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REVIEW: Napoleon Dynamite – Ten Years Later…
Directed by: Jared Hess
Produced by: Jeremy Coon, Chris Wyatt, Sean C. Covel, Jory Weitz
Written by: Jared Hess, Jerusha Hess (screenplay)
Edited by: Jeremy Coon
Cinematography by: Munn Powell
Music by: John Swihart
Starring: Jon Heder, Jon Gries, Efren Ramirez, Tina Majorino, Aaron Ruell, Diedrich Bader, Haylie Duff, Emily Kennard, Shondrella Avery, Sandy Martin, Trevor Snarr
Based on the short film Peluca by Jared Hess
Year: 2004
Released in the summer between my junior and senior years of high school, Napoleon Dynamite would pretty much become one of the defining films of that year for my class (and a lot of other people, too, but this is my blog). Along with the first Anchorman and Garden State, seemingly nobody was able to shut up about these three films, all released that same year. Of those three, though, Napoleon Dynamite was the only one that I took to along with everyone else – I didn’t see Anchorman until well after it was released on DVD (and even then, I didn’t care for it much – I was a bit of a prude at the time), and I didn’t see Garden State until after college, when I gave myself the graduation gift of Netflix, because I had gotten quite sick of hearing about how wonderful it was over the next few years (it was… alright). Read more…
REVIEW: Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer
Directed by: Larry Roemer
Produced by: Arthur Rankin, Jr. (producer), Jules Bass (co-producer)
Written by: Romeo Muller, Robert L. May
Animation supervised by: Tadahito Mochinaga
Music by: Johnny Marks
Starring: Burl Ives, Billie Mae Richards, Paul Soles, Larry D. Mann, Stan Francis, Paul Kligman, Janis Orenstein, Alfie Scopp, Carl Banas, Corinne Conley, Peg Dixon
Based on the story and song written by Robert L. May
Year: 1964
I’m going to allow for my first 2013 Christmas movie review to make me out to be a Scrooge.
A 1964 TV special done in the medium of stop motion capture, Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer has become one of the most beloved and influential examples of the medium – if someone doesn’t know what the term “stop motion” means, you could undoubtedly point to Rudolph or one of its other Rankin/Bass Christmastime siblings as an example that nearly everyone will then immediately understand. It’s arguable that even the likes of The Nightmare Before Christmas owes its aesthetic style to these holiday productions, albeit with the obligatory Tim Burton-esque macabre twist, not to mention the countless spoofs, knockoffs, and affectionate references that followed across TV and film. Beyond the aesthetics and styling, however, this short TV movie also stands as one of the longest running TV traditions, airing annually each Christmas season since it was first shown. Read more…
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