Now Screening - What Are You Watching Right Now?

[struth]

The Mouse on the Moon (1963).. great cast inc Terry-Thomas, Margret Rutherford, Ron Moody etc..

[struth]

Deep Impact (1998)




After discovering the comet, one of the astronomers is killed in an automobile accident. This mirrors the real-life automobile accident death (July 18, 1997, in the Australian outback) of astronomer Eugene Shoemaker, who helped discover the Shoemaker-Levy 9 comet that collided with Jupiter in 1994 and was a source of inspiration for this film.

A line was edited in the President's press conference scene. President Beck stated "Life will go on, we will prevail." Originally, President Beck said "Life will go on, we will prevail. This is not Armageddon." The producers later realized that the movie was going to be in box-office competition with the movie Armageddon (1998).

A giant object from space struck the general area of the Eastern Seaboard where "Biederman" impacted in the film. Hitting the Norfolk, Virginia vicinity, it created the huge, now-buried, Chesapeake Bay impact crater. It happened about 5.5 ± 0.3 million years ago, during the late Eocene epoch age.

[struth]

Heat (1995)





Rather than dubbing in the gunshots during the bank robbery shoot-out, Michael Mann had microphones carefully placed around the set so that the audio could be captured live. This added to the impact of the scene, because it sounded like no other gunfight shown on-screen.

In an interview with Al Pacino on the DVD Special Edition, Pacino revealed that for the scene in the restaurant between Hanna and McCauley, Robert De Niro felt that the scene should not be rehearsed so that the unfamiliarity between the two characters would seem more genuine. Michael Mann agreed, and shot the scene with no practice rehearsals.

When Kevin Gage was imprisoned for two years in 2003, he was universally addressed by fellow inmates and prison guards as "Waingro", his character from this movie. Waingro (Kevin Gage) is based on a real Chicago criminal named "Waingro", who ratted out some influential Chicago criminals. According to Michael Mann, Waingro went missing. His body was found in northern Mexico, where it had been nailed to the wall of a shed.

In the director's commentary, Michael Mann noted that Al Pacino improvised the line "Because she's got a GREAT ASS!" Hank Azaria confirmed it, saying that Al Pacino's unexpected outburst "scared the hell out of me", "he just actually terrified me" and that his look of shock was "not acting at all".

[struth]

The Great Train Robbery, 1978..



Sir Sean Connery spent several days running on top of a moving train. The train was supposed to be travelling at thirty-five miles per hour; Connery argued it was going faster. The train driver was counting telegraph poles to measure the speed. A helicopter pilot confirmed Connery's suspicion. The train was travelling at over fifty-five miles per hour.

Writer and director Michael Crichton based his book and movie, only loosely on the actual crime committed in 1855. In real-life, there were four criminals: Pierce, Agar, the railway guard Burgess, and a railway clerk named Tester. All four keys were kept on railway premises, two in London, and two in Folkestone. They were stolen temporarily by Tester and Pierce, respectively, so that Agar could duplicate them, but it turned out that the Folkestone keys were not being used anyway. The guard's van was not locked from the outside; Pierce and Agar were let in by Burgess, and a share of the loot was handed out to Tester, at stations. None of the criminals were spotted at once; it was several months before the railway conceded that the crime must have occurred on the train. The details came to light after Agar had been convicted in an unrelated crime, and his accomplices decided to steal his share instead of using it, as he had asked, to provide his mistress an income. She got word to him, and he turned Queen's Evidence against the others, and told all. At no point in the case, did anyone escape from custody.

[Barry]

The Great Train Robbery, 1978..



Sir Sean Connery spent several days running on top of a moving train. The train was supposed to be travelling at thirty-five miles per hour; Connery argued it was going faster. The train driver was counting telegraph poles to measure the speed. A helicopter pilot confirmed Connery's suspicion. The train was travelling at over fifty-five miles per hour.

Writer and director Michael Crichton based his book and movie, only loosely on the actual crime committed in 1855. In real-life, there were four criminals: Pierce, Agar, the railway guard Burgess, and a railway clerk named Tester. All four keys were kept on railway premises, two in London, and two in Folkestone. They were stolen temporarily by Tester and Pierce, respectively, so that Agar could duplicate them, but it turned out that the Folkestone keys were not being used anyway. The guard's van was not locked from the outside; Pierce and Agar were let in by Burgess, and a share of the loot was handed out to Tester, at stations. None of the criminals were spotted at once; it was several months before the railway conceded that the crime must have occurred on the train. The details came to light after Agar had been convicted in an unrelated crime, and his accomplices decided to steal his share instead of using it, as he had asked, to provide his mistress an income. She got word to him, and he turned Queen's Evidence against the others, and told all. At no point in the case, did anyone escape from custody.

Not a bad little film.

[struth]

Not a bad little film.

it is... very good...


now, The Password Is Courage (1962)






The 2-6-4T LMS locomotive involved in the crash was bought by MGM for £3,500 from the railroad. The studio then turned around and sold it for scrap for £5,000.

The tagline claims that Coward is the only man to get an Iron Cross from the enemy. This is untrue. Double agent Eddie Chapman was awarded the Iron Cross by the Nazis while working loyally for the British.

No mention is made in the film of Sergeant Major Charles Coward (Sir Dirk Bogarde) being transferred to Auschwitz III labor camp, located five miles from the better known extermination camp of Auschwitz II (Birkenau).

[struth]

The African Queen (1951)





Sources claimed that everyone in the cast and crew got sick except Humphrey Bogart and John Huston, who said they avoided illness by essentially living on imported Scotch whisky. Bogart later said, "All I ate was baked beans, canned asparagus and Scotch whiskey. Whenever a fly bit Huston or me, it dropped dead."

Humphrey Bogart hated Africa immediately and was miserable, but Katharine Hepburn adored it, calling it "utterly divine." Bogie complained about everything: the heat, the humidity, the dangers, the food. He recalled, "While I was griping, Katie was in her glory. She couldn't pass a fern or berry without wanting to know its pedigree, and insisted on getting the Latin name for everything she saw walking, swimming, flying or crawling. I wanted to cut our ten-week schedule, but the way she was wallowing in the stinking hole, we'd be there for years."

"The African Queen" sank and had to be raised twice during filming of the movie. Lauren Bacall is quoted as saying, "The natives had been told to watch it and they did. They watched it sink."

[Barry]

How many films do you typically watch in a day Grant? ()

[struth]

How many films do you typically watch in a day Grant? ()

varies.. on number 3 at moment.. depends on how mobile i am. if i can get about and weather is ok then i do if not i might have to sit;; so watch films of listen to music.

[struth]

The Wild Bunch, 1969... Director Sam Peckinpah..starring William Holden, Ernest Borgnine, Robert Ryan, Edmond O'Brien, Ben Johnson and Warren Oates.



The film was shot with the anamorphic process. Peckinpah and his cinematographer, Lucien Ballard, also made use of telephoto lenses, that allowed for objects and people in both the background and foreground to be compressed in perspective. The effect is best seen in the shots where the Bunch makes the walk to Mapache's headquarters to free Angel. As they walk forward, a constant flow of people passes between them and the camera; most of the people in the foreground are as sharply focused as the Bunch.