Happy 81st Birthday To Michael Caine

As Biography.com notes, today is the birthday of one of my favorite actors, Michael Caine. He was born on March 14, 1933, in London, England.

Michael Caine went on to pursue a varied acting career. He starred as agent Harry Palmer in The Ipcress File before going on to be featured in projects like Alfie, The Italian Job, Sleuth, Dirty Rotten Scoundrels, Christopher Nolan’s Dark Knight series and many, many more. He’s won two Oscars, one for Hannah and Her Sisters and the other for The Cider House Rules.

You can read the rest of the piece via the below link:

http://www.biography.com/people/michael-caine-9234754

Note: Michael Caine was great in the films based on Len Deighton's spy thrillers. He was also great in John Houston's The Man Who Would Be King with Sean Connery. And he was outstanding in his supporting role in the Batman series of films.

I wrote about Michael Caine's performance as a hardcore criminal in Get Carter and as a crime writer in Pulp in my Crime Beat column on crime in the cinema. You can read the column via the below link:

http://www.pauldavisoncrime.com/2012/11/cinema-crime-wave.html

The Dark Knight Rises: Chris Nolan's Batman Trilogy Ends

Todd McCarthy at the Hollywood Reporter gives Chris Nolan's new Batman film a good review.

The real world threats of terrorism, political anarchy and economic instability make deep incursions into the cinematic comic book domain in The Dark Knight Rises. Big-time Hollywood filmmaking at its most massively accomplished, this last installment of Christopher Nolan's Batman trilogy makes everything in the rival Marvel universe look thoroughly silly and childish. Entirely enveloping and at times unnerving in a relevant way one would never have imagined, as a cohesive whole this ranks as the best of Nolan's trio, even if it lacks -- how could it not? -- an element as unique as Heath Ledger's immortal turn in The Dark Knight. It's a blockbuster by any standard.

You can read the rest of the review via the below link:

http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/review/dark-knight-rises-movie-review-batman-349354