by Peter Ferguson Swarr 1. The Thin Red Line It’s been said that any war film inevitably ends up making warfare look exciting, but Terrence Malick’s poetic, elliptical examination of the Guadalcanal campaign makes it look more like a spiritual crisis than a thrill ride. Released the same year as ‘Saving Private Ryan,’ Malick’s Altman-esque […]

by Peter Ferguson Swarr Recently, HBO made millions of cash-strapped ‘Game of Thrones’ fans’ dreams come true and announced that, yes, next year you’ll finally be able to subscribe to its streaming service, HBO Go, without shelling out for a cable package that includes Outdoor Channel, IndiePlex and Showtime Extreme. Of course, many of those […]

by Derek Lau As hard to believe as it may be, there are plenty of video hosting sites out there besides YouTube. You may have heard of some, like Vimeo and Sprout, but assumed they were just YouTube clones with similar setups and mechanics. Well, the truth is that each video hosting site has unique […]

by Derek Lau Just as Autumn leaves turn the countryside from a single shade into a rich tapestry of hues, color correction can take an amateurish video and make it into an eye-catching work of professionalism. Once a luxury for major studios, color correction is now a standard procedure in the video industry, thanks to […]

by Peter Swarr It’s been nearly five years since James Cameron’s FX-opera ‘Avatar’ hit theaters, but expectations for the sequel (or rather ‘sequel trilogy,’ as Cameron confirmed that three sequels would be produced simultaneously last December) continue to run high both in the film industry and among the general public. While details remain scarce and […]

1. Remember the Titans Though it’s a bit more ‘story’ than ‘true,’ this tale of integration in a small town calls all the right plays when it comes to inspiring drama. While we’ve seen all of ‘Titans’ elements before (tough-love teacher whips teens into shape, a small town learns to let go of prejudice), Denzel […]

by Peter Ferguson Swarr It’s no big secret that streaming content has gained significant ground in recent years, especially within the coveted ‘young, single and cash-happy male’ demographic. But while Netflix, YouTube and Hulu get all of the media coverage, another platform with equally impressive numbers has taken root over the past decade and shows […]

by Derek Lau Are you sick of having to personally train every new employee at your business? Do you want to make sure that every employee receives the same level of training and prevent protocol problems down the road? Then consider investing in a training video for your business. Training videos are easy to produce, […]

1. Severus Snape in the ‘Harry Potter’ franchise Sure he’s sour and strict, but boosting students’ self-esteem only goes so far when the fate of the magical world hangs in the balance. Without Snape’s cunning and encyclopedic knowledge of all things dark and dangerous, the Boy Who Lived would have surely ended up as a […]

As the summer blockbuster season lumbers on towards Labor Day, something truly out-of-the-ordinary blipped to life on the cultural radar, defying all conventional wisdom and possibly even signaling a sea change in an industry grown fat on sequels, remakes and comic book franchises. ‘Snowpiercer,’ a science-fiction thriller starring ‘Captain America’ lead Chris Evans and directed […]