Hell has apparently frozen over cause one of the best distribution companies is back from the dead. Fantoma, one of the best new (well, as far as the last 5 years) dvd companies, has gotten their asses in gear and are up and running again. They had not updated their site in almost a year and had even started a sale on all their films. I figured they were a goner. So their next release is going to be a Rainer Werner Fassbinder film called Why does Herr R. Run Amok? on May 30th. After that comes a Samuel Fuller film entitled Dead Pigeon on Beethoven Street, a film I have been waiting for them to release for over a year now. This is great news. They claim they will have regular updates now and will have a new slate of film release very soon. Let's hope their right. Who knows, maybe they will finally release the two Yasuzo Masumura titles, Red Angel and Black Test Car, that Film comment claimed they were supposed to release 3 years ago. Okay, maybe I am pushing it. Also, if you really want to know more about the people who started Fantoma check out this cool little article.

I am heading off to Cleveland tomorrow to check out the first Cinema Wasteland of the year. If you don't know what it is, I will gladly tell you. Its a convention for us horror film dorks. It's a whole alot fun actually. Last year Sid Haig was their among other horror film guests, while this year hosts some more greats from the genre. Alright maybe not any great this year but still some interesting one, including Priscilla Barnes, of all people (actually its because this year hosts the victims of The Devil's Rejects while last year was home of the killers of the film). Another person this year that is pretty damn blog worthy is the one and only Kane Hodder (the best Jason to ever wear the hockey mask in the Friday the 13th flicks). He also oddly enough was the stunt co-ordinator for The Devil's Rejects. Now isn't that a great coincidence. I must finally give a shout out to Lloyd Kaufman, the head of Troma Entertainment, who will also be attending the convention (and the reason why my brother, Kevin, is planning on going).

On a final note, Chiaki and I saw Cache last night at Canton Palace Theater. It was a great film out of France, that everyone should check out. I will give you all more information about it soon.

I will report back tomorrow sometime, I promise. I know its been almost a week since my last post but I want to put all you naysayers to rest ( yeah you, Nate!) and promise to update the site more. Until then.

So my vacation is over and I am kinda sad. It was great while it lasted. Caught mostly great films over the last week My film festival venture included the Italian film Quo Vadis, Baby, which was pretty damn disappointing despite a very promising lead actress and Midnight, My Love, a great little quirky romance from Thailand with a whole lotta originality. I will definitely try to hunt for that as soon as it reaches dvd somewhere. The best film I caught from the fest was a great western starring Guy Pearce out of Australia entitled The Proposition. And man was it violent as hell. Really reminding me of some of the great spaghetti westerns. Hopefully this thing gets released with all the scenes intacted but at press time it is questionable. When it comes around, and I know it will, everyone should really check it out. I have a feeling it will stack up well with the rest of the great films released this year.

I also caught some mainstream flicks over the past week: V for Vendetta and Inside Man. If I had to choose the better film the ball would definitely be in Spike Lee's court, however don't get me wrong V for Vendetta is still one hell of a ride. Lee's Inside Man just really seemed to have more of a "what the hell is going to happen next" factor.

Some good stuff comes out this Tuesday if you a horror fan. Cigarette Burns, the John Carpenter episode of the Masters of Horror series, along with four Giallo films from the 70's. I am definitely picking up the former and really want to also pick up at least one of the Italian horror films. I guess we will see how bad it damages my wallet.

So I gone and done it again.I just saw a movie I should have gone to see along a time ago. An damn, was it entertaining. I feel so out of touch last year now that I realized I missed two of best films from last year. Cause its hard out here for a pimp...yep you guessed it, I just checked out Hustle & Flow. Man, I love this film. Terrence Howard is amazing in this film. Its great to see him go from Crash to Hustle & Flow. Two different yet equally outstanding performances. I will shut up about the film now cause its kinda too late to praise it and I am sure everyone has heard as much as they want about it but I just have to give it some props. I can't wait to see where Howard goes next in his career. An then theres Anthony Anderson, who up until this point I hated with a passion. He's great in this fim too. If you haven't seen this film yet, do yourself a favor and check it out. I don't care if you love hip hop or hate it, this movie is about so much more than that. Check it out.

How could I be so blind. So lazy. After watching the film I just watched, I keep on asking myself why I hadn't seen it earlier. This film is easily the best film of last year. It touched me more than any of the films I saw last year (including Munich and A Constant Gardener, two films I hold dare to my heart). What is this film, you ask? Well that film is...Crash.

