This is not a recommendation – just a note to those seeking bizarre Halloween-themed programming tonight. Not since Geraldo Rivera entered Al Capone’s vault has live TV offered up such an obvious carney stunt – but here it is. The exorcism scheduled to be performed isn’t on a person, but on a house – which makes it a minor exorcism, not a major one. (I would have considered this a minor TV event, regardless.) It takes place at the same suburban St. Louis house in wh

2015

Oct

GHOSTBUSTERS By David Bianculli

With a female remake in production, and with Halloween just around the corner, you’ve got two good extra reasons to watch this 1984 comedy classic, starring Bill Murray, Harold Ramis and Dan Aykroyd. But who needs extra reasons? That trio of comics, plus the special effects, and supporting scene-stealers Rick Moranis and Sigourney Weaver, add up to more than enough reasons to sit back and enjoy.

2015

Oct

CNBC'S DEBATE FLOP RE-TARNISHES 'MAINSTREAM MEDIA' By Ed Bark

Blasting the “lame stream,” media has long been a favorite pastime of the GOP. But this time there’s a strong case to be made...

2015

Oct

'THE VOICE' STILL HITS HIGH NOTES AS MUSIC INDUSTRY MORPHS By Alex Strachan

The biggest surprise watching The Voice today is how it has managed to sustain the high notes, both in the ratings and, more importantly, with the way it has connected with its primarily young audience...

2015

Oct

LITTLE SHOP OF HORRORS By David Bianculli

There are all sorts of fun horror movies on TCM today and tomorrow and Saturday, celebrating Halloween – but this one, from 1960, deserves special notice. It’s the Roger Corman film that, eventually, spawned a hot off-Broadway musical, and a popular movie musical as well. In this original version, watch for the then-unknown young actor playing a dentist’s masochistic patient. The actor is… Jack Nicholson.

2015

Oct

BONES/SLEEPY HOLLOW CROSSOVER By David Bianculli

This one-night crossover pairing, of the supernatural series Sleepy Hollow and the forensics procedural Bones, sounds almost laughably unlikely. But when you look closely at the chemistry of each show’s leading couple, you see the similarities, especially with the mismatched personalities and playful verbal jabs. Tonight, that two-way chemistry becomes a foursome – but only comically, not physically.

2015

Oct

IT'S THE GREAT PUMPKIN, CHARLIE BROWN By David Bianculli

After A Charlie Brown Christmas, this 1966 cartoon is the best Peanuts special ever made. Both of them, in very different ways, are about the importance of faith. For Halloween, that seems an out-of-place message, yet Linus, in the pumpkin patch, is like a grade-school Fox Mulder: He wants to believe.

2015

Oct

THURSDAY NIGHT FOOTBALL By David Bianculli

The New England Patriots are undefeated, this far into the season – and tonight, face AFC division rivals the Miami Dolphins, who are only a .500 team this year. However, the Dolphins are undefeated since they dismissed their losing coach, Joe Philbin, and have won the last two games in uncharacteristically dominant fashion. My heart is rooting for the Dolphins – but my head, and the years of history of the Dolphins having their dreams crushed by the Patriots, say the advantage goes

2015

Oct

THE HURT LOCKER By David Bianculli

All this month on Tuesdays and Thursdays, TCM has saluted women directors – and tonight’s final dip into that well brings us the most recent films in its female moviemaking sampler. Newest of all, and unusually recent for a TCM offering, is this film from 2008: Kathryn Bigelow’s The Hurt Locker, starring Jeremy Renner as a munitions expert faced with the potentially deadly duty of defusing bombs during the Iraq War.

2015

Oct

NEW HEIGHTS OF HYPOCRISY: TRUMP'S NEW 'SNL' GIG MEANS NBC RATINGS By Ed Bark

Believe it or not, this has nothing to do with Donald Trump’s politics, but it has everything to do with NBC’s remarkable inconsistency...

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