Heaven’s Gate (1980)
Directed by Michael Cimino
Written by Michael Cimino
Produced by Joann Carelli
Running time: 219 minutes (original cut)
Should I Care?
As the 1970s came to a close, five runaway film productions loomed on the horizon, piling up doom and gloom courtesy of the mainstream news media. Suffering from fiscal recklessness at best, studio mismanagement at worst, if [...]

[Read more →]

Brokeback Mountain (2005)
Screenplay by Diana Ossana & Larry McMurtry, based on the short story by Annie Proulx
Directed by Ang Lee
Produced by Good Machine/ Focus Features
Running time: 134 minutes

What the *&#! Is This About?
In the town of “Signal,” Wyoming in 1963, two ranch hands arrive and are put to work by a rancher (Randy Quaid) [...]

[Read more →]

 
Synopsis
Jack (Jeff Bridges) and his Indian buddy Cecil (Sam Waterston) pass the time in Montana shooting cattle and sawing them up on the spot with a chainsaw. Rancher John Brown (Clifton James) and his wife (Elizabeth Ashley) – who sold a [...]

[Read more →]

“Miramax is brilliant at publicizing its successes, but it’s even more brilliant at burying its failures,” said Dennis Rice, their former president of marketing. Miramax Films was notorious for test screening its movies – often in malls in New Jersey – and barely releasing the ones that scored poorly. Some went straight to video, even [...]

[Read more →]