Michael Parsons
Father. Realtor®. Movie nut. After pestering my parents for their commentary on “Star Wars” when I was four years old, my mind went into a creative frenzy. I’d imagined something entirely different than the actual film, which I didn’t end up seeing until its 1979 re-release at the Uptown Theater in Washington, DC. This was my formal introduction to the cinema.
During that long wait, which felt like an eternity to a child, my mind was being molded by more corrosive stuff like “Trilogy of Terror” and “Rosemary’s Baby”, most of which I’d conned various babysitters into letting me watch on television ( I convinced one poor lady that “Jaws” was actually “Moby Dick”).
The folks were pretty strict in that regard, so the less appropriate it was for a kid to watch, the more I was fascinated by it. Horror staples like “Halloween” and “Friday the 13th”, as well as lesser-known low-budget fare like “Madman”, “Sleepaway Camp” and “Pieces” all ended up sneaking their way into the VHS on a regular basis.
Since then, I’ve developed an obsession with the entire film industry. Even though I watch and review a wide breadth of films these days, my appreciation for the campy, poorly lit micro-budgeters still lends itself to my evolving perspective on movies just as much as the summer blockbusters and Oscar contenders. As I recall my trips to the movie theater, I realize that this stuff is about much more than just a fleeting piece of entertainment.
A couple years ago, I was finally given the opportunity to lend my opinion on films to a publication, The Rogers Revue, with a subsequent run at Reel Film News. It's been both a privilege and a gateway to what we’re doing now. Most of my experience has come from interviewing independent filmmakers, who consistently promote innovation. The filmmaking process is grueling and relatively unforgiving.
Fellow film enthusiast Eddie Pasa and I have created DC Filmdom as a medium for film reviews, discussion, and (inevitably) some debate. And so, the creative frenzy continues.
(Michael is a member of the Washington, DC Area Film Critics Association).
Posts by Michael Parsons
(This review was originally published on November 5, 2011 at The Rogers Revue) It’s good to have Eddie Murphy back in the realm of comedy, and a relief to know that characters like Reggie Hammond and Billy Ray Valentine still have a place amongst the Norbits and Pluto Nashes that have weighed down his bag of […]
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(This review was originally published on November 5, 2011 at The Rogers Revue) In the midst of celebrating the blood and gore at this year’s Spooky Movie International Horror Film Festival in Washington, DC, two relatively introverted head scratchers emerged that ended up in my top picks, “Pig” and “Skew” (see also my reviews of “The Watermen”, “The Millennium […]
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(This review was originally published on October 31, 2011 at The Rogers Revue) A FOUR DAY INDULGENCE OF ZOMBIES, SLASHERS, PSYCHOTIC DEVIANTS (AND FEW THINGS I’M NOT SURE THEY HAVE A NAME FOR YET), THE FESTIVAL BOASTS AN ECLECTIC AND TWISTED SELECTION OF HORROR FROM A BEVY OF INDEPENDENT FILMMAKERS. AND JUST IN TIME FOR HALLOWEEN – […]
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(This review was originally published on October 28, 2011 at The Rogers Revue) “Martha Marcy May Marlene” begins as a quiet, unsettling psychological thriller that plants a seed of apprehension within its eerie first minutes and patiently grows into something considerably more terrifying. We see a young woman emerge from a cabin with a backpack, seemingly in […]
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(This review was originally published on October 21, 2011 at The Rogers Revue) Tim Chambers didn’t seem concerned about much other than preserving a piece of sports history when he wrote and directed “The Mighty Macs”, a film that endured four years of adversity, three of which involved seeking distribution after its completion. Along with co-producing […]
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(This interview was originally published on October 20, 2011 at The Rogers Revue) Cathy Rush became a basketball icon when she led Immaculata College, a small Catholic girls school near Philadelphia, to three back-to-back AIAW titles from 1972-1974, continuing to a total of six consecutive Final Four appearances by 1977. The Mighty Macs, as the […]
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(This interview was originally published on October 13, 2011 at The Rogers Revue. Photographs by Alissa Parsons) On Friday, October 7th, at Westminster Hall in Baltimore, a commemorative wreath laying ceremony took place at the grave site of Edgar Allan Poe, honoring the enigmatic author on the 162nd anniversary of his death. Participating in the […]
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(This review was originally published on October 7, 2011 at The Rogers Revue) Director Shawn Levy inaugurates the fall movie season with “Real Steel”, a frustrating effort that proves the rope-a-dope can be just as effective on a human audience as it is against a 2,000 lb. robot with nitrous-fueled jabs. Set in the year […]
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(This interview was originally published on September 26, 2011 at The Rogers Revue. Photographs by Michael Parsons) There has been much talk about the upcoming Lucasfilm production “Red Tails”, an adventure story based on the exploits of the Tuskegee Airmen in World War II. The airmen, made up of the 332nd Fighter Group and 477th […]
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“Red Tails” Interview: Cuba Gooding, Jr., Terrence Howard and Tuskegee Airmen (Part 2)
(Above from left to right: Terrence Howard and Cuba Gooding, Jr.; Tuskegee Airmen Roscoe Brown and Charles McGee – Photograph by Michael Parsons) (This interview was originally published on September 26, 2011 at The Rogers Revue) There is still so much that the average history-savvy American doesn’t know about the significance and impact of the Tuskegee […]
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