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I snapped this photo of Roy when we attended the Philadelphia International Film Festival in March, 2007. The only reason he isn't wearing a Hawaiian shirt is that it was wintry that week!
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The last time I saw Roy E. Disney was in May, when he attended a memorial for Wayne Allwine, the voice of Mickey Mouse. People in the extended Disney family were delighted to see him, but somewhat taken aback at his gaunt appearance. Still, for a man who had battled cancer as vigorously—and optimistically—as he had, he seemed to be in pretty good shape, and he spoke with great spirit and humor that night. Best of all, he was wearing one of his trademark aloha shirts.
Now he’s gone, and the news is difficult to digest. Just two weeks ago he was making plans to attend the Palm Springs Film Festival. Death was not on his agenda. Roy Edward Disney would have been 80 on January 10, but he didn’t think or act like an old man. He only curtailed his celebrated participation in sailboat racing during the past decade.
Continue to Leonard's Journal
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AVATAR
Avatar is at once a fascinating and a frustrating movie. I found much of it captivating, and while I resist the hype-driven phrase “immersive experience,” I did find myself drawn into its 3-D world, an extraordinarily rich cinematic environment created, in breathtaking detail, by artists and computers. I didn’t think I could care about odd-looking humanoid characters, but I did. I didn’t think I would relate to the interaction between humans and aliens, but I did. Writer-director James Cameron has delivered on his promise to take filmmaking to another level by fully realizing his imaginative visual concepts of character and design...and by turning the 3-D process inside out by pulling us through the looking glass instead of sticking things out at us across the proscenium.
to Picks Page |
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 I love reading film books but I simply can't keep up with all the new titles that come over the transom...so, with holiday gift-giving in mind, I have compiled this annotated listing based on my first impressions of these recent releases, including a few that haven't gotten the attention they deserve. I haven't bothered to list anything that doesn't seem worthwhile. If you click on the book covers or titles, you'll be taken directly to their purchase page at Amazon.com.
to Book Roundup Page
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Behold the “test slab,” perched on the refreshment counter in the lobby of Grauman’s Chinese Theater. The people who supervise this beloved Hollywood ceremony have perfected a formula over many years’ time to create commemorative pieces that will stand up to wear and tear. If you’ve never read Stacey Endres and Robert Cushman’s definitive history of the theater and its world-famous ceremony, Hollywood at Your Feet (Pomegranate Press, 1992) you can readily find used copies online, and I encourage you to do so.
to Photos Page
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 November, 2009
A Leap Into the Digital Age
Oscar, Take a Bow
Movies: the Cure for What Ails You
The Sign of the Z - on DVD
 October, 2009
Disney Museum in a Word: Dazzling
Another Vault Opens
Everything Old is New Again
September, 2009
Digging into Disney: Frank Thomson's Documentary Walt & El Grupo
Flying High at Telluride
News, Notes, and Passings
more in The Vault
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 It’s finally here: the new issue of Leonard Maltin’s Movie Crazy, with part two of my article about remakes, “Once More, With Sound,” exploring the little-remembered talkie versions of such silent classics as Tol’able David, Way Down East, Seventh Heaven, and The Miracle Man, culminating in the almost-unbelievable saga of how a British producer remade D.W. Griffith’s Broken Blossoms—after firing Griffith off the picture. Also in this issue, part 2 of my conversation with Dick Jones about working with Errol Flynn on Rocky Mountain, doing his own daring stunts on horseback, and starring in such early TV series as The Range Rider and Buffalo Bill, Jr. You’ll also see unusual decorative letterheads from silent-film distributors and reproductions of Hollywood studios passes for those people lucky enough to visit Columbia, RKO, and Paramount Pictures decades ago. For more information, click HERE.
Yes, it’s that time again: the new 2010 Edition of my annual Movie Guide is here. As usual, it’s available in two sizes: a mass-market paperback from Signet, still retailing for just $9.99, and the larger-format Plume edition at $20. I can’t believe how quickly my publisher manages to produce this hefty book, which is bursting at the seams at 1,645 pages: we’ve got films as recent as Up and Terminator Salvation among the 350 new entries, along with hundreds of changes, corrections and tweaks that make the book more accurate and, I hope, more useful every year. (Did you know that Robert Pattinson of Twilight fame was in Vanity Fair in 2004? Or that Michael Shannon, who earned an Oscar nomination for his work in Revolutionary Road, has been in films since Groundhog Day in 1993?) And thanks to a steady stream of e-mails from sharp-eyed readers, we’ve been able to correct mistakes—including some that have been in print for decades! For instance, Harold and Maude went into national release in January of 1972 but opened in New York in December of 1971—so that’s the year we should have cited all along. It’s always frustrating to discover an error, but heartening to know that we can set the record straight.
 It’s daunting for me to realize that I’ve been editing this book for most of my life—but then, it’s become such a part of my life that I can’t picture not working on it (or at least thinking about it) all the time. Whenever I read about a director’s cut of a film on DVD, a reissue of a classic that includes long-lost footage, a remake of an old movie or a DVD sequel to a recent one, I automatically make a note for next year’s edition. And every time I see an older movie I check the book to see if I still agree with my own review—or if someone who wasn’t well-known when the film was made deserves to be added to the cast list. (I recently revisited the original The Taking of Pelham One Two Three and was pleased to see that we listed Doris Roberts and James Broderick, who have small but noticeable parts.)
I frequently meet people who tell me that they’re still using a 1987 edition, or a 1995 book. I don’t want to sound like a huckster and tell them to buy another copy, but I can honestly say that we not only expand but improve the book every year. We’ve moved many older films to our companion volume, Leonard Maltin’s Classic Movie Guide (and we’re finishing up a revised edition of that book for publication next spring) but we still have 17,000 movies at your fingertips... and we’re already hard at work on next year’s guide. |
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