If you know me you know that I always go against the grain I never follow the hype but, man, is this thing powerful. Its real. Its honest. It never holds back. It truly is the way life is. I could shoot myself for not see this last year and raving on and on about it because it truly deserves it. It wholeheartly deserves that Oscar. I am still glad that Ang Lee got the director award because he has had amazing career. Paul Haggis has so much ahead of him. I can't wait to see what he has up his sleeve. Hell, he has two screenwriting Oscars already and thats pretty damn great. This film immediately made me think of another Paul. Paul Thomas Anderson (and if you know me well, you know I love PTA). Crash needs to be seen by everyone, it really does. I guess I can't say anything that hasn't already been said about this film, I just want to say that its an exceptional piece of work that really touched the heart and it deserves every ounce of praise that it is given. Actually, why don't you just go pick up the director's cut of the film that comes out April 4th. I know I will!

Just got done watching one powerhouse of a film. But before I go ahead, I would like to back track a few steps. During the late 80's and all through the 90's, Hong Kong cinema was on fire. Matter of fact, my first love of international film (others than a handful of Italian horror films) came by way of Chinese cinema. I am about to mention a best kept secret....I used to be a huge Jean Claude Van Damme fan.

Okay, I am glad that is out of my system, we all can sleep better now.

Anyways, luck for me, I was introduced to John Woo in the early 90s thanks to the Muscles from Brussels (sorry again, I just couldn't resist). From their on it was all over. Everything out of Hong Kong I fell in love with. Slowly but surely, I expanded to other parts of the world of film, Spanish films, French films, Italian films, you name it. To be honest Mr. Tarantino himself, turned my on two great things thanks to his now-defunct distribution company Rolling Thunder, Wong Kar Wai's Chungking Express and Takeshi Kitano's Sontaine. Wong Kar Wai is now one of my favorite directors of all time and Kitano, also one of my favorites, was a great introduction to Japanese cinema. Wong Kar Wai also turned me on to Jean Luc Godard (who has highly influenced Wong Kar Wai) and we all know how highly I respect that director.

But something happened with Hong Kong films...they kinda died. It seemed that the only thing I would watch from their would be a Wong Kar Wai film (which if you are a fan of the man means every 3 or 4 years) or from time to time a good Tony Leung Chi Wai starrer. Nothing really was all that impressive until Infernal Affairs (possibly one of the greatest films out of Asia ever). Recently Korean and Japanese film has been far more successful on all levels than any out of Hong Kong. After Infernal Affairs, came SPL, a nice welcome return, but still not comparable to the other. Until now.


Like I said at the beginning, I just got done watching a pretty powerful film, Election. The film follows the Chairman selection process as two triad (the Chinese Mafia) leaders struggle with each other to head the Wo Sing Society. Matter of fact, the one Chairman is elected rather early in the film (in the first 15 minutes), that's not really what this film is about. Its about the war between them and how they must do what has to be done to stay on top and stay true to their name. The last 30 minutes of this film is right now of a Scorese film. And I don't mean this in a negative way, I think that the director, Johnnie To, has definitely done justice to the genre. It is truly some powerful stuff, especially the ending that really sets you up to wanting to see more (ironically the sequel comes out next month in Hong Kong). My only complaint is that I wish it was longer. I really wanted to see more of what was happening among these people. Do yourself a favor and check this film out please. Its not out state side as of yet but do some internet soul searching (by clicking on the image above) or check your local Chinatown. Trust me you won't be disappointed.

We just got back from Cleveland and I have to say I am pretty satisfied. The documentary we watch, Abduction: The Megumi Yokota Story was heartbreaking. God, it was so well crafted. For those that don't know what the hell has been going on in Japan for the last 20 years or so I will try to fill you in. Starting back in the late '70s, North Korea began to kidnap Japanese citizens to bring to their country to teach Koreans how to be Japanese. Over the years North Korean has admitted to kidnap 13 Japanese and 5 have since been returned back to Japan. The others North Korea claims have died. One of which was Megumi Yokota, a 13 year old girl. This is her story ( along with information about the others). Its a very sad story but it was something I am very glad that I saw. Chiaki has been telling me about ever since 2002 (when the 5 Japanese were finally returned home) but the film really helped me in learning even more. It truly is a film everyone needs to see. I wish it would be nominated for an Academy Award this year so that the mainstream audience can discover it. I will be pushing hard for this film to play at the Canton Palace Theatre this year. This is really powerful stuff.

So I know. It has pretty much been a whole week since my last post. I have sorta been busy but that's no excuse really. It's laziness pure and simple. I apologize. So on with the post.

