Martin Scorsese

CHICAGO – Frank Vincent always looked good, no matter what role he was playing, but he mostly portrayed mafia types, and was styling as those guys as well… he even wrote a book on dress, “A Guy’s Guide to Being a Better Man.” He was best known as Phil Leotardo on the legendary HBO series, “The Sopranos,” and he passed away at age 80 in New Jersey on September 13th, 2017.

CHICAGO – For gosh sakes, someone call the Vatican and make Marty Scorsese an honorary priest. He is overtly fascinated – in this work and his other films – with the notion of religious faith, particular within his Catholic roots. He approaches the subject again in the intense “Silence.”

CHICAGO – In 1966, a breakthrough book about the movies was released, entitled “Hitchcock/Truffaut.” A new documentary explores the actual interviews that were conducted between French new wave director Francois Truffaut and the legendary Alfred Hitchcock, that would become that book.

CHICAGO – We’d all be so lucky to live a full life of love, success and dignity. But earning it and then dying with it is the ultimate accomplishment.

CHICAGO – We will never see the likes of his kind again – the influential arbiter of cinematic taste, whose magic thumb could make or break the dreams of both filmmaker and film fan. The journey of Roger Ebert, the most influential film critic of our times, is told in the new documentary, “Life Itself.”

CHICAGO – The iconic film critic and renaissance man, Roger Ebert, deservedly gets a full documentary film treatment of his 2011 memoir, “Life Itself,” and who better to create it than the Chicago-based director of “Hoop Dreams,” Steve James. And who better to produce and guide it than Roger’s soulmate, his wife Chaz Ebert.

Something always felt a bit out of place for me in Martin Scorsese’s brilliant “The King of Comedy”, just released on Blu-ray for the first time. I couldn’t put my finger on it but chalked it up to it being thematically ahead of its time in its investigation of the cult of personality that defines modern entertainment.

What to Watch is back in two-week form this time around, hitting the most important Blu-ray, DVD, and streaming offerings from both March 25th and April 1st. No April Fool’s Day jokes here. We’re above that. Sorta. What you will find is one of the best movies of last year, a fantastic comedy series, a foreign film you really should see, and further proof that John Cusack is merely slipping into straight-to-DVD oblivion like that damn horse in “The Neverending Story”. Pick one of the six. What the Hell, pick two.

CHICAGO – The buzz at Sundance was for a documentary about the life of a film critic – but that film critic happens to be Roger Ebert, and the film is an adaptation of his memoir, “Life Itself.” Magnolia Pictures announced yesterday that they have acquired U.S. theatrical, Video-On-Demand and home entertainment rights to the film, and are planning on a summer release.

CHICAGO – No matter how painfully bad it may be, I never walk out of a screening. It’s a professional rule I’ve set and keep it at all costs. But with Martin Scorsese’s latest stroke of genius, I experienced a kind of pain I don’t usually wrangle with: the survival of my bladder.