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"The one thing we can never get enough of is love. And the one thing we never give enough is love." — Henry Miller
Today is Valentine's Day and love is in the air. And we're not talking about platonic love or brotherly love, tough love or self-love, but romantic love — the real hearts-and-flowers, butterlies-in-your-stomach type of love that sets your soul on fire and makes you feel like you're walking on air. Scientists may say that the euphoria we feel when we are in the embrace of romantic love is merely a chemical response with evolutionary advantages, but anyone who has truly experienced it knows that it feels far more like magic than science. Though romantic love is nearly impossible to define or describe to others, great filmmakers are often capable of capturing just enough of that magic feeling that we recognize it in their films and respond to it with our sighs and our laughs and our tears. Light a few candles, pour a couple glasses of wine or sparkling cider and help us select the most romantic movies of the past twenty years.
Rate the Top 10 Most Romantic Movies >>
Posted 02.14.13 by BrentJS -
"A dream you dream alone is only a dream. A dream you dream together is reality." — John Lennon
Some of the most imaginative films in motion picture history are inspired by, based on, or even take place within, dreams. This is not really that surprising considering comparisons between the two have been made since the birth of cinema, with Hollywood often referred to as the "dream factory." Psychologists have long noted that the collection of sounds and images that comprise both movies and dreams are heavily steeped in symbolism and latent content and that both experiences arouse similar psychological mechanisms in the participants.
Even the most pedestrian of movies are akin to dreams in the way that they transport us away from our everyday lives and allow us to experience people, places, events, and even emotions that might otherwise be foreign to us. But, the similarities between the two are never more apparent than when dreams are represented on screen. Pour yourself a nightcap or nice cup of chamomile tea, put on your PJs and help us rate the best movies about dreams.
Rate the Top 10 Best Movies About Dreams >>
Posted 01.28.13 by BrentJS -
The Los Angeles Film Critics Association cast its votes for the best movies of the "aughties," and in the end, it was David Lynch's Mulholland Dr. that came out on top, according to The Hollywood Reporter.
The organization made the following statement in announcing its decision:
Lynch's film stands as both a cautionary tale and a mascot for the triumph ofart and personal vision in an industry that, from where we sit, often seems actively devoted to the suppression of both.
Mulholland Dr. stars Laura Elena Harring as an upscale LA woman who suffers from amnesia after a car accident. She meets Naomi Watts (in her breakout role), an ingenue trying to break into Hollywood, and the two set about trying to solve the mystery of the accident. The movie also features Justin Theroux as a director whose project is sabotaged by big-studio producers.
The movie both glamorizes and satirizes Hollywood, often in the same moment, and the tone runs the gamut from absurd hilarity to outright horror. It's a rhapsodic celebration of the history of movies on one hand, and yet at the same time a ruthlessly bitter denunciation of industry evils. Perfect territory for Lynch, whose very success depended partly on Hollywood capital and partly on his ability to keep his distance from it.
Paul Thomas Anderson's There Will Be Blood was second on the critics' list, followed by Michel Gondry's Eternal Sunshine of theSpotless Mind and Ang Lee's Brokeback Mountain. Other contenders included Peter Jackson's Lord of the Rings trilogy, Hayao Miyazaki's Spirited Away, and Alfonso Cuarón's Y tu mamá también.
Posted 01.13.10 by reelz -
The ReelzChannel 100 began when we asked Leonard Maltin for his favorite Hidden Gems of the decade. His list led the web team into a general discussion about the best movies of the decade and — after no small amount of debate, arguing, and (we're not proud to say) some petty name-calling — we decided we'd better bring it to an end with a company-wide vote. Then it was just a matter of tallying up the votes and hoping for the best. Lucky for us, ReelzChannel is filled with a staff ranging from movie lovers to movie fanatics. What turned out isn't what you'll find on a critic's best of list — instead it's what movie fans really enjoyed.
In our final day of the ReelzChannel 100, we highlight 10 New Classics from the Decade.
Posted 01.01.10 by reelz