Hollywood Goes Gaming, as part of Starz’s new Starz Inside series hosted by Richard Roeper, dives into the history of the union between the video game and movie industries and the fruits and rotten apples cultivated from years of development, blunders, and an occasional blockbuster.

The program really focuses in on the beginnings of this brain trust with films like Disney’s Tron, which were more inspired by video games than actually based on them. The epitome of bad licensing, E.T.: The Game, is touch on more than once as single handedly crippling the collaboration between the two industries and sending video game companies into the great market crash.

The program touches on a few big movies including Super Mario Bros., Street Fighter, Mortal Kombat and Tomb Raider giving some interesting tidbits that many fans might not have known about including the husband and wife tandem directors of Super Mario Bros. telling you how they really feel about the script and the film, and the backstory about how much work Eidos has to put into making Lara Croft into a marketing icon before a movie studio would even think about touching the property (and making all that fanboy money).

The hour showcase does miss a few notable entries including only touching upon the Resident Evil series (one of the most financially successful crossovers) not mentioning Final Fantasy, the hugely successful Pokémon, or Silent Hill and the huge stable of upcoming releases stuck in development, or moving forward like Alice and World of WarCraft.

When journeying on the flip side (games from movie licenses) the program only spends a few minutes showing examples like Superman Returns and never showing some of the critical blunders like Superman 64 and just about every animated film to game transition in the last ten years. Even a solid mention of GoldenEye 007 as one of the greatest games of all time would have provided enough lip-service to fans.

Catering to the controversy surrounding him, the special devotes a sizable amount of time to Uwe Boll, the modern day Ed Wood who is the antagonist to many video game fans. With his stable of release critically and commercially panned, and upcoming films already garnering unrespectable buzz, the scourge of gamers pleads his case with references to his boxing matches against his critics and his feelings when he gets a bad review. There isn’t much new here in the constant battle of gamers attempting to preserve their beloved licenses.

Maybe an hour wasn’t enough to fully realize the connection between video games and Hollywood, but what we do get is a respectable look at how some of the gaming world’s biggest properties made the less than successful transition to movies, and vise versa as the age of cross marketing continues unabated. Maybe a follow up in a year or two can divulge more information on modern day practices, including the outright licensing of a property before the movie is even completed. As a casual look at Hollywood‘s journey through gaming territory, Hollywood Goes Gaming provides enough topical information, but for the deeper discussion of business practice you’ll need to look elsewhere.

The Lost Book of Nostradamus is a difficult program to review because if one does not find the subject matter completely viable, a bias might inadvertently hinder the final evaluation. For the sake of full disclosure, let it be known that this reviewer does not believe in the prophecies foretold by the 16^th century man. With that said, the program does provide an interesting look into the recently discovered “lost book” of Nostradamus, allegedly containing the exact date of the end of the world and prophesizing modern events like the September 11 attacks on the World Trade Center, the trials and tribulations affecting the Catholic church and many other events that happened in the last 100 years.

Whether these are true, or simple water color paintings shaped in the minds of the viewers to hold some sort of significance in today’s world is really in the mind of the beholder, yet The History Channel’s special takes a clever approach to present the viewer with one side of the issue and let the audience make their own decisions. Still, this approach is troubling because there is only one side presented throughout the two hour special. The producers decided to not including any dissenting members of the community refuting claims that the book was authored by Nostradamus. Mention is made to the fact that he might not have drawn the watercolor paintings inside, but it is firmly held that he did write the background text on which they are based. What the show ends up is a decidedly one-sided affair, which is disappointing.

The big hook of the special is the revelation of the date in which modern society will meet its end when a collection of cosmic events and constellations lining up will signal the end of human activity as we know it. Unfortunately the baiting of the audience is done far too often throughout the runtime, with each commercial break repeating the same thing over and over again, with the revelation being made two minutes from the end of the special.

