom Heathcote, 9 Martin Roberts, 8 Leroy Houston. 7 Mat Gilbert, 6 Will Skuse, 5 Ryan Caldwell, 4 Dominic Day, 3 Anthony Perenise, 2 Ross Batty, 1 Nathan Catt.
Replacements: 16 Tom Dunn, 17 Charlie Beech, 18 Kane Palma-Newport, 19 David Attwood, 20 Nick Koster, 21 Chris Cook, 22 Matt Banahan, 23 Anthony Watson.
Referee: Simon Rees (Wales)


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It used to be that when custom electronics (CE) professionals designed theaters one of their chief objectives was finding a way to hide the video projector.
Big, bulky and industrial looking, they were considered an eyesore by many homeowners, and CE pros became masters of concealment. A popular method of disguise was the soffit. Usually constructed of wood, it was designed so that the entire projector could be stowed inside. The only giveaway was a small, round opening in the front for the projector lens to shine through.
Soffits, when designed correctly with adequate ventilation and easy access to the interior, are still effective hiding spots, but recently, we've seen more and more homeowners electing to bring their projectors out of hiding, leaving them completely exposed for everyone to see and admire.
Why the trend? Thanks to the implementation of new technology—particularly LED and laser—manufacturers are able to design projectors that are not only smaller than earlier models, but are also quieter. Better internal cooling and sound insulation make newer projectors quieter, so their fan and color wheel sounds don't get in the way of your movie enjoyment. Some manufacturers also offer customization services, so you can order your projector in a color and finish that complements the room—or that makes it stand out as a visual showpiece.
So what's the best solution: soffit or no soffit? Based on the wide variety of choices now available in projector designs, it's become a tough decision. This list of pros and cons will offer some guidance.
Pro Soffit
Hides the projector for a clean room aesthetic
Offers protection from dusk and other elements
Contains the noise of a projector when it's operating
Can add architectural interest when designed appropriately
In this theater, the projector is built into the back wall.
Pro Exposed
Easy to service the projector
No worries about ventilation of heat that's generated by the projector
Can add visual interest
Inexpensive to install, minus the soffit
Con Soffit
Can be expensive and complicated to install
Tough to access the projector for service and maintenance
Can eat up a fair amount of space
Presents safety issues, particularly from heat build-up
Here the projector is exposed, making it easy to access and keep ventilated.
Con Exposed
Can clash with the décor
Some projectors can be noisy
Quiet and attractive projectors like this SIM2 can easily be exposed without being distracting.
Check out this system that uses an additional mirror and motor hide the bulk of a projector when it's not being used.
In this room, high performance meets interior design.
See how New Hampshire-based custom electronics pro Audio Video Experience constructed its own showroom theater with the projector peeking in from an adjacent room.
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Check out our recommendations for the season's best new TVs for home theater, living room or anywhere.
Home automation system helps wounded war veteran live more comfortably.
Check out our recommendations for the season's best new TVs for home theater, living room or anywhere.


text:
2. The Hybrid Space
Home theater, media room, game room, family center … it doesn't matter much what you call it, as long as it includes two main components: a sound system and a display device. After those two criteria, what passes for a media room varies greatly.
David Berman, vice president of sales at Stereo East in Frisco, Texas, prefers the term media room over home theater. Instead of the traditional look of a dedicated home theater, he finds that more people are taking a hybrid approach—meaning the incorporation of more traditional furniture (sofa and chaise lounge seating) instead of specialty theater seating,and applying lighter colors to the walls.
Why this shift? Berman says many people want a home theater experience, but they don't want to limit the room to just one use. In his market, single-family homes usually only have one room to spare, so making it a multipurpose room ensures the systems installed are used more frequently and by more members of the family.
But a multipurpose media room has requirements that a dedicated theater doesn't. First, it needs access to a wide variety of content. Streaming media devices are supplying a lot of that. While Blu-ray players or high-end movie servers may offer the best-looking pictures for home theaters, Berman sees a lot of Apple TVs and Roku players going into family rooms.
In a dedicated theater, the projector can usually be boxed in or placed in a separate projection room. For the multiuse media space, especially if it's a retrofit installation, the projector often cannot be easily hidden, so it needs to be as quiet as possible.Also important is light output. Michael Bridwell of Digital Projection Inc. (DPI) says high-lumen projectors are ideal for rooms that aren't going to be completely dark. If the theater isn't in a basement, then you probably need to get a bright projector, which mostly rules out LED-based models. Berman concurs and says he always recommends high-output screens in media rooms to maximize the light coming from the projector.Facebook and Twitter.
Check out our recommendations for the season's best new TVs for home theater, living room or anywhere.
Home automation system helps wounded war veteran live more comfortably.
Check out our recommendations for the season's best new TVs for home theater, living room or anywhere.


