Michael Moorcock is by far one of my favorite authors. His Eternal Champion series is, in my opionion, one of the best fantasy series available and while I enjoy reading Tolkien, C.S. Lewis and Zelazny, I admit Michael's stories have an edge to...
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Michael Moorcock is by far one of my favorite authors. His Eternal Champion series is, in my opionion, one of the best fantasy series available and while I enjoy reading Tolkien, C.S. Lewis and Zelazny, I admit Michael's stories have an edge to them that I find lacking in the others and which puts his stories in a league of their own. While my favorite Eternal Champion has always been Erekose, though he has fewer stories written about him in comparison to the other heroes such as Elric, Corum and Hawkmoon, I found that each one of Michael's Eternal Champions is intriguing and special in his own way and combined together, make the Eternal Champion series one of the best.

In addition to that I've had the pleasure of corresponding with Michael Moorcock a few years ago and must admit that he is one of the most interesting, intellectual and fascinating people I have ever had the pleasure to correspond with. In addition to being an amazing author who, unlike most authors, is almost always available to his fans through his website, he's a very worldly person who is involved and interested in many different activities taking place around the world, whether it be related to politics, civil rights of minorities or animal related issues, Michael is involved, interested and voices his opinion. Michael, in his own way is like all his Eternal Champions combined together. A voice in the dark against all chaos. Absolutely the best!

Jeff Fahey, at the age of 56, with his beard and untidy grayish hair still has the same alluring presence he had on screen twenty years ago. With his haunting blue eyes and handsome roguish look, he has, in his appearance in Lost developed a cult...
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Jeff Fahey, at the age of 56, with his beard and untidy grayish hair still has the same alluring presence he had on screen twenty years ago. With his haunting blue eyes and handsome roguish look, he has, in his appearance in Lost developed a cult of Lost followers who treasure him as one of the finest additions to the Lost series and hope to see more of him over the upcoming seasons.

Part of Jeff's charm is his mysterious mannerism. Not much is known about Jeff except for his extensive biography detailing mostly his travel abroad in his youth. I have found that the same biography circulates on almost every website that holds Jeff's biography with no additional information available. As the editor of his page on www.tv.com I read and re-read the few interviews I found on the web in order to collect tiny tidbits about the man, then I went into all the chats, message boards, websites etc. related to him and collected whatever I could find that seemed interesting. Though there's hardly any information about him, it's been fascinating and captivating. I love a good mystery and Jeff is a great one. Not to mention that his extensive travel to Afghanistan to build and support an orphanage and to promote women's rights just adds to the man charm.

The only fault I can find with him is his choice of movies. He is, no doubt, a very talented actor, as can be seen in the 1990 movie White Hunter, Black Heart (which is my personal favorite Jeff Fahey movie), The Lawnmower Man (1992), The Marshal (1995), Planet Terror (2007) and of course Lost (the 4th season) which makes it all the harder to understand why, he would choose to participate in movies such as Scorpius Gigantus (2006) or Absolute Zero (2005) which I recently watched. The plot of Absolute Zero's story, though scientifically entirely incorrect was interesting enough, but the acting was just awful. I think other than Jeff's character, all the other characters were extremely shallow, the cast was poorly chosen and some of the actors/actresses should never have been allowed to participate in any movie. There are a few other examples of poorly chosen movies but it doesn't really matter, because on a scale from 1 to 10, I'll still give Jeff a full 10 because there's just something about him. It's uncanny, but I'll admit it, there's something about his presence that will make me sit through his movies, even be it a low budget B movie, with a cast that does not know how to act. And you know what, I'm sure there are many others that feel the same way as me, and that is perhaps why he can afford to get away with B-movies.

Gary Oldman, The Chameleon, The man with a thousand faces, is one of my all time favorite actors. Gary has a unique talent which enables him to become absorbed into each and every character that he plays and in that making each of his characters...
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Gary Oldman, The Chameleon, The man with a thousand faces, is one of my all time favorite actors. Gary has a unique talent which enables him to become absorbed into each and every character that he plays and in that making each of his characters come to life in their own right. Gary's talent enables him, without the aid of many props, to change his appearances significantly from role to role. My favorite all time Gary Oldman movie is actually not one of the movies where he plays a twisted character but rather a nice simple person, Rosencrantz, in Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead (1990) along side his friend, Tim Roth. I think Rosencrantz and Guildenstern was an excellent movie under-rated by critics and the audience. My second favorite Gary Oldman movie is State of Grace (1990), in which he plays Jackie Flannery, the brother of an Irish American mobster, played by Ed Harris. My third favorite film, is Dead Fish, where he actually does play a twisted, yet very entertaining character, Lynch. And of course, I think he's grand as Sirius Black in the Harry Potter movies, actually can't think of anyone else more suited for the role. Brilliant actor. It's a shame we don't get to see more of him in movies these days.

When I was ten years old, I attended a costume party which opened with the screening of a movie. The Crimson Pirate. That was the first movie I had ever seen with Burt Lancaster. Burt Lancaster played the part of the swashbuckling Captain Vallo...
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When I was ten years old, I attended a costume party which opened with the screening of a movie. The Crimson Pirate. That was the first movie I had ever seen with Burt Lancaster. Burt Lancaster played the part of the swashbuckling Captain Vallo and I was fascinated, by his comic performance, his acrobats and the plot. I went home after the party and told my Grandmother that the best part of the costume party was the screening of the Crimson Pirate which I thoroughly enjoyed. My Grandmother, who was in her youth a humanitarian activist, much like Burt Lancaster, was extremely pleased that I enjoyed such an old movie and told me all about Burt's humanitarian activities which were just as important to him as acting, if not more. From then on, I kept a lookout for his name in the TV Guide and made a point of taping and watching anything that he appeared in. Over the next couple of years, I think I saw close to twenty five Burt Lancaster films and as an adult I think I've actually managed to watch almost all of them. Throughout the years my opinion of Burt Lancaster has never changed. He's a great actor, granted in some films his acting is not as brilliant as his acting is in other films, for example as an adult, I actually did not find The Crimson Pirate to be quite as entertaining as I found it to be when I was ten years old, but I did and still do, enjoy his more mature films, such as From Here to Eternity and the Birdman of Alcatraz. What can I say, he will always remain one of my favorite actors.