Frankly, the special could have been trimmed down to an hour, chocked full of information, and still proved the same point. There’s too much exposition on lesser watercolors and how they relate today than focusing on the bigger ones (like a burning tower symbolizing the World Trade Center) or how an eight-spoke wheel and fire under a stick can symbolize the end of the world.

For fans of the prophesier The Lost Book of Nostradamus indulges them from beginning to end, but for more skeptical audience members, the information is harder to grasp and even harder when the opposing side is not represented during the course of the show.

Starz Annual Fear Fest usually delivers something all horror fans crave, a whole month of genre films, hour after hour of excellent, questionable, B-movie, amazing, disgusting, and enticing cinema that is both a guilty pleasure and some of the most memorable films of all time. This year’s Fest also includes the hour feature Bloodsucking Cinema, a look back at the history of the vampire film from the myth and legend to modern interpretations and genre bending engagements.

From F.W. Murnau’s original Nosferatu to modern films like Underworld and Bram Stoker’s Dracula, the piece takes a careful look at the history of the film and peers into the window of what makes the vampire movie so enticing to movie-goers that it still remains nearly a century later.

Cory Haim in Bloodsucking Cinema

Starz Media manages to gather some big name director’s in the genre like John Carpenter (John Carpenter’s Vampires), Joel Schumacher (The Lost Boys), David Goyer (Blade: Trinity), and Stephen Sommers (Van Helsing) to relay their experiences with the genre, and how they tried to flesh out their takes on the legend. Commentary from Leonard Maltin, Ain’t It Cool News’ Harry Knowles, and Blade creator Marv Wolfman give a great reflection on how the sub-genre has really affected generations of filmmakers.

The special pays particular attention to several memorable entries in the vampire stable like Interview with the Vampire, From Dusk till Dawn, Blade, Underworld, Van Helsing, and The Lost Boys. Questionably added to that list is Uwe Boll’s BloodRayne which is easily one of the poorest entries in the special. Personal opinions aside of the filmmaker’s work, Boll’s inclusion is sure to turn off a great many of hardcore fans who may loath his writing and ‘filmmaking’ skills.

Stan Winston in Bloodsucking Cinema

Bloodsucking Cinema doesn’t quite spend enough time focusing on how the genre has branched off from the core mythology into other genres like the teen flick (Buffy: The Vampire Slayer) and comedy (Dracula: Dead and Loving It), instead just touching upon them with a simple screenshot of their respective one-sheets. It would have been nice to get some perspective from some of the director’s and special effects artists who shaped the genre on what they thought of the films coming to a point where they’re making fun of themselves because of overblown mythologies and sometimes bloated back stories and contradictory rules.

With all the movies included, the producers opted to go for the T&A wherever possible, which isn’t so much of a problem when it doesn’t feel as though they are trying to hard to entice the audience with talk of vampirism being a thinly veiled metaphor for sexual activity and eroticism. Sometimes the scenes just seem shoehorned and forced into the special to keep the audiences’ interest, which isn’t needed because Bloodsucking Cinema is an hour of horror pleasure in itself.

John Carpenter in Bloodsucking Cinema

Horror fans and especially vampire movie fans will find tons to love here, including some little trivia bits about some of your favorite films you might not have known (they added glitter to the blood in The Lost Boys, did you know that?). For those with Starz, you should be able to catch the special one of a dozen times over the next few weeks. For those without the premium channel, the special is worth the monthly payment, and the daily dose of horror is only blood-red icing on the cake.

WARNING: Major Spoilers Within

Street Thief is a great film, but its no documentary. No matter how much the marketers want you to believe that the contents could be, or are real, there’s just too much to this film that plays out too conveniently for you to ever really take it as a serious piece of documentary filmmaking. The film is a stylized, suspenseful and very entertaining look into the life of a burglar, planning his jobs, casing the places, and putting himself into all sorts of situations where getting the job done is key, and being forgotten is almost mandatory.

