DAVID BIANCULLI

Founder / Editor

ERIC GOULD

Associate Editor

LINDA DONOVAN

Assistant Editor

Contributors

ALEX STRACHAN

MIKE HUGHES

KIM AKASS

MONIQUE NAZARETH

ROGER CATLIN

GARY EDGERTON

TOM BRINKMOELLER

GERALD JORDAN

NOEL HOLSTON

 
 
2014
Jun
4
 
 
Natalie Portman plays a 12-year-old, and was a 12-year-old, in Luc Besson’s gripping 1994 thriller that stars Jean Reno as a professional hit man who decides to protect a young girl whose family was brutally murdered. Gary Oldman plays one of the very best – as in the worst – villains in his career-long rogue’s gallery. And Portman, even at such a young age, is remarkable, while the film itself is equally remarkable for not being at all exploitive.
 
 
 
  
 
 
2014
Jun
4
 
 
It’s good to be the Queen. Ursula Andress stars in this unintentionally campy 1965 version of the H. Rider Haggard novel, playing the immortal East African ruler known as She Who Must Be Obeyed. (Yes, Rumpole of the Bailey fans, this is where Rumpole got the playful nickname for his wife.) And while the Queen’s demeanor is cold, her wardrobe is hot – hot enough to be remembered, and singled out as a Best Bet, almost 50 years later. Sigh.
 
 
 
  
 
 
2014
Jun
4
 
 
It’s two days before the anniversary of D-Day 70 years ago, but National Geographic couldn’t wait, so is presenting this prime-time documentary special, which recaps the bold, bloody 80 days from the original landing on the Normandy beach to the Allied liberation of Paris.
 
 
 
  
 
 
2014
Jun
4
 
 
SERIES PREMIERE: The newest original sitcom by TV Land is a departure of sorts for the network. Instead of a standard, vintage-style multi-camera sitcom performed before an audience, Jennifer Falls is a single-camera comedy, like, say, My Name Is Earl. And that’s an intentional name drop, because the star of Jennifer Falls, playing a formerly successful career woman who moves back in with her mother when hard times hit, is Earl star Jaime Pressly. Another Earl veteran, Ethan Suplee, plays
 
 
 
  
 
 
2014
Jun
4
 
 
The documentary currently airing on CNN, The Sixties, was reviewed in Newsday recently by Verne Gay. In his article, the author noted that notable television critics are interviewed in the series -- but only one critic was mentioned by name: our Founder and Editor David Bianculli...
 
 
 
  
 
 
2014
Jun
3
 
 
The passing on Sunday of beloved Brady Bunch star Ann B. Davis brings all sorts of memories to mind for people lucky enough to have grown up during the Television Generation...
 
 
 
  
 
 
2014
Jun
3
 
 
Stanley Kubrick’s 1968 film was a genre masterpiece then, and it’s a genre masterpiece today – and, most likely, will remain a genre masterpiece tomorrow. The movie seems to be almost nothing but extended set pieces, each iconic movie sequence leading to another. Monoliths. Moon shuttles. Malevolent supercomputers. Star childs. Trips to the end of space and time. And speaking of trips – watch again, as paranoid shipboard computer HAL uses his photographic red “eye&r
 
 
 
  
 
 
2014
Jun
3
 
 
This show just builds and builds, as its characters deepen along with the plot. And Billy Bob Thornton as Malvo – he may just be the most deadpan antihero, or villain, in TV history. Or at least since Miguel Ferrer popped up as super-droll FBI forensics specialist Albert in Twin Peaks.
 
 
 
  
 
 
2014
Jun
3
 
 
So now we know what Wil Wheaton’s new show is all about. It’s an overview of the week in sci fi – part recap, part preview, and part politely snarky observational humor. The humor needs a little work, but Wheaton, and Syfy, may be on to something here, especially with the proliferation of the Talking Dead-type TV shows popping up all of a sudden. And with Chris Hardwick, that show's host, popping up on Wheaton's first show as well...
 
 
 
  
 
 
2014
Jun
3
 
 
2001: A Space Odyssey isn’t the only outer-space film classic shown tonight on TCM. Right after that 1968 movie ends, 1979’s Alien begins – and, before long, presents one of the scariest scenes in all of science fiction cinema. Sigourney Weaver stars.