Cinema Junkie

Satisfy your celluloid addiction and mainline film 24/7 with Cinema Junkie’s Beth Accomando. So if you need a film fix, want to hear what filmmakers have to say about their work, feel like taking a deep dive into a genre, or just want to know what's worth seeing this weekend, then you've come to the right place. You can also find Beth's coverage of other arts and culture events here.
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SD Fringe adds SDSU filmmaker showcase

'Park Opera' redefines opera in Balboa Park

Unpacking the virtues of Ryan Coogler's 'Sinners'

La Jolla Playhouse serves up audacious theatre to WOW you
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Masked wrestlers, nunsploitation, monsters, and San Diego Latino Film Festival's Un Mundo Extraño — Cinema Junkie looks to extreme Latin cinema with Horrible Imaginings' Miguel Rodriguez.
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Turner Classic Movies launches its March spotlight program, Condemned, a look at more than four decades of censorship, the Catholic Legion of Decency, and the film industry.
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For almost two decades, starting in the late 1950s, you could count on Hammer Films for breathtakingly lurid Gothic horror tales that served up vampires, werewolves, monsters and luscious ladies. British author Antony Earnshaw talks about the studio and it legacy for the launch of a yearlong film series Get Hammered at the Digital Gym Cinema.
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Filmmaker Joshua Oppenheimer talks about making documentaries from a subjective point of view in "The Act of Killing" and "The Look of Silence," which is up for a Best Documentary Oscar this Sunday.
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This year is off to a good start with "Bone Tomahawk" and "The Witch" (now playing throughout San Diego) serving up well-crafted horror tales that challenge expectations about the genre.
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"Bone Tomahawk" gets a one-time screening in San Diego on Feb. 21 at the Digital Gym Cinema. Writer-director S. Craig Zahler talks about ramping up his slow-burn horror western.
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Film Struck is showcasing eight classics of Blaxploitation Cinema so it's time to revisit the Cinema Junkie Podcast featuring David Walker, writer of the "Shaft" comic books. Walker loves the Blaxploitation films of the 1970s and says we're due for Blaxploitation 2.0.
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With "Pride and Prejudice and Zombies" reanimating on screens this weekend, the time seems ripe to speak with Doctor of the Dead Arnold T. Blumberg about a recent strain of the undead — the self-aware zombie.
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Bryan Singer guided two "X-Men" films to worldwide grosses of $700 million. But the latest installment of the "X-Men" saga, "The Last Stand" (opening May 26 throughout San Diego) has a new director at the helm, Brett Ratner. Will fans stand with Singer or join up with the new leader, Ratner?
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Film actors Guy Pearce and Ray Winstone play men on opposite sides of the law in the new Australian western, "The Proposition" (opening May 19 at Landmark's Hillcrest Cinemas). But director, John Hillcoat, refuses to paint these characters in black and white. KPBS film critic Beth Accomando speaks with the filmmaker about making a western down under.
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After each new film he makes, Hayao Miyazaki says it will be his last. Thats because the 64-year-old filmmaker still draws some of his own animation and his vision has been getting progressively worse. So fans will be thrilled with the release of yet another Miyazaki anime, this one based on a childrens novel, Howls Moving Castle (opening June 10 at Landmark's Hillcrest Cinemas).
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South Korean cinema is hot, not only at home but also abroad. Korean films typically hold their own at the local box office with Hollywood fare, and internationally they are popular with film festivals. But as the Korean industry grows bigger, it poses challenges for filmmakers interested in more independent projects. Beth Accomando looks at a pair of South Korean films that attempt to push the boundaries of what's acceptable.
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The infamous Nessie meets the notorious German director Werner Herzog in a documentary about things that are not what they seem, Incident at Loch Ness (playing for one week only at Landmark's Ken Cinema beginning November 19).
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Beth Accomando is taking a short break from film reviews and arts coverage to create a six-part video podcast called Stripper Energy. Check it out!