Went to my first meeting of the Art Film Committee of the Canton Palace Theatre. It went good. It was actually pretty damn cool. I was one of three new members, one of which was a friend of mine from work, Jeremy. They meet once a month and I will attempting to attend all of them from now. I have already been email them ideas for future film screenings. Hopefully, this will work out to be a great opportunity for me.

The Cleveland International Film Festival started yesterday. Our first film we are catching is tomorrow. I can't hardly wait. This is one of my favorite times of the year.

I picked up to films the other day while visiting Columbus. Three Times and Election (no, not the Reese Witherspoon film). One from Taiwan, and the other from Hong Kong. Both played at Cannes last year and are supposed to be excellent films. I picked them up at Eday, a relatively new store which sells Chinese films (along with some from Korean and Japanese). They also have a website you can order from if that is your thing.

Caught the The Hills have Eyes remake the other day. Not much to say about it. Most people I talked to loved it. I just thought it was okay. As far as the gore factor, the film blows most out of the ball park. I mean I am not quite sure how they got away with this much blood and gore. But others than that, it didn't grab me much. The actors were fine that wasn't my problem it just didn't do much for me. In my opinion, Hostel is superior on so many more levels.

Well, I guess that's all for now. I will post tomorrow when we get home from the film festival to let everyone know how it went.

So other one bites the dust. I just read that Wellspring, one of the great distributors of international cinema, is shutting there doors forever. To all you out there who don't know them you really should. Over the years they have released nearly a dozen Rainer Werner Fassbinder films, along with classics from Francois Truffaut, Hou Hsaio-hsien, Eric Rohmer, Tsai Ming-Liang, Akira Kurosawa, Takeshi Kitano. While forming named. Formally known as Fox Lorber, and sadly known for bad transfers, by tranforming into Wellspring they changed paths and became a critically acclaimed distributor of solid releases. They will be sadly missed. This news comes of the heels of the recent shut down of another great defunct distributor, Homevision (who was responsible for an amazing array of international films, one of which was the Yakuza Papers boxset that I drool over everyday). Luckily for us, some superb companies our coming out of the wood work to help film fanatics like myself see some of these great lost films from around the world. Tartan Video, Noshame Films, Discotek, Panik House Entertainment, Blue Underground, Synapse Films, Fantoma, Kino, and Criterion Collection are making us proud with their excellent array of releases.

So I always go on and on about the Cleveland Cinematheque and how great it is but I always fail to mention other great theater around me. This theater is even closer to me (as a matter of fact less than 15 minutes away), The Canton Palace Theatre.

This baby has been standing strong for 80 years. Look at that marquee doesn't it make you cry. The theater is a beauty from top to bottom. The coolest thing about them is that about 5 years ago they started to do a art film night every Thursday. A blockbuster Hollywood film would play on the weekend while a foreign or art house film plays on Thursday. Its pretty damn cool. This month we are going to check out Cache, a film from France that one the Prix de la mise en scene (the Best Director Award) at the Cannes Film Festival last year. Some they just started doing, as far as I know, is play Classic films on Sundays. They keep on getting better and better. A friend from work even recently inviting me to be on their Art film committee so you know that I am extremely excited for that. Hopefully I can get them some even great insight on the best films to get there. We will see, I guess.

So we had plans to Bowling Green today to check out the school, when I was reminded of something my friend Andrew, a Bowling Green student, told me last week. It's spring break. So it looks like my school visit will have to wait until next week.

We got back from Dave Chappelle's Block Party a few hours ago. It was quite an enjoyable hour and a half. If you go in wanted a all Chappelle stand up film your not going to get it. If you go in thinking you will see some crazy visuals from Michel Gondry, your not going to get that either. Matter of fact the only signs of Gondry is maybe the opening credits and his voice throughout. I would have to say their is more concert footage than anything else and man is it great stuff. I mean the music in this film is always the artists I have grown to love over the years as far as hip hop goes. The Roots, Common, Talib Kweli, Mos Def, Erykah Badu, Kayne West. Great Stuff. Even the appearance of The Fugees, who I think were a bit overrated, was pretty entertaining. And don't think their isn't any Chappelle comedy mix in because their is definitely a fair share. I mean come on this man is leader of our generation in comedy. He is the second coming of Richard Pryor in my opinion (ironically he was wearing a Pryor shirt throughout most of the film). It really was a well made film. I would go as far as to say it is a groundbreaking film. Their has never been a film I can remember like this, with a wide release at least. Matter of fact I can't even find a film of the top of my head that is a documentary mix comedy with music.

