With St. Patrick’s Day just around the corner, Webb Weekly herewith presents — in chronological order — a toast to films featuring the Emerald Isle: “The Quiet Man” (1952): Legendary director John Ford made 14 movies starring John Wayne; most were Westerns — but not this Technicolor feast about an Irish-American who returns to his
When discussing Kenneth Branagh, it’s hard to know where to begin — or end. The famed British actor, writer and director is currently enjoying box-office success with the long-delayed whodunit “Death on the Nile,” while his most recent film, “Belfast,” stands nominated for seven Academy Awards. Starting with screen versions of Shakespeare in the 1990s,
This is the first time I ever ran through a rock album with the lyric sheet in one hand and a Bible in the other. On “The Zealot Gene,” brand-new record from British prog-rockers Jethro Tull, front-man Ian Anderson continues his career-long examination of the Judeo-Christian tradition. Fortunately, this legendary band also continues the unique
Shakespeare’s “Macbeth” is famously plagued by a curse — a frightening series of mishaps, injuries, and deaths going all the way back to the play’s first staging in 1610. We don’t have space to go into all that here (just google “curse of Macbeth”), but perhaps this is one reason why it’s proven perilously difficult
When Sidney Poitier died on Jan. 6 at the age of 94, he left behind a body of work as weighty, beloved, and ground-breaking as any other actor you can name. Author, director, diplomat, and star of more than 50 films, Poitier was the first black man to kiss a white woman on screen, the
Steven Spielberg’s “West Side Story” achieves so many unlikely triumphs that, at times, it seems downright miraculous. Based on the beloved 1961 musical, this is a rare remake that’s every bit as good as the original — maybe better. Yet somehow, it manages this without actually eclipsing that film — without modernizing or updating it
