Posts filed under 'actors'
July 21st, 2009
The first sentence of this Associated Press story about an effort to create a Bruce Lee museum is certainly attention-getting, even if you’re not a fan of Bruce Lee…
HONG KONG – The former home of Bruce Lee is now a love motel, renting rooms by the hour. But officials on Monday launched a design competition to turn it into a Hong Kong museum for the kung fu icon.
The story goes on to discuss a design competition aimed at establishing a permanent museum to honor the groundbreaking action star who, besides starring in ENTER THE DRAGON and other classics, revolutionized the martial arts movie and thereby shaped the way action movies are today. (No ENTER THE DRAGON? No MATRIX.)
There is an impressive statue of Bruce Lee on Hong Kong’s Avenue of Stars, located on Victoria Harbor. Here’s a picture of the wife and me during a 2006 trip to HK. We were actually in China to adopt our daughter, but being a devoted Hong Kong film fan, I couldn’t pass up a chance to see the Avenue of Stars.
July 1st, 2009
Actor Karl Malden – born born Mladen Sekulovich in Chicago on March 22, 1912 — has died at the age of 97. He died of natural causes at his home in Brentwood, Calif. Here’s a link to the LA Times obit, and here’s a great Malden quote from that article…
“I was so incredibly lucky. I knew I wasn’t a leading man. Take a look at this face.”
Though he was probably best known (especially in the past couple of decades) for his American Express commercials and the phrase “don’t leave home without it,” Malden had a long, distinguished career in theater, movies and television. He won an Oscar for playing Mitch (a role he originated on Broadway) in A STREETCAR NAMED DESIRE with Marlon Brando and director Elia Kazan. He worked with both of those men again in ON THE WATERFRONT. Here’s a great Malden moment from that movie…
June 15th, 2009
Christopher Lee, star of (among hundreds of other movies), THE HORROR OF DRACULA, DRACULA: PRINCE OF DARKNESS, THE MUMMY, THE MAN WITH THE GOLDEN GUN, 1941, POLICE ACADEMY: MISSION TO MOSCOW, the STAR WARS prequels and THE LORD OF THE RINGS trilogy, has been knighted by Queen Elizabeth as part of the Queen’s Birthday Honours (as they spell it across the pond).
Read the whole story here.
June 5th, 2009
In all the talk about David Carradine’s death, I forgot to mention my favorite movie on his resume. Here’s the trailer…Â
May 29th, 2009
Back in 1975, the movie JAWS kicked off this whole crazy thing we call the summer movie season. Here’s the best scene in that movie — and it’s just an old guy talking!
May 28th, 2009
Glenn Kenny, over at his Some Came Running blog, has a nice appreciation of actress Jane Randolph, who died May 4 in Switzerland but whose death was only announced here in the states today.
Randolph, who was born in 1915 in Youngstown, Ohio (coincidentally, pretty close to where I was born) only acted for about a decade, but her filmography has some very intriguing entries, including an uncredited ice skating model for Disney’s BAMBI, the horror comedy classic ABBOTT AND COSTELLO MEET FRANKENSTEIN, the great film noir T-MEN and two of my all-time favorite films, CAT PEOPLE and CURSE OF THE CAT PEOPLE.
Here’s one of Randolph’s most famous scenes, where she’s stalked by — well, something — in CAT PEOPLE.
May 27th, 2009
Tonight, be sure to tune in to Turner Classic Movies (that’s channel 608 if you’ve got Comcast) to catch an evening of films programmed by none other than character actor Tommy “Tiny” Lister. If you watch movies, you’ve seen Lister at work — he made his debut in RUNAWAY TRAIN, played Deebo in FRIDAY, played the president (!) in THE FIFTH ELEMENT and was recently seen as the prisoner with a surprising moral backbone in last year’s THE DARK KNIGHT. (Check out his extensive — and I mean extensive — filmography here.)
He also has some intriguing movie tastes. According to the TCM site, his lineup includes ANGEL AND THE BADMAN, SHANE, THE PROFESSIONALS and IT HAPPENED ONE NIGHT. Three Westerns and a classic screwball comedy — not a bad mix. It all starts at 7 p.m.
May 14th, 2009
If you were wondering why, in the new STAR TREK movie, young Kirk has the Beastie Boys’ song “Sabotage” blasting out of his car stereo, according to geek lore on the Internet, it’s a reference to original Kirk (aka the great Bill Shatner) pronouncing the word “sabotage” in his own, distinct way…
May 7th, 2009
Via Cinematical, here’s the image from a T-Shirt entitled (T-Shirts have titles?) “Being Bill Murray.” As you can see, it features Murray’s most memorable screen characters, including roles from SATURDAY NIGHT LIVE, GHOSTBUSTERS, THE LIFE AQUATIC WITH STEVE ZISSOU, THE ROYAL TENENBAUMS, QUICK CHANGE, CADDYSHACK, GROUNDHOG DAY, KINGPIN and others.
You can order your own from the Dutch Southern Web site, and you can see a bigger version of the image by clicking here.
May 5th, 2009
Actor Dom DeLuise died Monday in Los Angeles at the age of 75. He appeared in some great comedies (BLAZING SADDLES), some OK comedies (SILENT MOVIE) and at least one terrible comedy (LOOSE CANNONS — but we won’t hold that against him).
He’s probably best remembered, though, for playing Burt Reynold’s friendly but delusional sidekick in CANNONBALL RUN and its sequel. I can’t think of a better way to honor the memory of this funny guy than with this bit of silliness, the outtakes that showed during the credits of CANNONBALL RUN.
Next Posts
Previous Posts
