Jonathan Poritsky

Graduation Cake Guy by CarbonNYC

This time of year, I get a hand­ful of e-mails from recent col­lege grad­u­ates ask­ing for jobs and advice about get­ting started in the film busi­ness. I always love respond­ing to all of them. As a blog­ger, obvi­ously I love it when peo­ple lis­ten to my opin­ions. Naturally, I tend to repeat myself a lot, so I started think­ing , why not just pile all of that advice into a sin­gle post that I can ref­er­ence when peo­ple have ques­tions. This advice isn’t lim­ited just to col­lege grads or even the younger set. If you’re in the mood for a career change there might be some tid­bits you can use in here. So clean out those ears and lis­ten up, here is the candler’s guide to start­ing out in the film indus­try. Continue read­ing at the can­dler blog…

So some joker cre­ated a hash­tag today that jumped to the top of twit­ter trends and caught my atten­tion: #film­food­eat­ing. The game seems to just be to incor­po­rate food into movie titles. Well, of course I latched on and haven’t let go. Here is a com­pendium of my con­tri­bu­tions. And please, do a search over at twit­ter to get in on the fun.

• @repressd Whoops! Good job! Too many to read, great minds think alike.. Chew on this: Bedtime for Garbonzo #film­food­eat­ing NOW I’M DONE!
• My final #film­food­eat­ing Spider-Flan, Grouperman, Cat on a Pot Pie Roof, Beauty and the Feast, Cracker, Gumbo, Free Chili, Meat Streets
• Oklahomefries! #film­food­eat­ing that one’s for you @deadcenter
• Canard Boiled #film­food­eat­ing adden­dum to John Woo Edition
• Lard Target, A Feta Tomorrow, Face Froth #film­food­eat­ing John Woo Edition
• Purple Chrain #film­food­eat­ing @kashrutnews @Jewishtweets I know you’ll get this.
• Spinal Frappe, Henry Portrait of a Cereal Killer, Boureka (baraka), Black Nar-tzimis, Gentlemen’s A-quiche-ment #filmfoodeating
• Passion of the Slice, Greatest Story Jello Mold #film­food­eat­ing Jesus Edition
• Fiddler on the Stew, The Cholent (the cho­sen), Lentil #film­food­eat­ing Jewish Edition
• Husbands and Chives, Shadows and Nog, Brine and Misdemeanors, Bananas #film­food­eat­ing Woody Allen Edition
• Wages of Pear, Á Bout de Soufflé, Elevator to the Shallots, The Seventh Veal #film­food­eat­ing @CRITERION Edition
• Last Bite at McCool’s, Lawrence of Arrabiata, Cakes on a Plane, The Graviator, Meringues of New York, I Am Ham #filmfoodeating
• While You Were Eating, Juarassic Tarte #film­food­eat­ing con­tributed by my twit­ter­less girlfriend
• Leaving Lox Vegas #film­food­eat­ing this one is sort of a repeat, but I couldn’t resist.
• Guacstoppers, Blue Chips , Leaving Manchego, Vicky Tortilla Barcelona #filmfoodeating
• You’ve Got Kale #filmfoodeating
• Detroit Guac City #film­food­eat­ing that ones for you @NachosNY
• Bakin’ 2: Electric Boogaloo #filmfoodeating
• Gourd of the Rings #filmfoodeating
• I don’t know why this is trend­ing, but I love it #film­food­eat­ing Schindler’s Grits

“Live long and pros­per” is the least that one could say about the Star Trek fran­chise. Over four decades have passed since the first incar­na­tion of Gene Roddenberry’s brain­child. The orig­i­nal series, known for it’s cheese and moral pomp, ran a mere three sea­sons, but nonethe­less inspired eleven movies, five tele­vi­sion series, count­less books, toys, videogames and, above all, gen­er­a­tions of space enthu­saists and geeks. Daunting, then, is the task of re-introducing the clas­sic char­ac­ters onto the big screen. Thankfully, direc­tor and tele­vi­sion impre­sario J.J. Abrams rises to the occa­sion to make Star Trek (it’s actu­ally the first film to bear that name alone) not only a wel­come addi­tion, but an inspired thrill-ride which really kicks sum­mer 2009 into gear.

Unlike some other 2009 block­buster, screen­writ­ers Roberto Orci and Alex Kurtzman have crafted a legit­i­mate ori­gin story for the fran­chise. The film opens with Captain Kirk and Mr. Spock as chil­dren on their respec­tive plan­ets show­ing a dis­tinct promise of great­ness. Over the years, the Star Trek galaxy has become so vast that the char­ac­ters within it seem to have shrunk in stature, con­sid­ered more to be model cit­i­zens of the Federation than any­thing more. By focus­ing on the early years of these two ship­mates, Mr. Abrams is empha­siz­ing that Kirk, Spock and their cohorts are not the norm; they are extra­or­di­nary; they are super­heroes. Continue read­ing at the can­dler blog.

The fol­low­ing short and sweet review comes from my account over at goodreads.com. If you’re a goodreads user, feel free to check in on my read­ing list and tell me what you think.

The Castle in the Forest: A Novel by Norman Mailer

rat­ing: 4 of 5 stars
This book it tough to swal­low as it human­izes one of the most vile peo­ple in his­tory, Adolf Hitler. However, once I allowed myself to get into the book, I saw the genius behind Mailer’s work. If we human­ize a man by see­ing him through the eyes of a devil, what does that say about us? Layers and ques­tions fill this book, mak­ing it more of a stim­u­lat­ing read than an infor­ma­tional one. Also, Mailer’s prose is incred­i­ble here. He is like a chameleon, enter­ing an older dialect for an older tale. I knew he was great, just didn’t real­ize he was so diverse. A mas­ter of let­ters! (excla­ma­tion points add to the book’s charm. check it out.

View all my reviews.

Drugs, guns, vul­gar­ity and rims are just the tip of the pigeon­holed ice­berg that is Benny Boom’s fea­ture debut, Next Day Air; but what this lit­tle caper has that so many other films of a sim­i­lar ilk lack is heart, and lots of it.

The improb­a­ble story fol­lows ten bricks of cocaine from a for­mi­da­ble drug dealer in Calexico, California to his dis­patcher in Philadelphia by way of an overnight deliv­ery ser­vice, Next Day Air. Donald Faison, of Scrubs fame, plays Leo Jackson, a chron­i­cally stoned deliv­ery man for the fic­ti­tious com­pany, whose mind is so clouded on the job that he deliv­ers the coke to apart­ment 302 instead of 303, set­ting events in motion. The drugs end up in the hands of fledg­ling crim­i­nals Guch, Brody and Hassie instead of the diminu­tive yet feisty Jesus, who prefers to be called “Gee-sus” rather than “Hay-zoos”. While Hassie is sleep­ing on the couch, as he is for the most of the film, Guch and Brody, played with an incred­i­ble bal­ance of humor and charisma by Wood Harris and Mike Epps, respec­tively, hatch a plan to sell the dope to Brody’s cousin, Shavoo, before the right­ful own­ers get wise to the mis­take. Think of it like True Romance but with­out white peo­ple and set in Philly. Continue read­ing at the can­dler blog.