The film focuses on criminal Kasper Carr who we understand is being followed by a few documentary filmmakers wanting to focus in on his craft and how he does what he does. Right from the start you’re hesitant to believe this as anything but a fictionalized and glorified life, but the screen presence of director Malik Bader, who portrays Carr,  is so engrossing that your almost hostage to watch. Our introduction to the character is him so eloquently breaking into a corner store and making off unknown amounts of cash. As he explains, it’s best to hit minority neighborhood businesses who do everything in cash, this certainly holds true until the film’s ultimate score.

The camera work is another dead giveaway to the nature of the film’s truthfulness as highly stylized lighting and camera work shies away from the more one-the-fly filming you’re used to for a film like this. Personally watching This Film Is Not Yet Rated and Street Thief back to back only amplified the gritty nature of the documentary and the clean look of Carr’s misdeeds.

It isn’t until the final act of the film that the wheels start to unravel in the storytelling department as the mysterious disappearance of Carr is inter-cut with clips of him earlier in the film maybe foreshadowing his ultimate plan, but there are a lot of loose ends that the filmmakers neglect to come through on. During the film’s big heist at a Cinemark Theater there’s special effort made to show Carr stealing a number of VHS tapes, although we never find out what they were. We also never learn what happen to Carr, and as huge advocates of the non-Hollywood ending this should please even the staunchest critics, but the open door here is more of a tease than anything else.

As a work of fiction Street Thief is a great way to spend 90 minutes, and as infatuated with the big heist film as we are in America (see: Ocean’s series) there’s a lot to like and a lot of pulp to this piece. The studio and cable network might want you to think of it as something more, but in the end it’s a work of fiction, good fiction, but fiction all the same.

By now you should have heard about a little film call The Aristocrats which makes good on its promise of no violence, no nudity, just words…a whole bunch of dirty words. In the hardcore politically correct word being created under us, it’s nice to see a film come out, on an independent label, and easily be one of the funniest in years.

And why the hell not, when you get nearly 100 of the world’s funniest comics, young and old, together to retell the same dirty vaudeville joke over and over, your sides are going to hurt.

While the film’s premise may seem painfully boring (how many times can you hear the same joke?) the execution and content is award winning. Shot documentary style with candid views of top comics in their homes, relaxing, The Aristocrats explores a joke containing the same punch line and its various incarnations. In fact, the joke itself is open to interpretation by whoever is telling it, it only needs to begin with a few simple lines and everything else is open game.

The movie manages to top itself over and over during its 90 minute runtime by being able to assemble a cohesive, free-flowing movement that never has you looking at your watch. From George Carlin giving us a little history to Bob Saget explaining his definition of cockeyed, The Aristocrats never fails to impress as each and every featured comic gets a line or two in and several tell nearly full renditions of the joke.

The Aristocrats is not for the easily offended as the subject matter ranges from incest to public defecation and everything in-between. In fact, think of the most horrible thing you can, and then top that twice and you might be close to some of the film’s subject matter. I managed to read reviews and user comments on IMDB keeping track of how many people walk out during each showing (this one had two when Howie Mandel went into a “C” word-laced triad). It makes you wonder why these people even bothered knowing that the press surrounding the film and its rating has been in the news since July.

Overall Gilbert Gottfried and Bob Saget steal this movie with each of their performances (especially Gottfried nearly making Rob Schneider collapse from laughter at the Friar’s Club Roast of Hugh Heffner). Sarah Silverman delivers, perhaps, the most well timed joke as it trails off into a wholly uncomfortable, but incredibly funny situation. With so many comics in the film, it’s almost impossible to say how well each one did, but even if you are the most jaded individual in the world, you’ll laugh at a mime donkey-punching a dog while acting out the joke.

Truly, The Aristocrats is a great film, if only for a way to escape and laugh in the face of language that would make Republican’s squirm in their seats and the religious-rite call for a boycott. If anything, the film proves the point that this country has become so fixated on what is best for the society as far as language and actions go. If something as simple as saying a few words can get your panties in a bunch avoid this film like the plague, but for those who would like a keen eye into the funny underbelly of professional comics, The Aristocrats is a great time.