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World Boxing Tournament 2
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World Boxing Tournament 2 is a fantastic follow up of the original boxing game. Some minor improvements such as the ability to pick from different boxers make this game even much more fun to play.
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SKULLCANDY NCAA Agent Headphones - Discontinued Model
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Product Details
Built on the foundation of the Agent headphone, the SKULLCANDY® College Series features a powerful 40-millimeter driver, an ultra-sleek contour, and a stashable design.
Get your new SKULLCANDY® headphones today from Sports Authority.
- Low-profile shape
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- Frequency Response: 18 to 20 kilohertz
- Impedance: 32 ohms
- Max Input Power: 30 megawatts
- Cable Type: Nylon braided
- Cable Length: 1.2 meters
- Plug Type: 3.5-millimeter, gold plated
Product Recommendations
Product Reviews
Reviewed by 1 customer
- Good Bass
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- Great Sound
- Falls Off/Out Of Ear
- Uncomfortable
Best Uses
- Music
Comments about SKULLCANDY NCAA Agent Headphones - Discontinued Model:
average but ear pads fall off
- Primary Use:
- Listening to iPod
- Was this a gift?:
- Yes


text:
Athames (also known as ritual knives) are a witches personal, magical knife. In neo-pagan witchcraft the athame is used only for casting the circle, and never for cutting. Other older traditions use the knife as much as possible in the belief that its power increases with use. The athame is associated with the element of fire (in some traditions, air). The athame is also used in many invocations, evocations, calling the watchtowers, LBRP (lesser banishing ritual of the pentagram), spellwork, ceremonies, initiation, and various rituals and rites.
Spirit Worker Sword
This amazing sword is hand-made and makes a great summing, conjuring or ritual sword. 27 inches, comes with sheath. Sheath is accented with gold trimmings.
Due to the size and shape of this piece, by ordering you are certifying that you are over the age of 18.
Item #: UT425, Price: $99.99
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Your ultimate Black Friday survival guide
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1 Comments | Add Yours
Oh my goodness. I would be mortified if that happened to me,
Especially in front of people that I go to school with.
by PugLove956 on 3/27/2013 8:55:29 PM
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We're kicking off our Lunar Chronicles Book Club with Cinder, the first story in this futuristic series with a fairytale twist.
CLICK HERE to join the club...and you could win your pick from the Chronicles—including Fairest, the newest novel to hit shelves.


text:
Prime Cuts: Tony Iommi Recalls the Best and Worst of Black Sabbath, the Heaviest Band South of Heaven
February 20, 2014 at 12:32pm
What happened to 'Sabotage'?
I've never been crazy about the sound of that record but musicially I think it's one of their better songwriting efforts.
Tony's got me confused: I've read him say elsewhere he recorded the first three Sabbath albums with the same white Strat he used with Tull - seen in Rock and Roll Circus.
I've always questioned it because, with few exceptions, I could never detect anything that sounded to my ear remotely like a Strat.
I'll buy what he says here that he used the SG.
February 19, 2014 at 10:32pm
Dehumanizer is one of favorite recordings of Dio and Iommi. I will have to dig it out and have another listen.
PureSalem Guitars
February 19, 2014 at 3:00pm
The Mob Rules is my favorite all time sabbath album. Tony has always disliked the sound of that record but I think it's the best sounding record they ever made. His playing on this album is Tony at the top of his game. This record covers all the bases ... From hard chargers like the MOB RULES and TURN UP THE NIGHT, the epic masterpiece THE SIGN OF THE SOUTHERN CROSS, and the greatest riff in all of metal history - FALLING OFF THE EDGE OF THE WORLD. There is no greater Sabbath album or metal album in existence that can top THE MOB RULES. THE NUMBER OF THE BEAST is a close second. ....... You know what they say about opinions but I can't help it!!!! I love this record !!!!
PureSalem Guitars
February 19, 2014 at 1:23pm
So many great songs with Tony Martin behind the mic. I wish he'd elaborated a bit more on the time when Martin fronted the band.
And, I'm surprised that he even acknowledged "Dehumanizer." I'm a Sabbath guy from waaaaay back and even I didn't like that album...I bought it, but didn't like it.
Interesting he didn't care much for "Never Say Die." That must have been a terribly troubling time for him and the band. Truthfully, it's one of my favorites because it doesn't sound patentedly like Black Sabbath. Still, the genius of classic Sabbath rears it's head in a number of places at just the right times.
I wonder if his views have changed since this was written?
August 12, 2013 at 7:31am
Where is Sabotage? It's only their greatest...
box of dope
August 09, 2013 at 12:56pm
awesome sound and great songs, in only 8 hours the mighty sabbath!
August 08, 2013 at 3:55pm
Bill Ward was not part of the line-up that recorded Mob Rules. Vinny Appice was behind the drums for that all-time classic.


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These were easy to make and very filling and my family loved them.
Sherri, Phillipsburg, NJ
From EatingWell: Winter 2004, EatingWell Serves Two, The Essential EatingWell Cookbook (2004)
If you are trying to boost your intake of omega-3s, try this simple favorite. It is a great way to use convenient canned (or leftover) salmon. The tangy dill sauce provides a tart balance.
These were easy to make and very filling and my family loved them.
Sherri, Phillipsburg, NJ
Yet another great recipe! My 11 year old son thought these were fantastic and went back for seconds! My husband really like them, too. Thanks for making such great, healthy recipes for my family so easily accessible.
Crystal B., Mustang, OK
My family really enjoyed these salmon patties. Very easy prep too.
Used leftover baked salmon, but substituted almond meal (from Trader Joe's) for the bread crumbs. I had to use bread crumbs one night when we were out of almond meal, and the cakes were much less moist that time.
Carolyn, St. Louis, MO
My southern family tradition made fried salmon patties. This recipe helps with the heart healthy menus. The egg added is tradition in a patty like this--try egg beaters. I suggest mashed potatoes leftovers instead of bread crumbs. You may also consider leaving out the bread crumbs and just added potato instant flakes or cracker crumbs--roll the patties in them. Baking is an excellent idea. What we do to cut out fat gives our children better dietary habits.
Sally, Parma, OH