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“Who Framed Roger Rabbit” (1988) Review
“WHO FRAMED ROGER RABBIT” (1988) REVIEW WHO FRAMED ROGER RABBIT (Robert Zemeckis, 104 min, color, 1988) What’s Happening: Murder mystery in 1940s Hollywood where cartoon characters live for real Famous For: Perfect synchrony among live and animated characters Hugely ambitious, highly original, very complicated to produce, and very expensive to create, Roger Rabbit was also…
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The Terrors of Television
THE TERRORS OF TELEVISION A fair number of science fiction and horror pictures in the 80s betray worries over television: it fools us, it makes us violent, it brainwashes us, it substitutes illusion for reality, and it even provides a dimensional gateway for aliens or demons. Why these fears? Sociologists point first to the growing…
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“Road Warrior” Imitators Of The 80s
ROAD WARRIOR IMITATORS OF THE 80s Who doesn’t love the post-apocalyptic sci-fi films of the 1980s? If you define the subgenre broadly, you’ll count at least 100 such films. They include post-nuke films and post-pandemic films. They also include Road Warrior imitators. I’d like to cover these Road Warrior imitators; that is, post-apocalyptic films that…
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“A Christmas Carol” (1984) review
“A CHRISTMAS CAROL” (1984) REVIEW: A CHRISTMAS CAROL (Cliver Donner, 101 min, color, 1984) What’s Happening: Ghosts persuade miser to change greedy ways Famous For: US/UK co-production made for television Though I’ll always be partial to the 1938 and 1951 adaptations, I think I like George C. Scott best as Scrooge. He seems smarter than…
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Stop-Motion Underdogs
STOP-MOTION UNDERDOGS If you think of stop-motion animation in classic fantasy films, you think of Ray Harryhausen. Even folks who know the name “Harryhausen” only from that restaurant in Monsters Inc. know the films themselves: Jason and the Argonauts, 7th Voyage of Sinbad, Clash of the Titans, Beast from 20,000 Fathoms, and the rest. But…
Claws & Saucers 