THE PICKY'S: The Year's Best and Worst -- MATCH POINT What can I say? The Wood-man tackles the topic of infidelity for his best film since another movie he did on the same subject, Crimes and Misdemeanors. This film is provocative, naughty, compelling, and all of the other critic's cliches I can possibly come up with. Woody Allen takes us through the life of a tennis player's (Jonathan Rhys-Meyers) simultaneous involvement of with an upper-class sweetie (Emily Mortimer) and the temptress brilliantly played by Scarlett Johannson. A must-see! The year's best film! Stupendous! Three cheers for Woody!

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~more (Joyce Picker)

The Good, the Bad, and the Missed Opportunity: Ron's best and worst film picks for 2005 -- What a weak year this has been. There have been a number of good, and even very good movies, but nothing truly terrific. Usually there’s at least one or two films that you think are head and shoulders above the rest: A great or near great film which you can easily say is truly worthy of a Best Picture Oscar, like a Million Dollar Baby or Sideways from last year. There’s not even a Hotel Rwanda that's unquestionably excellent but not quite on the very top tier of movies for the year. It says a lot of the mediocrity of the year that a good but not great film like Brokeback Mountain seems at this point the leading contended for Best Picture at the major awards shows. And though there were no terrific films, there were quite a number of really bad ones.
~more (Ron Morales)

In the Name of the King: A Dungeon Siege Story – Group Interview -- Lunch time on a film set never fails to amuse me — especially when it’s a movie involving creatures and costumes. I’m in Vancouver, Canada, on the set of German director Uwe Boll’s latest fantastical epic, In the Name of the King. It’s fall and it’s cold, but the guys wearing rubber suits are thrilled to be able to unzip, de-head, and let their sweaty hair down.

I’m standing in the buffet line behind an actor whose boar-like Krug head has been peeled away and is resting on the back of his neck, staring at me with gaping eyeless holes. Another fella is laying against the side of the soundstage, trying to catch a Krug-nap in the few remaining rays of sun. He looks like roadkill from another world.

Meanwhile one of the leads, Leelee Sobieski, is holding her little lap dog (Nina, a Yorkie) and talking to one of her costars, Ron Perlman, about the Inside Deep Throat documentary. Claire Forlani flits about in a low-cut velvet gown and Kristanna Lokken, who’s not actually shooting today, is in her street clothes. Her dog, a mutt she rescued in Romania while shooting BloodRayne (coming to theaters 01.06.06), runs amongst the lunching cast crew, obviously hoping for a tidbit. Meanwhile John Rhys-Davies is quoting Shakespeare in dulcet tones, Ray Liotta has a tantrum over having to do press for the movie, and Will Sanderson is practicing his moves against a huge green-screen...
~more: interview (Staci Layne Wilson)

Chuck's best and worst films of 2005 -- When compiling my list of best and worst films of the year at the end of every December, I usually end up complaining about what a terrible year it's been for movies. Thankfully, though, I don't have to do that this time. While 2005 produced few excellent movies, and nothing really came close to challenging my one bona-fide four-star movie, Million Dollar Baby, which remained No. 1 on this year's best list since last January, there were more good to very good movies in '05 compared to recent years. In fact, I had 18 titles viewed in the past 12 months competing for the top 10, as opposed to the last few years when I had a hard time coming up with 10 titles worthy of making a best-10 list. And this is actually the first time in a few years in which there were enough strong movies to give me some runners-up to the top 10.
~more (Chuck)

Renee's Top Ten Reads of 2005 -- The Town that Forgot How to Breathe by Kenneth J. Harvey

The town of Bareneed may not have anymore fish to catch but it does have mythological sea creatures rising from the depths of the ocean, ghostly little girls haunting the living, and a strange respiratory disease plaguing the natives in this tale by Kenneth Harvey

Platinum Pohl by Frederick Pohl

This book collects short stories and novellas from the science fiction great Frederick Pohl. Spanning the length of his career, and containing 30 different tales, this book is a must read.

More Books...


~more (Renee A. Mallett)

Eileen's Top Ten Reads of 2005 -- 2005 has obviously been a great year for interesting new books, because my to-read stacks have grown so high that I don't know when I will be able to get to them all! I always find it difficult to narrow things down to a Top 10 list, but here's my valiant attempt at the 10 best books I have read this year:

1. "Going Postal", by Terry Pratchett. Con man Moist Von Lipwig is being offered a reprieve from the hangman's noose if he is willing to accept a job as Postmaster of the town's ailing postal service. It is wickedly funny as it finds new and interesting topics to satirize. Although this novel is populated with wizards, guards, and other Ankh-Morpork denizens who have made appearances in earlier Discworld books, readers new to the series can fully enjoy the story without needing background information.

More Books...


~more (Eileen Rieback)

Best Entertainment of 2005 -- Our resident film and book experts will soon have their own, more comprehensive "Best Of..." (and possibly "Worst of...") 2005 lists posted here before the end of the year, but as an appetizer here is my own jumbled list of standouts in entertainment that made an impression on me. A lot of these choices are for pure fun, not from an elitist "critic" standpoint.

I’m going to be a bit of a cheater here and choose amongst my favorite 2005 movies, TV shows, music CDs, and books to make up the list. Since my travel schedule is so busy I miss a lot of the new releases, and since I mainly cover the horror genre it’s not really possible for me to do much in the way of a traditional, one-subject list and rate them from best-to-last. I still haven’t seen most of the highest-rated films of the year...
~more (Staci Layne Wilson)

Chuck O'Leary takes a look at five new holiday releases (Munich, Brokeback Mountain, The Producers, Fun with Dick and Jane and Rumor Has It) -- So many movies and so little time. With all the activities associated with the holidays in full swing, here's a quick look at five new releases.
~more (Chuck)