Jamie Lee Curtis

CHICAGO – Let’s get this over with … Rian Johnson directed “Star Wars: The Last Jedi” in 2017. Let’s let that fanboy quiver die down and note the talented filmmaker has produced a Thanksgiving treat, his new film “Knives Out.” The old fashioned “whodunit” flicker with an all-star cast was put together in the spirit of fun at the movies.

CHICAGO – Some extraordinary local and outside talent coordinated to produce the film “An Acceptable Loss” in 2018, including featured stars Jamie Lee Curtis and Tika Sumpter (“Southside with You”). Producer Colleen Griffen and writer/director Joe Chappelle, who hail from Chicagoland, helped to create this passionate thriller, with echoes of paranoid government oversight films like “All the President’s Men” and the recent “Vice.” The Midwest Independent Film Festival has made “An Acceptable Loss” the kickoff film for their 2019 season. Click here for tickets and details.

CHICAGO – At this point, the “Halloween” franchise is looking as tattered and tired as Michael Myers old William Shatner mask… fraying around the edges and on the verge of falling apart. The 2018 “reboot” sequel brings back former scream queen Jamie Lee Curtis as Laurie Strode, along with original Michael Myers, Nick Castle.

CHICAGO – It was 38 years ago that the seminal horror film “Halloween” was released, and its impact made a star out of the heroine in the film, Jamie Lee Curtis. Curtis was in the Chicago area in September to promote her new children’s book, “This is Me: The Story of Who and Where We Came From,” (illustrated by Laura Cornell).

CHICAGO – In the latest HollywoodChicago.com Hookup: Film, we have 50 pairs of advance-screening movie passes up for grabs to the new true-story drama “Spare Parts” starring George Lopez and Marisa Tomei!

CHICAGO – A TV movie for the silver screen, “Veronica Mars” is a historical film that was Kickstarted into existence by the will of 91,585 backers. Now, it stands like a crossroads in the intersection between TV and film, showing that what may work in TV doesn’t necessarily make for a great film.

CHICAGO – A TV movie for the silver screen, “Veronica Mars” is a historical film that was Kickstarted into existence by the will of 91,585 backers. Now, it stands like a crossroads in the intersection between TV and film, showing that what may work in TV doesn’t necessarily make for a great film.

CHICAGO – “Halloween” is no mere horror movie. It is arguably the best of its genre, a film that continues to influence the form 35 years after its release. The excellent new transfer of the film on the latest Anchor Bay HD iteration is reason alone to pick it up, and the new active participation in the release on behalf of Jamie Lee Curtis, a star often silent regarding the films that made her a star, is just an amazing bonus.

CHICAGO – Scream Factory, the horror branch of the great Shout Factory, continues to impress with an ambitious slate of catalog films making their HD debut in the coming months, many of which were announced at Comic-Con last month (“Nightbreed”!). They also seem to be upping their release rate, unleashing two horror flicks last week, John Carpenter’s beloved “The Fog” and the truly horrendous “The Incredible Melting Man,” a cultural curiosity but a crap film.

CHICAGO – The torch is being passed at Studio Ghibli from the great Hayao Miyazaki (“Princess Mononoke,” “Spirited Away”) to his son Goro, who directs this week’s tender “From Up on Poppy Hill,” certainly not one of the best in the Ghibli canon but a well-made, enjoyable melodrama nonetheless. A full awareness that it’s kind of a cheap melodrama (one of the characters even says so) doesn’t change the fact that it is but the young Miyazaki’s visual palette is notably beautiful and the voice work is strong throughout.