Q-90.1's Movie House

For his final Movie House, Mark reviews 2024's Mother's Instinct, starring Jessica Chastain and Anne Hathaway.

Tired of being bombarded with the same three movies every holiday season, I decided each December to highlight an alternative Christmas movie.

A regular feature of the show was A Movie You Might Have Missed, where I highlighted a movie that flew under most people's radars.

Annual holiday shows became a fun tradition on Movie House.

Generally, I try to be positive and find value and worth in the movies that I see. But I'm not going to lie. Writing a bad review is pretty fun.

One of my favorite episodes of Movie House wasn't about any particular movie, but about the act of going to the movies.

My goal with my annual Halloween shows was to provide spooky alternatives for people who don't like gore.

Mark looks back on his time attending, and covering, the annual Hell's Half Mile Film and Music Festival in Bay City and the independent dramas, comedies, documentaries, and shorts he's seen there.

One of my favorite episodes I've done of Movie House is one that you'll likely never hear the full version of: a six-minute take on the documentary Life After Flash.

The sequel to Creature from the Black Lagoon, rushed out a mere 13 months after the original, borrows heavily from the second half of King Kong, sticks the Creature right in the middle of civilization.

When you have two stars with awards, box office draw, and talent to burn, what project do you make with them? In this case, they remade a German art film about an angel falling in love with a human.

Many of the Universal monster movies are worth revisiting and talking about and my favorite is the last original movie in their classic lineup, Creature from the Black Lagoon.

With Wings of Desire, German director Wim Wenders reflects on German identity, history, and iconography while examining the human condition in general.

Unless you're a movie person, you may never have heard of Roger Corman at all, but you've almost certainly seen his work or that of the people he's mentored.

As threatened, Zack Snyder returned with the sequel/second half of his sci-fi blast-o-rama epic, Rebel Moon.

I know I'm late to the party, but I can't not do a show about Celine Song's gorgeous, heartbreaking 2023 film, Past Lives.

An extended interview with Kelley Kent, executive director of the Friends of the Historic Masonic Temple in Bay City.

In his Oscar acceptance speech, screenwriter Cord Jefferson suggested Hollywood could make several lower-budget movies for the price of one action tentpole and the first movie that came to mind for me was 2023's Quiz Lady.

Using all the tools of filmmaking at his disposal, Denis Villeneuve transports viewers to whatever world he's built for a film and keeps them utterly convinced and compelled until the lights come up. And this is true of Dune: Part Two.

While more bitter than its clear precursor, Dead Poet's Society, Alexander Payne's The Holdovers has a softness and nostalgia that his previous school-based film, Election, does not.

Richard Linklater's animated Space Race coming of age story is wonderfully specific, idiosyncratic, and a pleasure to watch.

Kelly Reichardt's films are often challenging in some ways, but usually - ultimately - they are rewarding. But here it's not clear what it all really adds up to.

Director Bradley Cooper seems to have checked every box under the category of Shameless Oscar Bait for this Leonard Bernstein biopic.

At this point it's clear that director Zack Snyder has never had an original idea in his life... at least not a good one.

A general piece of writing advice for any medium is that specifics make the world go 'round. Does a lack of specificity explain the failure of three superhero movies from the past few years?

My annual tradition of recommending an alternative Christmas movie began as a reaction to seeing the same three movies in 24 hour marathons each year, but I'm starting to rethink that motivation.

Guest host Donny Winter takes a look at Godzilla Minus One to see what's made it so successful at the box office.

Is this prequel to the 2010s hit franchise necessary or is it just a shameless cash grab?

Martin Scorsese is one of America's greatest living filmmakers, but there is more to Killers of the Flower Moon than just its director's legacy.

I talk to film buff Scott Seeburger about his exhibition of movie posters at the Grace A. Dow Memorial Library in Midland.

Independence allows brilliance, but it can also allow terrible decisions, such as in Youtopia.

A good documentary instructs and edifies. I recently screened two opportunities to do just that: 2021's Objects and 2023's Join or Die.

Indie films can give us the grit, darkness, and experimentation usually missing from the mainstream, but I find it refreshing when one manages to be sweet, light, and funny.

Character and story take a backseat to stunt casting and nostalgia in a new low point for comic book movies.

My true favorite thing about fall in this area is the Hell's Half Mile Film and Music Festival, being Sept. 21-26 this year at various venues around Bay City.

We wrap up the summer by taking a look at box office winners and losers, the ongoing writers' and actors' strike, and those we lost this summer.

Chances are, in the years to come, Christopher Nolan's Oppenheimer will be seen as one of the director's greatest films.

The "Barbenheimer" phenomenon is fantastic news for fans of standalone movies that don't involve superheroes or extended cinematic universes, Barbie has become a fascinating cultural lightning rod (we'll get to Oppenheimer next week).

Harrison Ford returns as the whip-wielding adventurer/archaeologist for one final installment.

Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse captured the beauty, pathos, wonder, pacing, and structure of a comic book in ways that I hadn't even seen before on film and the sequel is as strong as the first and, in some ways, even more impressive.

I've joked for years about wanting to see a sci fi movie from Wes Anderson. With the arrival of Asteroid City, I've finally got my wish... or have I?

1984's Blood Simple is surprisingly accomplished for a first movie and absolutely has all the hallmarks of later Cohen Brothers films.