CULT:  Tuesday 9PM on CW – Change the Channel CW has had little good news this season apart from the arrival of Arrow, and it’s not helping itself by deciding to launch the new thriller CULT just as FOX has introduced its own somewhat similar The Following.  Comparisons are inevitable between the two shows […]

  This year’s Toronto International Film Festival had a very solid line-up, so much so that although the titles below are listed in rough order of preference, even the worst of them is of some interest, very possibly worth seeing for those intrigued by the genre or filmmaker.  The Festival, as has been the case […]

  LOOPER:  Worth A Ticket – Maybe Too Enthralling For Its Own Good   Rian Johnson’s most salient trait as a filmmaker may be a tendency to get carried away.  His first film, Brick, was a high school film noir so shrouded in mock-tough guy dialogue and exhaustively detailed mood that it forgot to tell […]

A lot can happen between the creation of a TV pilot in the spring and the production of episodes for the regular season: a writing/producing team is hired, audience focus groups weigh in, networks and studios (which may have had their own turnover) give plenty of notes, helpful and otherwise, and critics begin to rear […]

  One of the many ways in which broadcast networks have started to resemble their cable counterparts is in the structure of a series season.  For years, cable has aired its shows, especially serialized series, in clearly-defined, repeat-free mini-seasons, with different programming in those slots during hiatus periods, rather than following the historical broadcast model […]

  2012 was, in the end, a very good year for movies–or a a good half-year, more accurately.  With the studios continuing to load their best efforts into the festival- and awards-heavy fall and winter part of the calendar, not a single one of the Top 10 below opened before July, and only 3 before […]

  IDENTITY THIEF:  Watch It At Home – Star Power Makes This Rote Comedy Look Better Than It Is IDENTITY THIEF is basically a string of contrivances, which makes it not all that different from most big-studio comedies these days.  The story arc traces all the way back to the screwball comedies of the 1930s […]

  BATES MOTEL:  Monday 10PM on A&E The idea of a pilot is to provide a template for the series that’s to come, but while the first hour of BATES MOTEL is accomplished and well-acted, it’s difficult to tell what kind of show it plans to be.  The premise is straightforward enough:  a prequel (although […]