By Dave Montalbano

www.AdventuresofCinemaDave.com

Since Roots became a ratings-winner in the winter of 1977, miniseries dominated broadcast television until the assimilation of cable television.  Opening tomorrow in local theaters, Bride Flight has the feeling of the miniseries The Thorn Birds. This multilingual epic contains gorgeous cinematography featuring the New Zealand countryside.

The film opens with the death of Frank (Rutger Hauer), whose funeral is attended by three diverse women of Dutch heritage. Bride Flight flashes back to 1953 when these three World War II survivors take a flight that wins a transcontinental race from Europe to New Zealand.

The three women are a diverse bunch. Esther (Anna Drijver) is a Holocaust survivor who masks her Jewish ethnicity. Due to an inconvenient pregnancy, Esther gives her child to the happily married, but barren, Marjorie (Elise Schaap).  Marjorie and Esther’s stories intertwine in tragic and humorous ways. The third bride is Ada (Karina Smulders), a woman who develops a crush on young Frank (Waldemar Torenstra), who is establishing a new wine business.

Slow paced with a rambling, but interesting narrative flow, Bride Flight should appeal to the audience weary of Transformers, Cars and Pirates.  This film is like reading an engrossing book while sipping red wine under the sunset.

Reading, or the lack of reading, is the fundamental concern of the documentary, Page One: Inside the New York Times. With the rise of computer usage, the New York Times has become known as “the dinosaur media”. Having relied on bloated advertising revenue streams, the major daily newspapers lost sight of it’s circulation figures.

This film documents this monster medium as it steps into the future. It concludes on an optimistic note, but it feels false, as if this is a propaganda puff piece for this once-respected newspaper institution. To director Andrew Rossi and writer Kate Novak’s credit, they do not flinch showing the tearful layoffs of employees who were devoted to their jobs and showing two reporters who misrepresented the stories they were covering.

But while the film shows the feud with the Tribune organization, it ignores the criticism from The Drudge Report and Fox News. In the midst of this, the one journalistic hero to rise from this film is Times columnist David Carr, who. the story centers around.

By Dave Montalbano

The Bucks Class of ’81 has been reminded of another milestone with the release of Transformers: Dark of the Moon. X-Men: First Class featured the Cuban Missile crisis of Oct. ‘62, and now the third Transformers flick reveals the secret reason why President John F. Kennedy insisted that America land on the moon by the end of the decade.

Using planet Earth as the arena, the intergalactic feud between the good guys, Autobots, and the bad guys, Decepticons, continues. In the middle of this mess is Sam Witwicky (Shia LeBeof) and U.S. Army Lt. Colonel William Lennox (Josh Duhamel), two characters who save the world in the previous two Transformers movies.

Sam and William are aligned with Optimus Prime (voiced by Peter Cullen), who awaits the second coming of his mentor, Sentinel Prime (Leonard Nimoy). Feeling snubbed by this reunion, the menacing Megatron (Hugo Weaving) plots mass destruction, beginning in Chicago.

Heeding my criticism about attention deficit disorder editing, this new Transformers movie is easy on the eyes, making the action sequences the most thrilling of the three movies. The characters are less cartoony and there is a sense of danger in the science fiction violence. The humor is situational, with many in-jokes for science fiction aficionados. On a six-story IMAX screen, Transformers: Dark of the Moon is Saturday matinee popcorn-eating fun.

For those seeking similar entertainment minus the budget of a Spielberg production, Kurt Donath’s locally-made Lucky Streak and the Crime Fighters will be screened and discussed tomorrow at 5 p.m. and Sunday at 11:15 a.m. at the Florida Supercon (www.
floridasupercon.com). Lucky Streak (Darlene Dinges), teenage daughter of Amazing Grace (Rachel Galvin), joins crime fighters to foil Dr. Dragon’s plot for world domination. If one can get over theatrical acting, the dialog is quite funny. Anthony Espina’s musical score carries the film.

For those seeking to renew the roots of American culture, Boston’s on the Beach will present their 2nd Annual Red, White and Blues Festival on A1A off Atlantic Avenue, from July 1-4. Much like the late Don Cohen’s Riverwalk Blues Festival, Red, White and Blues will host a three-ring circus of musical performers, such as Joey Gilmore, Iko Iko and Matt “Guitar” Murphy.

Best known as Aretha Franklin’s henpecked husband from the two Blues Brothers movies, Murphy brings Blues authenticity to Delray Beach. Support this Blues legend this Saturday
at 4 p.m.