Hollywood
February 26, 2012 — Scott Johnson
Occasional contributor Bill Katz holds down the fort at Urgent Agenda. Bill is a man of many parts, a few of which go back to his days as a producer on The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson. Bill is back on the show biz beat with reflections on tonight’s Academy Awards show: The Oscars are on this Sunday night. Aren’t you excited? No? Why not? Can’t you sense the excitement
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January 6, 2012 — Steven Hayward
In my short review of The Iron Lady last week I noted that Meryl Streep had generally spoken carefully about her opinions about Margaret Thatcher. The worst I could find at that time was her comment to Newsweek that “For feminists it’s a betrayal because she doesn’t do the right thing, and so you hate her more than you’d hate a man who stood for the same things.” I had
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December 26, 2011 — Scott Johnson
I started writing for The Dartmouth daily newspaper as a reviewer in the fall term of my freshman year in 1969 and continued to write for the paper until I graduated. I reviewed plays, books, and films. Writing for the paper, I also interviewed campus visitors such as the literary critic Alfred Kazin, the sculptor Elbert Weinberg, and the one and only William F. Buckley, Jr., all now deceased. As
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November 30, 2011 — Scott Johnson
Occasional contributor Mark Falcoff writes to comment on the story that a Chilean judge is charging a US military officer with the 1973 murder of two Americans: I don’t know how many Power Line readers have ever seen Costa-Gavras’s 1982 film Missing. Even if they have, they probably have forgotten the details. The story is alleged to be true, although it deals very carelessly with the facts surrounding the military
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November 26, 2011 — Scott Johnson
I think I went to see Harry and Tonto after Art Carney won the Academy Award for his portrayal of Harry Coombes in the title role. For some reason, however, I went to see the film with no particular expectation that I would enjoy it. Probably for that reason the movie caught me by surprise and bowled me over. Watching it again on cable yesterday, I found that the film
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November 13, 2011 — Steven Hayward
F. Scott Fitzgerald famously wrote that ‘There are no second acts in American lives,” but it would seem this applied chiefly to him alone for the obvious reason: Fitzgerald’s literary career peaked in his twenties, with Gatsby. There have been lots of notable second acts: Ronald Reagan’s political career, for example, or numerous actors like Leslie Nielsen, who went from being a serious dramatist to the straight-man comic. You can
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October 5, 2011 — Scott Johnson
The prominent author Edward Jay Epstein is a man of many interests, a few of which are represented in his new ebook, The Money Demons: True Fables of Wall Street. Ed has drawn from the book to explain “why businessmen wear black hats in the movies nowadays.” He writes: It is hardly surprising that pop culture protesters in zombie-masks are now intent on occupying Wall Street. For the past decade,
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August 5, 2011 — Scott Johnson
The August issue of O Magazine (I think) features four Books That Made a Difference to Gary Sinise. Sinise is of course one of Hollywood’s good guys, and two of the four books he selects will be familiar to faithful Power Line readers: Surviving Hell: A POW’s Journey, by Leo Thorsness (Sinise’s comments are here) and Unbroken, by Laura Hillenbrand (Sinise’s comments are here). These two books obviously relate to
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February 28, 2011 — Scott Johnson
I caught just enough of the Academy Awards broadcast last night to find best cinematography winner Wally Pfister (“the p is silent, as in phthisis, psychic, and ptarmigan”) make a point during his acceptance speech of thanking his union crew on “Inception.” ABC News posts Pfister’s elaboration of his point backstage. There he explained that everything good in his life derives from his union: “I think that what is going
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March 9, 2009 — Scott Johnson
We just got around to seeing “The Reader” this weekend (warning: plot spoilers below). I don’t think I’ve ever seen a movie that I felt ruined my weekend. This was a first for me. If only there were an Oscar for worst excuse for sex in a film, “The Reader” could have garnered the Oscar it deserved. As it was, Kate Winslet won the best actress award for her sympathetic
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April 6, 2008 — Scott Johnson
The death of Charlton Heston represents a great loss for American art. It’s possible to imagine other fine actors of his era playing the roles Heston made unforgettable, but it’s not possible to imagine the other actors making them unforgettable. From Moses to Judah Ben-Hur to George Taylor and all the rest before and after, Heston uniquely combined physical grace, a superb physique, that resonant voice, a commanding presence, and
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