Mad Men

Remember Larry Tate, Darren's boss in the 1960s TV-series Bewitched? Darren was a smoking, drinking, 1960s advertising man working for the ad firm of McMahan & Tate. They would come up with sometimes hilarious ad campaigns for various clients so people would buy their stuff. Tate would do or say anything to keep the client happy. Now imagine a TV-series set entirely at the 1960s ad firm, about the various wacky ad men and you have "Mad Men," a current AMC series. And a cable channel TV-series made for AMC doesn't have to follow FCC rules, so you may detect some words now and then they couldn't say on Bewitched in the 1960s. So if you hear any words in "Mad Men" you don't like, you better put the kids to bed before you watch "Breaking Bad." Mad Men & "Breaking Bad" both got Emmy nominations in 2009, including Aaron Paul, Elisabeth Moss and Jon Hamm.

Breaking Bad
Stephen King on why AMC's strange, violent crystal-meth drama is the best scripted show on TV

"This modest basic-cable network is now broadcasting the best scripted show on TV. Your Uncle Stevie may not care much for "Mad Men," but he has never seen anything like BB on the tube. The only thing that comes close is Twin Peaks, also by "Blue Velvet" auteur David Lynch
Whatever reasons AMC had for greenlighting BB, the payoff for viewers who like their suspense cocktails a little stronger than the usual "Law & Order" mojito is a big one... It's like watching "No Country For Old Men" crossbred with the malevolent spirit of the original Texas Chainsaw Massacre. Breaking Bad invites us into another world, just as "The Shield" and "The Sopranos" did, but Walt White (Bryan Cranston) could be a guy just down the block, the one who tried to teach the periodic table to your kids before he got sick... That's exactly what makes it all so funny, so frightening, and so compelling. This is rich stuff.
Entertainment Weekly, 3.13.09

American Movie Classics was launched 10/1/84 featuring lesser-known movies of Turhan Bey, Randolph Scott, Piper Laurie, John Wayne and hosts of other stars whose films were not quite big enough to all be featured on broadcast networks or most other cable networks. Originally shown without commercial interruption, some commercial breaks have been added in recent years to keep AMC a free service to viewers (unlike Showtime, HBO and Starz which charge a monthly fee). There are original documentaries, and even new TV-series seen exclusively on AMC, though one late-night host called it the Ancient Movie Channel at the time. The movies were originally hosted by Bob Dorian and Nick Clooney. Its first original series was Remember WENN (1996)

Clint Eastwood movies showing on other channels this month. The letters in Clint Eastwood's name can be rearranged to spell "Old West Action" according to Ripley's Believe It Or Not

Solaris and Ed Wood (with Martin Landau as Bela Lugosi as he was filming Plan 9 from Outer Space) are showing on AMC's sister station, Independent Film Channel
Glory
(click to play movie trailer)

Lake Placid shows up from time to time. The official "Lake Placid" movie website at Fox.com features an animated picture of a giant mutant crocodile chasing a helicopter and chomping a scuba diver in half, which may be too intense for some wimpy internet viewers. Just think of it as another Alligator

Sorry, no Tales From The Crypt scheduled this year. For Crypt movie/TV-series description, see Tales from the Crypt page, or episode descriptions

Doc Hudson is the Hudson Hornet

If anyone asks, I was smashin' mailboxes with Lightning McQueen

The story of "It's A Wonderful Life" told in 30 seconds by cartoon bunnies...unless you prefer The Exorcist Bunny

AMC no longer has entire month schedules
Previous movie titles on AMC (American Movie Classics)
February 2014

You may also want to check out Turner Classic Movies for this month

Return to Monstervision.org or Sci-Fans

Fun fact: in the movie Men In Black, agent K steps on a packet of mustard, not an actual cockroach because under Hollywood rules, no actual live creatures can be killed on camera, not even a bug.
Humphrey Bogart says he was sent on location to Palm Springs for his first Hollywood movie and it was 120° in the shade, "only there weren't no shade." You played it for her, you can play it for me. Play it, Sam

Think ya used enough dynamite there, Butch?

Last Chance

Today is

Nobody's home right now except Smith & Wesson

The Birds are coming! It’s death by pecking, as birds of every species terrorize coastal California towns and complicate the budding courtship between Tippi Hedren and Rod Taylor. This film is another razor-sharp example of Hitchcock taking the everyday and mundane and making it terrible. Or when a knife is thrown into a UN official's back just as Cary Grant is talking to him. So Grant is framed and must spend the frantic movie trying to prove his innocence while on the run north by northwest from men in black who may or may not be on his side.