Back in July, Universal released Trail of the Lonesome Pine (1936). The film is an important stepping stone in the history of colour cinema because it marked the first time a feature-length movie was shot on location with Technicolor’s new (and very big) 3-strip cameras.
J.J. Abrams’ Star Trek will street Nov. 17, and Paramount will spread the film out on single disc and 2-disc standard DVD editions, as well as a 3-disc Blu-ray release, the latter featuring what’s billed as “plot-based deleted scenes,” a new phrase that’s rather baffling, given most deleted scenes were originally conceived to advance plotting, if […]
Why bother archiving old columns for DVD releases with unique film music content from years ago? Is it ego? Or just the cold hard fact that words written – good, bad, or blatherish – can vanish when a site folds? If one comes from a print background, the discomfort is when the physical medium of one’s work is no longer in print, and the content can’t be…
Brian Hecker’s period at the AFI yielded the short Family Attraction (1998), which reportedly became one of the AFI’s most popular shorts – unsurprising that it would be the first of six films in Vanguard’s DVD 2003 collection, Celebrating AFI. Hecker eventually wrote and directed his first feature, Bart Got a Room (Anchor Bay/Starz) ten years later, wherein he mined his uncomfortable teen years for a refreshing take on guy-getting-girl-for-prom plot…
For some writer/directors, making a short film is indeed a stepping stone towards a career in the feature film realm, although sometimes a short’s success doesn’t guarantee an immediate film deal. When Sean Ellis’s Cashback was nominated for an Oscar in 2005, the director managed to develop the short into a feature film, using most of the existing footage for his upgraded narrative. Cashback, the feature (Canada: Altlantis/Remstar, U.S.A.: Magnolia), was later followed by The Broken (2008) and though both films are very flawed…
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