Barb DiGiulio is off. Richard Crouse fills in on NewsTalk 1010’s The Nightside and talks to Luke Marklin, the CEO of Bellhops Movers who was so impressed with a new employees determination, he gave him a car.
Listen to the whole thing HERE!
Episode three of the new Pop Life CTV podcast is live! This week comedian Darcy Michael talks censorship and being true to himself and then, from the vault, Amy Schumer talks comedy!
Listen to the whole thing HERE!
Richard sits in on the number one morning television show “The Marilyn Denis Show” to discuss the big movies coming out in July and August. Find out which movie had 3000 setups, 13 helicopters, 6 pregnancies, 5 hiatuses and which stars a 70-foot shark!
Check out the Richard Crouse Show on NewsTalk 1010 for July 14, 2018! This week Richard welcomes the best selling author Linwood Barclay. We talk about his latest book, “A Noise Downstairs” and how he found his way from newspaper columnist to chart topping writer of thrillers. Listen to the whole thing HERE!
Some info on “A Noise Downstairs” from GoodReads: “The New York Times bestselling author of No Time for Goodbyereturns with a haunting psychological thriller that blends the twists and turns of Gillian Flynn with the driving suspense of Harlan Coben, in which a man is troubled by odd sounds for which there is no rational explanation.
“College professor Paul Davis is a normal guy with a normal life. Until, driving along a deserted road late one night, he surprises a murderer disposing of a couple of bodies. That’s when Paul’s “normal” existence is turned upside down. After nearly losing his own life in that encounter, he finds himself battling PTSD, depression, and severe problems at work. His wife, Charlotte, desperate to cheer him up, brings home a vintage typewriter—complete with ink ribbons and heavy round keys—to encourage him to get started on that novel he’s always intended to write.
“However, the typewriter itself is a problem. Paul swears it’s possessed and types by itself at night. But only Paul can hear the noise coming from downstairs; Charlotte doesn’t hear a thing. And she worries he’s going off the rails.
“Paul believes the typewriter is somehow connected to the murderer he discovered nearly a year ago. The killer had made his victims type apologies to him before ending their lives. Has another sick twist of fate entwined his life with the killer—could this be the same machine? Increasingly tormented but determined to discover the truth and confront his nightmare, Paul begins investigating the deaths himself.
“But that may not be the best thing to do. Maybe Paul should just take the typewriter back to where his wife found it. Maybe he should stop asking questions and simply walk away while he can. . . . ”
Here’s some info on The Richard Crouse Show!: Each week on The Richard Crouse Show, Canada’s most recognized movie critic brings together some of the most interesting and opinionated people from the movies, television and music to put a fresh spin on news from the world of lifestyle and pop-culture. Tune into this show to find out what’s going on behind the scenes of your favorite shows and movies and get a new take on current trends. Click HERE to catch up on shows you might have missed! Read Richard NewsTalk 1010 reviews HERE!
The show airs:
NewsTalk 1010 – airs in Toronto Saturday at 9 to 10 pm.
For Niagara, Newstalk 610 Radio – airs Saturdays at 6 to 7 pm
For Montreal, CJAD 800 – Saturdays at 6 to 7 pm
For Vancouver – CFAX 1070 – Saturdays 6 to 7 pm.
For London — Newstalk 1290 CJBK, Saturdays 10 to 11 pm
A weekly feature from from ctvnews.ca! The Crouse Review is a quick, hot take on the weekend’s biggest movies! This week Richard looks at “Skyscraper,” the animated Adam Sandler flick “Hotel Transylvania 3: Summer Vacation” and the documentary “Whitney.”
Watch the whole thing HERE!
Richard joins CP24 anchor Nick Dixon to have a look at the weekend’s new movies including “Skyscraper,” the animated Adam Sandler flick “Hotel Transylvania 3: Summer Vacation,” the documentary “Whitney,” the biopic “Mary Shelley,” “Sorry to Bother You” starring LaKeith Stanfield and the comedy “The Death (and Life) of Carl Naardlinger.”
Watch the whole thing HERE!
Dwayne Johnson has saved his family from an earthquake, fought a volcanic demon and prevented a wild, overgrown ape from destroying Chicago. If you gotta life-or-death problem, yo, he’ll solve it. His new film may be his fieriest yet. “Skyscraper” sees him hundreds of stories above the earth, trying to save his family from certain death. Let’s see him revolve that.
Johnson is former FBI Hostage Rescue Team leader and U.S. war veteran Will Ford. After an bomb blast left him with a prosthetic leg he went into business as a security expert for big companies. His latest gig takes him and family, including wife Sarah (Neve Campbell) and twins, to Hong Kong where he will assess the security concerns for a building nicknamed the Eighth Wonder of the World. At three times the height of the Empire State Building, The Pearl is one of the world’s greatest architectural achievements, but is it safe? That’s what billionaire owner Zhao Min Zhi (Chin Han) wants to know. It’s the tallest most advanced building in the world, it’s a vertical city, but, as Ford says, “you have brought with it every single safety and security challenge I can think of. Not only have you brought them all indoors but you have trapped them 240 floors in the air, No one really knows what would happen if things go wrong.”
Of course things go wrong—there’d be no movie otherwise—when some terrible people sabotage the building’s security systems, starting a blaze on the ninety-sixth floor. Ford’s family is trapped above the fire line so our one-legged hero must rescue them while fighting the bad guys and convincing the cops the fire wasn’t his fault.
