Dinner and a Movie with Moxie

  Whisper Of The Heart Whisper Of The Heart is a 1995 Japanese animated film from Studio Ghibli, and directed by Yoshifumi Kondo.  Kondo was set to be the successor to Hayao Miyazaki, however sadly this would be the last and only film he would direct before his death in 1998.  Originally released in Japan in 1995, it was also the first Japanese film to used Dolby surround sound.  The film was distributed by Toho, and later re-released in the USA through a deal that Studio Ghibli had with Walt Disney for their US releases, which also featured American voice actors doing the English language dub.   The version I am reviewing is the English dub that Disney released, and the Bluray version that I have is the GKIDS reissue (for Studio Ghibli Films I prefer the GKIDS versions for their packaging and extra features). Whisper of the Heart is a film adaptation of the manga Mimi o Sumaseba created by Aoi Hiiragi.  The original film release is called Mimi o Sumas...

  The Wicker Man (1973) The Wicker Man is a 1973 folk-horror film, directed by Robin Hardy, with a screenplay by Anthony Shaffer, and is loosely based on the 1967 novel Ritual by David Pinner.  The Film was produced and distributed by British Lion Films.  The Wicker Man is about a devout Christian police officer from the Scottish mainland, who is sent to the remote Hebridean island Summerisle, to investigate reports of a missing young girl named Rowan Morrison.  When he gets there by way of seaplane he discovers something is quite off about this island, and that the people have cast away their Christianity and began embracing the Pagan faith of the Celtic people, and have replaced the Christian god with the ancient Celtic Gods and Goddesses.    No one seems to know of the young girl that he is looking for, even her own mother, and when he discovers that he thinks she is dead, he finds only a hare in her casket.  No one is giving him straight answers, b...

What Lies Beneath What Lies Beneath is a Hitchcockian horror suspense film directed by accomplished director Robert Zemeckis, who is well known for films such as Romancing the Stone, Back To The Future, Forrest Gump, and Castaway.  This is the first film for his newly founded production company ImageMovers, and was distributed domestically by Dreamworks Pictures, and internationally through 20th Century Fox, and was a huge success grossing $291.4 million in the box office against its $100 million budget. What Lies Beneath stars Harrison Ford as Dr. Norman Spencer, in a role that definitely goes against type for the famous actor, as in this film he gets to play the villain.  Michelle Pfeiffer plays his wife Claire Spencer, who starts seeing the ghost of a young woman in their bathroom.  Katharine Towne plays Caitlin Spencer, the daughter of Norman and Claire Spencer, who in the beginning of the film leaves to go to college.  The film also stars Diana Scarwid as Claire...

War Of The Worlds: Two Versions from 2005 2005 saw two versions of HG Wells' classic science fiction story adapted to film, one is the well known Steven Spielberg adaptation starring Tom Cruise, and the other a lesser known release by Pendragon Pictures.  One film saw a the classic reimagined in the modern day USA, while the other stayed quite faithful to the original novel, in setting and in the screenplay.   Both films were interestingly enough released in June of 2005, though the Pendragon Pictures version never saw a theatrical release. War Of The Worlds, was directed by Steven Spielberg, and was distributed by Paramount (domestic) and Dreamworks (internationally.  The film was written by Josh Friedman and David Koepp, and based on HG Wells novel of the same name from 1898, though it also took inspiration from the famous Orson Welles' radio-show version of the story as well.  Through Spielberg wanted to take elements of the original story, he also wanted to ...

  Village Of The Damned (1995) Village Of The Damned is a remake of the 1960 film of the same name, and based on the 1957 novel The Midwich Cuckoos by John Wyndham.  This version was directed by John Carpenter with a screenplay by David Himmelstein and re-written by John Carpenter.   The film was distributed by Universal Pictures, who had received the rights from MGM to do a re-make.   The film stars Christopher Reeves, who is best known for his iconic role as Superman, in his last film before his tragic accident, and also his final theatrically released film.   Christopher Reeves plays Dr. Alan Chaffee, Karen Kahn plays his wife Barbara Chaffee, Kirstie Alley plays Dr Susan Verner, Linda Kozlowski plays Jill McGowan, and Mark Hamill plays Reverend George (goes from "Luke I am your father", to "father Luke Skywalker"... I found that really funny was I watched this).   The children are played by Thomas Dekker as David McGowan, Lindsey Hau...

Children Of The Damned Children of the Damned, released in 1964 is a thematic sequel to the 1960 classic Village of the Damned.  The stories are not connected in anyway, other than the premise being similar with children being born without fathers that have mysterious mental powers, and act and think with a hivemind.   Many critics slagged off the film for being a dull and pretentious film that lacks the excitement of the original film, Village of the Damned.   That reflected as well in the box office, only grossing $1 million compared to the over $2 million that the previous film grossed. Children of the Damned was directed by Anton Leader, written by John Briley, and distributed through MGM.  The film was made in England, filmed at the MGM studios in Borehamwood, Hertfordshire, England, as well as being filmed on location in London England.   The film stars Ian Hendry as Dr. Tom Llewellyn, Alan Badel as Dr. David Neville, Barbara Ferris as Susan...

 Village Of The Damned Village Of The Damned is a science fiction horror film released in 1960, based on the 1957 novel, The Midwich Cuckoos by John Wyndham. The film was directed by Wolf Rilla with a screenplay by Stirling Silliphant, Wolf Rilla, and Ronald Kinnoch, and was distributed by MGM.  The film stars George Sanders as Gordon Zillaby, Barbara Shelley as Anthea Zillaby, and Martin Stephens as David Zillaby (one of the strange children with mental powers), and Michael Gwynn as Alan Bernard.   Village Of The Damned is filmed in England at MGM's Borehamwood Studios and on location in the village of Letchmore Heath, near Watford England, and is set in the fictional town of Midwich England.  John Wyndham is also the author of the science-fiction horror novel Day Of The Triffids (I plan to add the film adaptation of that novel to my collection in the future).  MGM originally planned to film Village of the Damned in the USA on it's studios in Culver City C...

  Prophecy (1979) Prophecy is a horror film released in 1979, which is set in the remote forests of Maine.  The film was directed by John Frankenheimer and written by David Seltzer.   Though the film is set in Maine, it was filmed in British Columbia Canada.  I tried to figure out where in Maine that the film takes place, and honestly the location in nonsensical, because they mention a town called Androscoggin, which isn't a real town, but it would suggest that it would be somewhere in the vacinity of Androscoggin County, or at somewhere near the Androscoggin River, however later in the film it suggests that the contaminated pond feeds into the Ossippi River, where the mill is located, which would suggest south western Maine, however, the river that they depict in the film where the mill is much larger than the small Ossippi River is, the river in the film would suggest a river much larger even than the Saco River which the Ossippi flows into.   Also t...