1993 Tagged Articles at Cinematical
Our Favorite Summers: 1993
Filed under: Fandom », Summer Movies »
1993 holds a really special place in my heart for one reason: Jurassic Park. While I had seen some event movies in my 11 short years, there had never been a movie like this. It was the first movie I had to wait in line for -- and the line seemed huge because it actually went outside the Southwest Plaza Mall.
To this day, I don't know when it first appeared on my radar, or how I saw my first bit of footage. All I remember is that T-Rex foot coming down in the mud with a sinister squish, and knowing this was going to be one hell of a movie. And it was. I'll never forget that first shot of the brachiosaurus. I'm pretty sure I stopped breathing. When the shot expanded to the swamp filled with dinosaurs, my mind knew it was that new thing called CGI, but my heart was half-convinced Spielberg really had cloned dinosaurs. It sounds pretentious, but I knew movies were going to never be the same again. This was the future, and I was going to see it. If you could go back in time and tell young Beth that she'd be employed to write constantly about it well, she wouldn't be surprised. She knew she wasn't going to be a paleontologist, anyway.
So large does Jurassic Park loom in my memory that it's kind of funny to see what else was released that summer -- and how drastically the idea of a "summer blockbuster season" has changed since the 90s. Let's revisit, shall we ...
To this day, I don't know when it first appeared on my radar, or how I saw my first bit of footage. All I remember is that T-Rex foot coming down in the mud with a sinister squish, and knowing this was going to be one hell of a movie. And it was. I'll never forget that first shot of the brachiosaurus. I'm pretty sure I stopped breathing. When the shot expanded to the swamp filled with dinosaurs, my mind knew it was that new thing called CGI, but my heart was half-convinced Spielberg really had cloned dinosaurs. It sounds pretentious, but I knew movies were going to never be the same again. This was the future, and I was going to see it. If you could go back in time and tell young Beth that she'd be employed to write constantly about it well, she wouldn't be surprised. She knew she wasn't going to be a paleontologist, anyway.
So large does Jurassic Park loom in my memory that it's kind of funny to see what else was released that summer -- and how drastically the idea of a "summer blockbuster season" has changed since the 90s. Let's revisit, shall we ...
Obama Endorses Jeff Bridges for President
Filed under: Casting », Celebrities and Controversy », Newsstand », Politics »
When it comes to sifting through all actors responsible for portraying the most powerful man on the planet, there's no shortage of options. John Travolta did a great Bill Clinton impersonation in Primary Colors and Timothy Bottoms delivered a near-perfect imitation of George W. Bush in both D.C. 9/11: Time of Crisis and That's My Bush! Neither one comes across as particularly flattering, so presidential nominee Barack Obama has chosen a safer bet: At a recent party in Los Angeles, Obama revealed that he prefers Jeff Bridges' conflicted commander-in-chief in The Contender. Granted, he may have said this simply to keep his audience happy -- in this case, Contender director Rod Lurie, one of the attendees who was willing to plop down $28,000 for the event. "'I just plugged your movie," Obama told Lurie, according to a report the director sent to Hollywood Elsewhere's Jeffrey Wells. Still, when you're under the kind of intense scrutiny that Obama currently endures, Bridges actually seems like a pretty safe choice. Choose Anthony Hopkins in Nixon and it sounds like you're endorsing the bad guy. Choose Kevin Kline in Dave and you come across as disingenuous. Choose Peter Sellers in Dr. Strangelove and somebody will call you incompetent. Bridges, on the other hand, plays a fierce leader bound to his moral convictions. Of course, Obama also expressed sympathy over Lurie's short-lived television show Commander-in-Chief, which featured Geena Davis as the first woman president. Perhaps it's no coincidence that he and Hillary have publicly made amends.
Tony Danza Wants to Play Nixon Aide
Filed under: Casting », New Releases », Celebrities and Controversy », Box Office », Politics »
.jpg)
Yesterday's New York Post contained a gossip item in Page Six taken from the book party for James Rosen's The Strong Man: John Mitchell and the Secrets of Watergate in New York, where attendee Tony Danza expressed an interest in playing Richard Nixon aide H.R. Halderman -- maybe in a movie version of Rosen's book. Halderman, who died in 1993, worked for Nixon as White House Chief of Staff until the Watergate scandal landed him eighteen months in prison in 1973. His story, partially recounted in The Strong Man, involved a longstanding relationship with Nixon going back to the 1950s and the tense moments immediately before and after the president's resignation. In between, he was involved in a botched attempt to assassinate Fidel Castro and other tumultuous events dutifully recorded in Halderman's diary, which became available to the public years later. Many political scandals often revolve around a single corrupt individual, but it's the right hand man whose story can be most revealing. (Roy Cohen's personal drama has way more twists than that of Joseph McCarthy, for example.) There's little doubt that Halderman's experiences would work well on the big screen, but this wouldn't be the first time: IMDb lists no less than five actors who have portrayed Halderman, including James Downing in The Pentagon Papers, as recently as 2003. Would Danza make sense in this role? And will any film have a chance at getting people interested in this story after Frost/Nixon nabs the spotlight later this year?
'Twilight' Fans: Do You Really Want to See 'Breaking Dawn'?
Finally! All Those Ambiguous Movie Endings Resolved!
Spin-ematical: New on DVD for 11/10
Fun with Math: The Huge Box Office Numbers for 'Precious'
Girls on Film: Domestic Violence and Media