Not much going on these last fool days. Sorry for the absence of posts theses days (for all five people that read this). While I stated early on that I wasn't going to talk much about myself on here I do have some pretty big news.

I have decided to go back to school and get my Masters degree. I seriously sat down and thought what the hell can I do with my life that I will really enjoy. Everyone that knows me knows that I love talking about film all day and night. I feel that I have a pretty good knowledge of and was thinking of the perfect thing that would fit me as a career. I decided that what I would thoroughly enjoy would be to teach film in college. I emailed a film professor I had and truly admired at Kent State, Professor Robert West, and he recommended that I participate in the Pop Culture graduate program at Bowling Green. So right now I am making those steps to see if that is the best thing for me. I am extremely excited to learn more about their program and the college. One of my friends have graduated from Bowling Green while another is currently attending it right now. Both tell me this is a great program. So I am pretty psyched, but enough about me.

I ordered Chiaki and I some tickets for a handful of films at the Cleveland International Film Festival. We are going for a record this year. So far we are planning on see four films. This year we plan on seeing the following films:

Abduction : The Megumi Yokata Story
At 13 years old, Megumi Yokota disappears on her way home from school. After nearly 20 years with no idea what happened to their daughter, Megumi parents learn from a North Korean defector she was one of at least 13 Japanese citizens abducted by North Korean spies in the late 1970s and early 1980s. Five years later, North Korea admits to the kidnappings and reveals the fates of the abducted. Resolving to bring Megumi home, her parents tenacious and untiring campaign takes their personal tragedy to the political forefront, resulting ultimately in a battle between nations. Set to haunting images of Megumi and wrought with half-truths and near triumphs, ABDUCTION (Executive Produced by Jane Campion, the Oscar winning director of "The Piano") is a shocking portrait of the strength of one family and the bureaucracy barring them from the truth. (In Japanese and Korean with English Subtitiles)

The Proposition
Charlie Burns (Guy Pearce) is presented with a proposition by British police Captain Stanley to choose between his two brothers. The Captain, fixated on bringing civility to his English settlement and on relieving the settlement of its worst outlaws, creates his own rule of law . Charlie searches for his elusive, vicious elder brother while his younger brother sits, terrified, in a jail cell. In town, the consequences of the Captain proposition begin to spread far, wide, and rather bloodily. The havoc reaches even to the Captain gentle wife, Martha (Emily Watson), who is no longer able to be protected by porcelain teapots and English roses. Nick Cave screenplay astounds, and the haunting soundtrack fits perfectly with the visibly sweltering and audibly painful outback. THE PROPOSITION is a thrilling twist on the Wild West genre, dealing brutally and beautifully with loyalty, revenge, and love in a violent and unforgiving territory.

Quo Vadis, Baby?
Working for her father private detective agency in Bologna, Giorgia is an unglamorous, short-tempered, quick-witted investigator. She spends most of her time trailing cheating spouses and lamenting that she has wasted her life. But when she receives a box containing video diaries of her younger sister Ada, she begins to question whether or not Ada's death 16 years ago was really a suicide. On the tapes, outgoing Ada appears to be happily struggling with her acting career and having a secret affair; nothing that suggests she was suicidal. Convinced that her sister was murdered, Giorgia begins interviewing Ada friends and family members. As she digs deeper into the past, a questionable family history begins to emerge. Wholly clever, atmospheric, and stylishly shot, QUO VADIS, BABY? is a thrilling contemporary noir film that invites the audience in to play detective. (In Italian with English subtitles)

Midnight, My Love
Driving though the Bangkok night is Bati, a shy cab driver who is more interested in listening to dramatic radio shows and the music of a time past than in picking up customers. Reluctant to adjust to modern technologies, Bati is happily stuck in his ways, often lost in his own romantic reveries that play out like old musical films. One evening he picks up a group of four prostitutes in his cab, three of whom loudly tease him and one who sits quietly. Bati and the beautiful woman, Nuan, have dinner together, agree that he shall pick her up each night, and begin a chaste romance. Bati dreams of a more passionate affair and of saving Nuan from her tarnished life, but both have their reasons for keeping the other at a distance. Popular Thai comedic actor Pechtai Wongkamlao brings a spectacular dimension to his sad, sweet character and his uncanny reason for resisting modernity. Soft-lensing, a romantic soundtrack, and stunning images establish the dreamy feel of this memorable, melancholic tale of an unlikely love. (In Thai, with English subtitles)

Alright we are off to see Block Party. I will probably post tonight to give everyone my opinion. Until then...