Films @ Dave’s Info Cafe

I just reread my previous post on Continuity vs Montage Editing and thought that I undervalued continuity editing and concentrated too much on the montage end of the spectrum. I just want to rebalance the equation a little bit. Continuity editing is very much Hollywood in that directors wanted to tell stories that were relatively [...]

I thought I would just put down a few thoughts about what I call “The New Epics” – films with scope, ambition, flair, scale, and energy – that tell gripping stories of the human condition in a way that grabs the eyes and senses. You won’t find these at the cinemas regrettably but on TV. [...]

The western as a genre was dead until 1989 but was revived by, of all things, a made for TV mini series directed by an Englishman. That series was Lonesome Dove, a four part drama, that rekindled an American love for the western. It was made for the small screen but it had epic ambitions [...]

John Ford’s westerns have influenced so many directors throughout the world so it was not so much of a surprise when “westerns” started being made outside the Hollywood system. The most famous mutation of the traditional western was the spaghetti western. These were films made largely in Europe (Spain being the most believable location to [...]

Westerns have been around since the  era of silent film. They have been the staple of early cinema and early TV. I can remember watching many western series on the box during the sixties such as Wagon Train, Gunsmoke, Rawhide and many more. But the western started to become more of an art form in [...]

I haven’t really posted anything about genres so far so I thought I would start with one of my favourite genres – the western. Genres are a way of categorizing films that have a loose set of similar characteristics. They are inevitably vague with flexible boundaries but include sets of conventions that recur in many [...]

To pigeonhole it, I suppose you might call it a revenge thriller. You have to admire its bravado and confidence in the cinematography and acting.

I’ve always loved watching movies. Good ones. Bad ones. And those in between. I also like to work out why I liked them or hated them or was indifferent to them. I do like to analyse films and find out why they work or don’t work for me. I enjoy them in the moment , [...]

This film has always intrigued me. I am drawn to it like a moth to a flame. It is quite intoxicating in a very strange way. Its origins are from a book by the acclaimed science fiction author, Robert Heinlein, but, after seeing the film, you might think it came from a comic book or [...]

Every so often I see a film on TV that I remember from long ago that surprises me. Southern Comfort is one such film that I feel is a hidden gem. Not only has it got much to offer cinematically speaking but it has balls and attitude. Southern Comfort is a film that follows the [...]