... FOR "CINEMA STAPLES AND THE MYSTERY OF THE RECYCLED CAMERA SHOT"

Making movies is hard. In fact, with so many factors at play - script, acting, editing, costume and set design, cinematography, not to mention escalating budgets and ever-tightening production schedules - it's a wonder studios manage to churn out coherent films at all. It takes an enormous amount of talent and patience and all-around singularity of vision to pull off what most directors do; that much is to be admired. Like the rest of us, though - those burdened by countless responsibilities throughout the course of our days - they are only human, and prone to make mistakes. Continuity errors, say - the placement of objects or actors mismatched from one camera shot to the next. Or repeated auditory motifs, which not only hearken back to Hollywood's long and illustrious past but also take us out of the movie itself - so that, when we hear them, we are self-consciously aware that what is unfolding before us is, in fact, only a movie.

The process of editing a film might also pinpoint mistakes not evident during actual production. A missing close-up or establishing shot, for instance, which would otherwise clarify narrative action. A director is then faced with a number of choices: one, he can rustle up the necessary approvals and crew to travel back and get that shot; two, he can skip the shot entirely, and risk confusing his audience; or three, he can find a suitable replacement shot, preferably of something already filmed. Most directors, because of time and money constraints, will often re-use or alter specific shots to suit their particular needs. Let's call this the mystery of the recycled camera angle - a repeated shot, used twice within the same film, to cover up a piece of missing footage.

... FOR "WALT DISNEY'S ANIMATED FIFTY (PART 45 - 'HOME ON THE RANGE' EDITION)"

Our continuing foray into Disney's fifty official Animated Classics. As always, don't hesitate to share your thoughts/memories/complaints in the comments section below. Links to previous entries are also included below.

Title: Home On The Range (2004)

The Plot: Three dairy cows in the Old West set out to capture a notorious cattle rustler and use the reward money to buy back their farm.

The Songs: "(You Ain't) Home On The Range," "Little Patch Of Heaven," "Yodle-Adle-Eedle-Idle-Oo," "Will The Sun Ever Shine Again," "Wherever The Trail May Lead," "Anytime You Need A Friend"

... FOR "WALT DISNEY'S ANIMATED FIFTY (PART 44 - 'BROTHER BEAR' EDITION)"

Our continuing foray into Disney's fifty official Animated Classics. As always, don't hesitate to share your thoughts/memories/complaints in the comments section below. Links to previous entries are also included below.

Title: Brother Bear (2003)

The Plot: In post-ice age North America, an Inuit boy kills a bear as revenge for his brother's death and is transformed into a bear himself.

The Songs: "Great Spirits," "Transformation," "Welcome," "On My Way," "No Way Out (Theme from Brother Bear)," "Look Through My Eyes," "No Way Out (Phil Collins Version)"

... FOR "SUMMER OF THE UNOFFICIAL REMAKE, 2013"

If our current summer movie season had a theme - I know, I know, it's only been a couple of months, yet already one has started to shake itself out - it might be The Summer Of The Unofficial Remake, Whether Its Makers Care To Admit To It Or Not. Of the season's biggest studio releases, at least a dozen of them - Iron Man 3, Star Trek Into Darkness, Fast And Furious 6, Man Of Steel, Monsters University, World War Z, White House Down, Despicable Me 2, The Lone Ranger, R.I.P.D., RED 2 and The Wolverine - seem cobbled together from the spare parts of previous films. Most, obviously, just happen to be sequels and/or prequels to popular franchises (or, in Star Trek's case, a sequel to the reboot prequel). But that's no excuse for the amount of literal scene-stealing going on now at your local multiplex.

The saying goes, of course, that there's nothing new under the sun. And this is true, to a point (as David Bordwell astutely says here, even box office behemoths like The Godfather, Star Wars and Raiders Of The Lost Ark took previously-established Hollywood genres and made them bigger and better). I've even written about films that take entire plots from other films and try to pass them off as their own - a dispiriting trend in Hollywood, and one that seems to be growing more common by the minute.