Does Luke defeat Vader? Because my memory is that he won't finish the fight, gets force-shocked within an inch of his life, then is saved by his mortally wounded father. Luke is kind of a wimp at the end of Jedi.

When was the last time you read Frankenstein? Because holy hell is that thing turgid. I recognize its importance and complexity, but it was such a chore to get through, and I've done it twice (but not in the past decade).

I saw Sin City with Grant Morrison and Robbie Williams.

One of the things that annoys me about Carpenter's Halloween is its insistence that Michael Meyers is just "ee-vil." I'd probably be able to accept it better without Donald Pleasance wandering around Haddonfield, waiting for his chance to be a deus-ex-machina, but it's ultimately just boring; Meyers isn't a character…

"…Rand would have derided as incompetents, people who are terrible at
their jobs, who have contributed something to the world that is embarrassing and amateurish, stupid and shrill."

Just out of curiosity — why the B-? I didn't really see any specific critique about the film (other than the suggestion that Antonietta's sexual desires were demeaning) or the BluRay.

I could qualify pretty much every director's films in this way. I love Kubrick, but 2001 is his only flawless film, and he had one outright stinker (The Shining, though some consider that a heretical opinion). Del Toro isn't in Kubrick's class, but I would put him in the top rank of filmmakers working today. On the…

It was the right decision at the time. Some local fisherman had caught and killed a large predator that had allegedly injured some bathers. It was a beautiful day, and people were having a wonderful time. Why not open the beaches? How was I to know that an even larger predator was out there? Am I supposed to listen to…

That is what I remember, but I want to give it another shot. It received raves just before it was released, so my negative opinion might have been a case of expecting too much. And my tastes might have matured in the past 10+ years.

He has made one legitimately great film (Devil's
Backbone), one very good movie that would have been great if
it hadn't been a more special effects-heavy of another one (the themes
of Pan's Labyrinth are very close to those of
DB, and I grew a bit weary of the set pieces towards
the end), some very enjoyable action…

It used to be aired on television as such back in the 1980s — as "The Complete Saga" or something like that. It reordered scenes into chronological order, if I remember correctly.

I see what you did there in that last sentence.

I may have said this before here, but when Mulholland Dr. ended, I wasn't sure I understood it but had the dreadful feeling that it understood me.

2001: A Space Odyssey is the first film where I sat in the theater wanting to think about what I had just seen; it demonstrated to me (at 13 or so) that films were more than just sensation-delivery devices. Its measured pace and obscure conclusion annoy many (including, at the time, my family and, now, my students)…

It was the best theater experience I've ever had. I saw a midnight screening on opening night (mid-October) in a packed theater in the South. The audience was very much into it, and nervously chattering throughout — so much so that I didn't even know that some scenes had audio cues until I watched it at home. At the…

No mention of the Mooninites?
https://www.youtube.com/wat…

Yeah, but Kane's career lasted maybe an album. It'd be hard to think of someone who fell off harder and faster than Kane.

Especially since "Don't Believe the Hype" might be their most overrated song. It's has always felt sluggish to me — the only track on Nation of Millions that I routinely skipped.

Maybe I'm wishing this were so, but I seem to remember some illustration (in Rolling Stone maybe?) of said letter, reading:

If you have to have the jokes explained to you…