You couldn’t turn on the news the past couple of weeks without hearing something about filmmaker Michael Moore’s latest documentary. Everyone was talking about it. From Hollywood stars who believe their opinion is worth more than everyone else, to local news stations trying to be “cutting edge” even the lowest of the low in journalism have been rumbling over this little film. As little as it may be in the minds of some, the ideas expressed in the film will have hard hitting repercussions on the upcoming election is left-wing liberals have anything to say about it.

Most movie reviews are nothing more than a Joe Somebody, such as me, spouting off about what I liked and disliked about a film. It’s as simple as that. I have no thoughts of grandeur about my work. There are hundreds upon hundreds of film reviewers online, each with their own taste in films and the judgments that they make upon them. So understand where I am coming from with my personal opinions in this review, because, chances are, if you don’t like what I have to say, there is bound to be someone who agrees with you, you just have to look for it.

Fahrenheit 9/11 is a film with one purpose and one purpose only, to get President George W. Bush out of the White House come November, and for the swing voters who see the film in the next couple of weekends, the desired outcome could very well happen. Fahrenheit explores the events prior, during, and after the attacks of September 11, 2001 and how the United States Government, lead by Dubya, brought our country into war with two Middle East countries and sent thousands of American troops overseas.

Like Moore’s Oscar winning Bowling for Columbine, Fahrenheit 9/11 is factual based opinion piece, and while you may not believe everything that Moore says in the film, you tend to believe some of it with the evidence that he has. Many groups have come against Moore because of the way his information is presented. They believe that most of the information is nothing more than fiction than truth, and without being a first hand witness to these events, it is very hard for the viewer to refute them. Still when you hear facts and figures, such as President Bush being on vacation for a great majority of his first 100 days in office, you tend to wonder if conservatives are afraid of this information getting out, rather than it being false.

Again, like Bowling for Columbine, Moore uses humor to progress his point throughout out the film. His editing techniques can turn even the most heinous subject into a chuckling matter purely because of how quotes are interpreted (or misinterpreted, depending on who you talk to). The first part of the film tries to show the connections between the oil rich Saudis and the Bush family. It also dives into George W. Bush’s background and his penance for driving companies into the ground, as well as his father’s involvement with members of the bin Laden family prior to him taking office. One aspect that Moore seems to shy away from is the 2000 president election, in which Al Gore lost his bid for the White House, and the actual attacks. They are in there, but only a black screen is shown for a good two minutes as audio clips play through the surround sound, creating a very powerful and overwhelming experience that had me close to tears. It isn’t often that such a serious movie, with such a serious topic in the title can both entertain and bring out the most extremes in human emotion.

The film then swiftly ushers us to present day focusing on the troops deployed in Afghanistan and Iraq and the countries reaction to going to war over evidence that has yet to be found. While the politics behind the decision may never be known, the actions taken by this nation are examined in great detail. Moore’s stunt in Fahrenheit is to hit up Senators on the street and persuade them to sign their children up for the armed forces. One of the most startling facts in the film is that only one lawmaker, in either the Senate or House of Representatives, has children who are serving in the armed forces. Moore seemed reluctant to put the bit in the film as it only lasts for less than five minutes and Moore only talks to a handful of lawmakers before the film moves on. 

Moore’s “bashing” of America’s leaders has spawned a new trend in Hollywood in using documentaries as vital weapons for any point anyone is wanting to make. The most high profile weapon is the upcoming Michael More Hates America which should prove interesting viewing.

Fahrenheit 9/11 is a great political weapon and a great film, while it’s standing when compared to Bowling for Columbine is still up in the air for me, the subject matter is hits much more closely to home than gun control. Fahrenheit may face opposition from any number of groups before the November election, but if the film can sway enough swing votes for the democratic party to win by one electoral vote, it would have done its job and there will be a new President in office to face the media, celebrities, and, most importantly, the public. No matter what your beliefs of the issues are, it certainly can’t hurt to see Fahrenheit 9/11, if only to add more material to your argument and throw some leaves on the fire.

