Dexter: The Seventh Season

There's no way to discuss the seventh and penultimate season of Showtime's hit Dexter without acknowledging how the previous year ended. Therefore, if you haven't finished the sixth season, stop reading now. You've got work to do.

05/21/2013 | Comments 0

Nightfall

As Simon Lam gets older, he gets better. The veteran actor has appeared in such in seminal HK action films of the 1990s as Once Upon a Time in China (opposite Jet Li) and Bullet in the Head (directed by John Woo); in the aughts, he graced audience and critical favorites Election and Ip Man.

05/20/2013 | Comments 0

Grand Duel

Lee Van Cleef enjoyed a secondary career in Italy cranking out spaghetti Westerns, with little regard to quality. However, 1972’s Grand Duel — aka The Big Showdown — is deserving of its Grand label. No wonder Quentin Tarantino borrowed its sweeping theme song by Luis Bacalov for Kill Bill; you'll recognize it in two notes.

05/20/2013 | Comments 0

The Last Stand

Early in The Last Stand, the small-town sheriff played by Arnold Schwarzenegger says, "It's my day off. Should be a quiet weekend." That's the new way of saying, "I've got one week to retirement," because it signals — with flashing neon and everything — that life is going to royally upend those plans.

05/17/2013 | Comments 0

Texas Chainsaw

One of the most inconsistent franchises in movie history is the one beget by Tobe Hooper's 1974 classic, The Texas Chain Saw Massacre. How does one follow all those less-than-beloved sequels? Lionsgate's latest in the series — the seventh — has a solution: Ignore 'em.

05/17/2013 | Comments 0

Ernst Lubitsch’s 1942 movie “To Be or Not to Be” will be discussed at the inaugural Film Comedy Conference.

February 9th, 2011

Professionals from around the globe will be speaking about the comedic arts in every culture, from American Indian to Greek. Also on the agenda for discussion are the films of Jacques Tati and Woody Allen, and David O. Russell’s "Flirting with Disaster."

The University of Oklahoma is getting serious about comedy. On Friday and Saturday, the OU College of Arts and Sciences hosts its inaugural Film Comedy Conference.

All of the dozen presenters are contributors to a book being edited by OU professors and conference hosts Andrew Horton and Joanna Rapf, “The Wiley- Blackwell Companion to Film Comedy.”

“Even though comedy sells at theaters and everyone enjoys it, there is a much bigger meaning behind it,” said Horton. “It’s important for people to realize how comedy impacts us in our day-to-day lives.”

“We’re very pleased that these speakers from all over the world could come and share their knowledge and experiences,” said Horton.

All of the presentations will be held in Oklahoma Memorial Union’s Heritage Room, 900 Asp in Norman, and are free and open to the public. For more information, call 325-3020 or visit ou.edu/fvs. —Courtney Silva