Hot Picks
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The Act of Reading
USA 2019
produced by Mark Blumberg, Alissa Blumberg (executive) for Barrow House Films
directed by Mark Blumberg
starring Mark Blumberg, Janet Werner, Vicki Hebert, Elizabeth Doss, Alissa Blumberg, Peter Gansevoort Whittemore, Samuel Otter, John Cleary, Ricardo Pitts-Wiley, Kristofer Blumberg, Rudy Cabrera, Maryanne Wolf, Peter Bergman
music by Nathan Felix
documentary Moby Dick
review by Mike Haberfelner
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Ok, the premise of this movie sounds a lot like a really schmaltzy
Hollywood feel-good movie: A student who has failed in his assessment to
do a report about Moby Dick back in high school has done so many
years later and now sets out to impress his teacher from back when. And
yet, that's the kick-off point of this movie, with the student being
filmmaker Mark Blumberg himself, the teacher being one Janet Werner - and
fortunately despite its premise the film is anything but Hollywood dross
but an actually pretty entertaining as well as interesting, very learned
exploration on all things Moby Dick and Herman Melville in general,
seeing the topic from quite a number of different perspectives, like a
high school teacher (Vicki Hebert) trying to get her students interested
in the subject, to a professor of English literature (Samuel Otter), from
a playwright (Elizabeth Doss) doing a play on Melville and Nathaniel
Hawthorne, to an actual descendant of Melville (Peter Gansevoort
Whittemore) who keeps the memory alive, and it even takes a detour
throwing philosophy according to Socrates into the mix. Now the
outcome of all of this is a movie that's as much about Melville and his
most famous book as it is about literature and reading as such, as it goes
way beyond being just another analysis of the well-analysed novel or
bio-piece about its very prominent writer, but a fascinating excursion
into what's essentially the reader's mind - and after having seen this,
chances are you'll want to pick up a book ... and it might as well be Moby
Dick.
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review © by Mike Haberfelner
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Robots and rats,
demons and potholes, cuddly toys and shopping mall Santas,
love and death and everything in between,
Tales to Chill Your Bones to is all of that.
Tales to Chill Your Bones to -
a collection of short stories and mini-plays ranging from the horrific to the darkly humourous,
from the post-apocalyptic to the weirdly romantic,
tales that will give you a chill and maybe a chuckle,
all thought up by the twisted mind of screenwriter and film reviewer Michael Haberfelner.
Tales to Chill Your Bones to
the new anthology by Michael Haberfelner
Out now from Amazon!!! |
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