My 650th Post + Other Things

With the clicking of the publish button on this post (which happened at 7:45 pm on this day, Thursday, August 8, 2012) I have become the proud owner/writer of 650 posts on this here site known as The Most Beautiful Fraud in the World.  Having posted my first rant on September 14, 2009, that comes to a new post every 1.6 days.  It's all about the numbers ya know.  Anyway, the true reason for this post, other than to boast about being a rather prolific babbler of cinematic ramblings, is to let you in on what is coming in the near future around these environs.

As far as new reviews coming, look for my takes on such recent and upcoming releases as A Burning Hot Summer, Beloved, The Intouchables, Ruby Sparks, Cosmopolis, The Campaign, Dark Horse, Farewell My Queen, Beasts of the Southern Wild, The Bourne Legacy, The Expendables 2, Little White Lies, Lawless and Killer Joe.  Also look for pieces on a pair of silent films, Louis Feuillade's 1918 serial Tih Minh and Fritz Lang's 1924 double feature Die Nibelungen - both being written about for the Speechless Blogathon happening soon over at Eternity of Dream.

Some long lost regular features will also be popping up once again.  My 10 Favourite Things feature, once a monthly thing, but only seen once in the past year, will rear its head once more, with a look at Brian De Palma's Scarface.   Also making a return to regularity will be Retro Reviews, where I repost some of my "older" reviews that were originally published at the now mostly defunct Cinematheque.  Some up-and-comers in this series will be Sofia Coppola's Marie Antoinette, Philippe Garrel's Regular Lovers and Kathryn Bigelow's Best Picture winner The Hurt Locker.

You may also see some pieces on what many would call guilty pleasure films (I though have no guilt toward such things).  They are from my Widescreen Wednesday screenings.  What are Widescreen Wednesdays you ask?  Well let me tell you.  It is what I have dubbed my Wednesday mornings/early afternoons.  Each week I watch a different widescreen film, CinemaScope or one of its ilk, up on the big screen of the Midtown Cinema - the arthouse cinema my lovely wife and I run together.  Sometimes it is something serious - a Kubrick, a De Palma, a Nick Ray - but more oft than not it is something quite silly.  Something along the lines of Forbidden Planet or The Vikings or The Girl Can't Help It or Seven Brides For Seven Brothers.  So don't be surprised if you find a piece on the utter silliness of Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea sometime soon.

As for new features, I am going to start running a monthly piece called Recasting.  Last month I participated in a fun blogathon where we were asked to recast modern movies with classic stars and directors.  Going overboard as usual, I took Pulp Fiction and recast it in ten different classic Hollywood genres.  Well that was enough fun that I want to do it again.  The first of this series will be a racasting of Dazed and Confused into three different genres - a 1949 Vincente Minnelli Musical, a 1955 Anthony Mann Western, and a 1961 Billy Wilder Comedy.  Look for that one sometime around the end of August.

Well that is it for this round of cinematic ramblings.  Check me out for my next 650 posts, and beyond.  And also keep voting in my Battle Royale series, where I pit two (semi)related classic Hollywood stars or directors in so-called mortal combat.  The poll, a new one every three weeks or so, can be found at the top of the sidebar.  The newest one, the fourth in the ongoing series, will be up and running later today (or is already up in case you are reading this at a later date and/or time.  And keep checking out my updates on My Quest to See the 1000 Greatest Films, as it comes to its close this Fall.  I will leave you with a shot from (appropriately enough) the 650th film watched on said quest's list.  And now, as Stan Lee would say, 'nuff said.