I've made no bones about my admiration for author Richard Matheson, and further, his indelible (and often unappreciated) influence on popular culture over the last 50 years.I've also spoken of the wild crush I had in my youth for Lindsay Wagner. (For a detailed biography of her, please visit my Celebrity Profile page at Examiner.)How am I going to tie these two together? Easy. The 1979 TV movie, The Two Worlds of Jennie Logan, was a time-travel love story regarding a woman struggling to keep...
Read More

I've written at length about my admiration for author Richard Matheson and his immeasurable influence on so much of today's popular culture. I may have also mentioned that when I was 9-years-old he scared the crap out of me with a little movie called, Trilogy of Terror.Produced in 1975 for ABC-TV, the film was a pilot for a horror anthology series that -- despite critical acclaim -- was never picked up. It has gone on to achieve cult status. Each of the three tales is based on Richard Matheso...
Read More

In summer 2006, TNT produced a limited-run anthology series entitled, Nightmares & Dreamscapes: From the Stories of Stephen King. Despite the title, the 8-episode run featured adaptations from three different King short story collections, Nightmares & Dreamscapes, Everything's Eventual, and Night Shift.Ratings were not spectacular (it was summertime, what'd they expect?), but this show has found an audience on DVD.While the show was undeniably well produced, it was ultimately a mixed bag...
Read More

Elsewhere on this site, I have devoted many words to my admiration and respect for Steven Spielberg and Richard Matheson. I have also noted that the first television movie Spielberg directed was a brilliant adaptation of Matheson's short story, DUEL.The story doesn't get any more complicated than this: mysterious truck terrorizes man driving across desert. Dennis Weaver stars as David Mann, and does a remarkable job of emoting panic and paranoia with a taut-but-threadbare script (also by Mathes...
Read More

Francis Lawrence's film version of Richard Matheson's classic I Am Legend, was a smash hit ($255,000,000 domestic box office - I'd call that a home run). Since I reviewed this film when it came out theatrically, I'll not bother rehashing my opinion here.I will keep this review short, because ... I'm pissed.Having bought the 2-disc DVD (as I am wont to do for certain movies), I was extremely disappointed to learn that ALL of the bonus content was viewable only on a PC. As I am a Mac man, this u...
Read More

In 1999, after seeing M. Night Shyamalan's landmark, The Sixth Sense, the first words I spoke as credits rolled, were, “Instant classic.” The low budget thriller went on to be (at the time) the 10th highest grossing film ever. “A Little Movie That Could” if there ever was one.A month after its release, another spooky little film came out entitled, Stir of Echoes. Given the fact its story was quite similar to The Sixth Sense -- a little boy who sees dead people -- the mo...
Read More

Richard Matheson's seminal 1954 short novel I Am Legend has been inspiring storytellers for over half a century. Its tale of Earth's last human survivor fighting hordes of vampire/zombies has influenced everything from Night of the Living Dead to Cast Away to Stephen King's The Stand.Filmed twice before (1964's The Last Man on Earth starring Vincent Price, 1971's The Omega Man starring Charlton Heston), Hollywood has never gotten it completely right. (Although, I must say the opening scene of ...
Read More