“Skyscraper” is the kind of over-the-top action movie that used to star Arnold Schwarzenegger or Sylvester Stallone. It’s a manly man movie that values sweaty action over narrative logic, rockin’ schlock over the laws of physics.
It’s Johnson in full-on the video-game hero mode. Fun to watch but whatever high wire antics he gets up to ultimately the stakes aren’t very high. (SPOILER ALERT) The Rock is not going to plunge to his death, leaving his family to become lumps of coal in the world‘s biggest inferno. “Skyscraper” is all about the stunts, the adrenaline and even then they give away the film’s best deed of daring do on the poster and in the trailer.
Johnson is charismatic, has a way with a line but here he is reduced to his most obvious asset, his over developed body, capable of superhuman feats of endurance and skills. He is Hercules a slab of grade A muscle who can power his way out of any situation, most often with a roll of duct tape in tow. (Begging the question, how much did the makers of duct tape pay in product placement. Not since “The Red Green Show” has the sticky stuff been so essential to the plot.) As a man of action he’s second to known, as a character in a film, however, he not as muscular. There’s not much to Will Ford—or any character here—other than a look of grim determination and a flex arm. Even the bad guy, Kores Botha (Roland Møller), is just a Hans Gruber wannabe but without the evil charm or nasty one-liners.
“Skyscraper” is a loud, over-the-top flick. The action may entertain the eye but with no characters to care about all that’s left are plumes of smoke and fire.
The Invisible Man, Frankenstein, the Mummy and let’s not forget Dracula all make appearances in “Hotel Transylvania 3: Summer Vacation” but the new, animated Adam Sandler movie isn’t about the monsters, it’s about the importance of kindness and family.
At the beginning of the film Dracula (voice of Sandler) is feeling down, stressed out from the pressure of running his luxury hotel. On top of that, seems even the Prince of Darkness has trouble meeting women. He’s forlorn, hasn’t had a date in 100 years and his voice-activated dating app is no help. “I’m lonely,” he says. “You want bologna?” it replies.
Noticing her dad is depressed daughter Mavis (Selena Gomez) arranges for a special treat; some time away with family and friends. “I figured you need a vacation from running everyone else’s vacations,” she says. She books passage on the monster cruise of a lifetime, a journey into the heart of the Bermuda Triangle.
Once onboard Drac immediately falls for Captain Ericka (Kathryn Hahn). The heart knows what it wants, even if it is a cold, un-beating heart. They hit it off, but it turns out Ericka might have an ulterior motive for returning Drac’s advances.
“Hotel Transylvania 3: Summer Vacation” is filled with the easy sentimentality that mars Sandler’s live action films. Good messages about acceptance—“We’re here, we’re hairy and it’s our right to be scary!”—tradition and finding your own way in the world—“ You have to honour the past but we have to make our own future,” says Drac.—are hammered home like a stake through the heart.
Surrounding the family friendly clichés are an untraditional cast of cute monsters and that’s the movie’s strength. The fun of “Hotel Transylvania 3” is in the details not the story. The kid friendly creepy crawlies, deadpan fish cruise ship staff, Grandpa Dracula’s (Mel Brooks) skimpy withered green body and Captain Ericka’s underwater craft that looks like it just floated in from “Yellow Submarine” are all a hoot. Come for the creatures, stay for the silly fun.
“Hotel Transylvania 3: Summer Vacation” doesn’t add up to much story-wise—music and dance numbers, though inventively staged, pad out the running time to feature length—but the messages of tolerance and kindness are important themes in today’s increasingly serious world. “Gotta be great-a than the hatas,” says one monster. That’s advice you can take to the (blood) bank.
Like the recent Amy Winehouse documentary, which tells the story of a prodigiously talented woman lost in life to a lifestyle that she couldn’t or didn’t want to control, “Whitney” is a study of a very public downfall.
Director Kevin Macdonald is tasked with telling the all-too-common story of the rise-and-fall of an icon. The details will be familiar to anyone alive and reading the tabloids when Whitney Houston, the preeminent singer of her era, flamed out in spectacular fashion, dying at age 48 after years of well-documented erratic behaviour.
“Whitney” tells the story, from good to bad to worse, with a dose of empathy. From her youth, the daughter of musical legend Cissy Houston and a dodgy official in the Newark government, as a bullied girl with a beautiful voice to a superstar who became the only artist to have seven consecutive U.S. number one singles, Macdonald sets the stage with dozens of interviews with the singer’s family, friends and associates. He emphasizes the chasm between Houston’s public girl-next-door image with her considerably more wild private life.
Career highlights are showcased, including her stirring version of “The Star-Spangled Banner” at Super Bowl XXV in 1991 and her blockbuster version of Dolly Parton’s “I Will Always Love You” which remains the best-selling single by a female artist in music history, but it is the personal side that intrigues. Interviews reveal blockbuster allegations of sexual abuse at the hands of cousin Dee Dee Warwick, early drug use with brother Michael and half-brother Gary Garland and a troubled financial history with her father. It’s the kind of toxic stew that tabloid stories are made of but instead of exploiting Houston, Macdonald digs deep to tell the story, presenting both a biography and a cautionary tale of excess.