This is defiantly one of the hardest movie reviews I have ever had to write. Is it hard because I really wanted to enjoy this movie and I found myself disappointed? No. Hard because I really didn’t want to see it and found myself uplifted in spirit? Wrong, again. This review is hard to write because Bowling for Columbine is such a masterpiece of a documentary, so hard hitting, so very true that words cannot describe just how good it is. This documentary should be viewed by all, it should be a prerequisite in junior high, high school, and college classrooms. Every student, adult, and every American should see this documentary because it really puts things into perspective on just what kind of culture we have going in this country and of the countless people interviewed by Michael Moore over the course of two hours, ever single one had a different reason on why we choose to shoot each other with guns.

Bowling for Columbine, written, produced, and directed by Michael Moore is about as blatant to the gun problem in America as you can get. The movie begins with Michael Moore strolling into a bank and asking for the account that “gives you the free gun.” You read that right. There are banks around the country that have nearly 500 firearms locked in their vault and give you a free gun with the opening of a checking account. In fact, these banks are licenses gun sellers and can run your background check on the premises. What all of this means is you can walk into a bank, open an account, get a background check, and walk out with a gun 60 minutes later.

The movie never lets you go for the 120 minute run time. You are grabbed by Moore’s ease of obtaining a gun in the beginning and are haunted by the ending conversation with Charlton Heston who walks out on the interview when questioned if he would like to apologize to the parents of a six year old school shooting victim. As an added plus you get to see just what kind of a dick Dick Clark actually is. Celebrities need a big reality check.

As the name states, Bowling for Columbine devotes an ample amount of time talking about the mass-murder shooting at Columbine High School in Littleton, Colorado. One of my favorite quotes from the movie comes from Moore when talking to South Park creator Matt Stone. He states that Stone and South Park co-creator Trey Parker turned their hatred “…instead of carnage, into a cartoon.” Again, as the name of the movie implies, the two murderers from Columbine reportedly bowled two games before heading off to school and killing a dozen of their classmates and one teacher. The most chilling part of the movie involves a four-way section of the screen equally divided among four different security camera tapes inside Columbine on the day of the shooting. Moore in no way glorifies the actions of the two teenagers but shows the audience what it must have been like to be inside of that school on April 20, 1999. The tapes themselves aren’t the chilling part, the 911 phone call in the background of a scared teacher under a desk in the library sends shivers down your spine.

Moore could be called anti-gun by his statements throughout the film, but he clearly recognizes the other side of the argument by analyzing just why people need guns in America. Let it be known that people in Canada don’t even lock their doors, and this is best seen when Moore travels through an up-scale Canadian neighborhood and simply walks up to doors and opens them, no knocking, no way in telling the home’s inhabitants that he is coming, he just opens the door. Why is this though? Mainly because, as Moore explains, is the American news media has a majority of the populations scared, scared of what ever is out there, so scared that they feel they need a gun to protect themselves and when demand is high, supply is equally as high and then the gun falls into the wrong hands.

There are so many things that stand out about this movie that it is impossible to name just a single part that really is the best, it is a movie that needs to be seen and enjoyed to fully understand where I am coming from. Interviews with Marilyn Manson and Charlton Heston really provide insight into what these people are actually thinking in an unadulterated, un-planned interview. Both sides of the issue are fully examined by the “gun-nuts” arguments usually shoot themselves in the foot on how ludicrous they are and amazingly stupid they look on film. Notable parts include Moore taking two kids shot at Columbine to K-Mart Headquarters and showing them what the bullets they sold did to these kids (one is paralyzed for life). This single act, and media attention caused K-Mart to discontinue selling handgun ammunition in it’s stores.

Bowling for Columbine is an amazing documentary (or film as you can use either term). Parts will have you at the edge of your seat in horror, other times you are laughing at the arguments by certain “experts” and why they keep loaded guns all around the house. Powerful, informative, and as unbiased as you can be, Bowling for Columbine is one of the best films I have ever seen in my life.