Goodbye IMDb message boards. Hello...The Movie DB?

As discussed recently, IMDb is shutting down its message boards. People have been wondering where to go to discuss movies. The Movie DB seems poised to run with the ball IMDb has dropped, and I like what I'm seeing thus far.

IMDb messages boards shutting down

There has been plenty of coverage of the recent sad news, that IMDb is shutting down its message boards. Clearly, mentioning it as such is not attempt to leave you wondering how I feel about it - indeed, the message board became the most useful feature of IMDb for me.

Noah, & Bibically themed films; the new "go-to" for Hollywood?

Now granted it’s been a while since I’ve posted anything, but don’t think I’ve given up my movie and specialty TV watching. That will never change. 

I just had to take a break while back in post-secondary classes. Now that I’m off I can get back to some articles and stuff on my mind. 

Yep, a lot of good movies so far this summer. Yes I have seen some, (How to Train Your Dragon 2, being the most recent one), so I will try to get into those as soon as I can. But first I wanted to talk about a noticeable pattern I’ve been observing - there’s been an increase of Biblically-themed films, and even a few TV shows of the same genre. 

The Pads of Mad Men

Matt Weiner is apparently "well known for being fastidious about period detail." 

As such, the following map, showing where a few Mad Men characters live, can help us envision their movements in and around New York City.

Brett and Marvin: Pulp Fiction and the (skill-testing) question

In this fifth installment exploring Pulp Fiction's treatment of redemption, we consider Jules' famous scene with Brett; he  had asked Brett if he knew why a Quarter Pounder with cheese was called a Royale with cheese in France. Brett proved he was a smart guy, figuring out that a Quarter Pounder with cheese can’t keep the same name in France… “because of the metric system” (“Check out the big brain on Brett…you’re a smart mothe…”) It was on the basis of his right answer that Jules could “lay his vengeance upon him” – because he should have known better. 

The Apartment

So, after watching Double Indemnity, I went looking for other Billy Wilder titles. I’d previously heard of The Apartment, although at that time I had no idea who Wilder was; it seemed like a good next movie to watch, given that Fred MacMurray was in both. And given that, unlike the darkness of film noir, this was a romantic comedy. Let's see how he handled himself. 

Double Indemnity - the film that started it all

I've mentioned on not a few occasions that Billy Wilder is my favourite movie-maker of all time. Quentin Tarantino is up there, as is Spike Lee, David Mamet, David Fincher, John Hughes, and other honourable mentions. However, insofar as I've been able to recognize, Wilder was not limited to any single genre - whatever style he approached, he nailed it.

The first Wilder movie I ever saw was not chosen because it was Wilder. I knew nothing of plot, didn't go looking particularly for it; I was at the video store (back when one went to video stores to rent videos), and decided to start getting through some classics. I saw the case, it had some award mentions on it, so I said "Okay, let's watch this tonight."

That movie was Double Indemnity, it had me from the opening to the close, and was the beginning of a journey of movie-making discovery I'm still travelling.