Author: Peter J Patrick
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The DVD Report #500
New This Week Emily Blunt has been on the verge of major stardom ever since her sit-up-and-take-notice supporting turn in 2006’s The Devil Wears Prada, but her climb to the top has been slow and not always successful despite stunning lead performances in the likes of The Young Victoria, Into the Woods, and Sicario. She…
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Oscar Profile #323: Mary Steenburgen
Born February 8, 1953 in Newport, Arkansas to Nellie May (Wall) and Maurice Steenburgen, a freight-train conductor, Mary Steenburgen grew up tap-dancing her way through talent shows and school functions. Active in school drama classes as well, she appeared in numerous high school plays, enrolling in Hendrix College upon graduation. At the recommendation of her…
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The DVD Report #499
New This Week Nate Parker’s The Birth of a Nation won the Grand Jury Prize and Audience Award at last year’s Sundance Film Festival and immediately leapt to the forefront of everyone’s 2016 Oscar predictions. By August, however, those hopes were dashed when news stories began circulating about the 1999 rape of an 18-year-old girl…
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Oscar Profile #322: Karl Malden
Born Mladen George Sekulovich on March 22, 1912 to a Serbian father and a Czech mother in Chicago, Illinois, the future Karl Malden spoke only Serbian until he entered kindergarten. The eldest of three children, his father worked in the steel mills and as a milkman in Gary, Indiana. His mother, who was twenty when…
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The DVD Report #498
New This Week Whenever a major recording artists dies, his or her back-catalogue soars in popularity even if they have been out of the spotlight for a while. When a well-known actor or actress dies, interest in their old movies picks up, though not usually at the same level as a rock star’s. On December…
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Oscar Profile #321: Florence Bates
Born April 15, 1888 to Jewish immigrants in Austin, Texas, Florence Rabe was the second of two children. She graduated from the University of Texas at Austin with a degree in Mathematics in 1906, after which she taught school. She gave up her career in 1909 when she married her first husband and gave birth…
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The DVD Report #497
New This Week Spy or whistleblower? Oliver Stone comes down clearly on the side of the latter assessment in Snowden, the triple Oscar winner’s best film in decades. Stone, never one to shrink from controversy, has always been at his best when underscoring the humanity in his characters rather than their behavioral eccentricities. That was…
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Oscar Profile #320: Ann Blyth
Born August 16, 1928 in Mount Kisco, New York to Irish-American parents, Ann Blyth’s parents split up when she was very young. She moved to Manhattan with her mother and sister, where they shared a walk-up apartment on East 31st Street and her mother took in ironing to make ends meet. A natural actress and…
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The DVD Report #496
New This Week Eight years ago, the world was deep in an economic crisis. In the United States, the country was hopeful for change as Barack Obama, the first black president, was about to take office. On January 15, 2009, five days before his inauguration, an incident occurred that many saw as an omen of…
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Oscar Profile #319: Clifton Webb
Born Webb Parmalee Hollenbeck in Indianapolis, Indiana on November 18, 1889, the entertainer later known professionally as Clifton Webb, moved with his mother Mabelle to New York, New York in 1892. On stage from 1902, he had become a professional ballroom dancer by the age of 19, often appearing with star dancer Bonnie Glass who…
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The DVD Report #495
New This Week Meryl Streep is an extremely lucky actress. Not only has the 67-year-old’s career flourished at an age when most of her contemporaries are either retired or given little to do in the films they do manage to make an appearance in, but she’s in the conversation for year-end awards for just about…
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Oscar Profile #318: Peter Hedges
Born July 6, 1962 in West Des Moines, Iowa, Peter Hedges was the third child of psychotherapist Carole Simpson and Episcopalian minister Robert Hedges. Father Hedges was, among other things, the chaplain of the Iowa National Guard for 21 years before relocating to Texas where he died in 2014 at the age of 88. Peter…
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The DVD Report #494
New This Week Presented at this year’s Cannes Film Festival last May, Cohen Media Group has released a sparkling new 25th Anniversary 4K Restoration of James Ivory’s film of E.M. Forster’s Howards End on both Blu-ray and standard DVD. The is the first of most films in the Merchant-Ivory library that will be restored by…
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Oscar Profile #137: Robert Morley
Born May 26, 1908 in Semley, Wilshire, England, Robert Morley was the son of a major in the British Army and a German-born mother. Educated in England, Germany, France and Italy, he was expected to go into diplomatic service, but chose acting instead. Morley made his West End debut in a 1929 production of Treasure…
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The DVD Report #493
New This Week Disney continues to rake in the big bucks for many of its films, but two of its highly hyped 2016 releases underperformed at the box-office so much so that in their first week of release on DVD and Blu-ray, neither The BFG nor Pete’s Dragon gets the spotlight at Walmart and other…
