The Joan Crawford Stress Test

Got a Library Card? You Should Be Watching Kanopy!

We're living in precarious times. As a result, it's easy to feel overwhelmed by current events and spending time glued to the news or our social media feeds can often add to our stress and discomfort. To make matters worse, many of us are also living paycheck to paycheck and things like streaming services can …

Celebrate LGBT+ Pride Month with Cinema

This an update to my original LGBT+ Pride Month post first published in 2015 that you can find here. As a film journalist, I have often tried to focus my attention on underappreciated films, unsung actors and lesser-known directors. Unsurprisingly, this has led me to write about a number of LGBT+ films and television programs …

BARBIE GOES HOLLYWOOD

I have a confession to make. I like dolls. A lot. I’ve been a casual collector for many years and I’ve also written about dolls for a few publications. I usually keep my fascination with classic films and dolls separate but it’s not easy trying to compartmentalize your interests. The film fans I’ve met often …

A Look Back & What’s Ahead in 2019

This month marks what would have been my 9-year anniversary working with Turner Classic Movies but after much thought & consideration, I decided to end my working relationship with them. Although the Movie Morlocks blog has been shuttered, I occasionally wrote for the TCM.com website and created promotional materials for the TCM Wine Club but …

One Year & Many Ideas: Occupy Cinema

Today marks the one year anniversary of the Occupy Movement, as well as the Occupy Cinema Movement

The Man of the Hour: Alfred Hitchcock

Back in May when I debuted Klara Tavakoli Goesche's video tour of VERTIGO locations at the Movie Morlocks I made note of the fact that: "Alfred Hitchcock’s name seems to be everywhere these days." It seems that my observation was somewhat premature because I had no idea that Hitchock would became a subject of daily …

The 84th Academy Awards

for Best ActorIt's awards season again and for the 4th year in a row I'll be "live tweeting" the Oscars over on Twitter. As usual, I haven't been able to see all the Best Picture nominees but in all honesty most of them hold little interest for me. I did see a lot of 2011 …

A Retro Night Gallery

"Vincent Price" One of my favorite working artists is SHAG (aka Josh Agle) and he's created some wonderful retro style pieces inspired by various movies over the years. A lot of his best work takes a tongue-in-cheek approach to horror and sci-fi films so I thought I'd share some of my favorite SHAG pieces during …

Film Locations: Kensal Green Cemetery

"Before the Roman came to Rye or out to Severn strode, The rolling English drunkard made the rolling English road... My friends we will not go again or ape an ancient rage, Or stretch the folly of our youth to be the shame of age. But walk with clearer eyes and ears this path that …

Racist Images in Classic Films

A recent discussion on Twitter inspired me to ask a group of classic film lovers, fellow bloggers and Twitter users to contribute to a conversation at The Movie Morlocks about racist images in classic films. It's a topic that's too often swept under the rug or completely ignored by film fans and critics. It also …

Celebrating Father’s Day

Steve McQueen in THE GREAT ESCAPE (1963) Me and my dad (1972) From my latest at the Movie Morlocks: "I recently became an aunt again so I’ve been thinking a lot about family lately and with Father’s Day right around the corner I thought I’d share some thoughts about my own dad and how the …

GOODBYE GODDESS: ELIZABETH TAYLOR 1932-2011

Elizabeth Taylor has always been one of my favorite actresses. She was an incredible natural beauty. Arguably the most beautiful actress Hollywood ever produced but she was also a brilliant performer when she wanted to be. She dominated almost every film she ever appeared in even when that film wasn’t particularly worthy of her larger …

It’s That Time Again

It's that time again - Oscar night is here! And for the third year in a row I'll be "live tweeting" the show. If you want to follow along or join in the fun you can find me on Twitter here. Update 2/28: I wanted to update this with some more thoughts about last nights …

A Decade of Fear

It's taken me a year but I've finally managed to compile a list of my Favorite Films of the Decade: 2000-2009 so I thought I'd share it. My introduction echoes some earlier thoughts about fear and cinema that I shared during Halloween and wanted to expand upon. Besides my alphabetical list of Favorite Films of …