Movie News & Gossip

As the 20-year anniversary of an unthinkable scene of carnage at New Mexico's Las Cruces Bowl approaches, the two Hispanic suspects thought to be responsible remain at large and unaccounted for. This despite the fact that three of the four victims gunned down during the February 10th, 1990 robbery were girls ages two, six and 13.

First-time filmmaker Charlie Minn is hoping to change all that with A NIGHTMARE IN LAS CRUCES, a 100-minute high-def video documentary shot last fall with the assistance of several New Mexico State University students. Set for a limited local engagement at the Cine 10 Theaters beginning Wednesday, February 10th, the movie features interviews with three surviving victims, case lead detective Mark Myers and a replay of the haunting 911 call by a distraught young Melissa Repass.

A California filmmaker has seemingly managed to solicit a piece of screenwriting feedback that will be hard to top in the coming year. All that's missing is the observation that her plotline tends in places to be a little helter skelter.

Via a belated Christmas card received January 7th from Corcoran State Prison, Melanie Scheller got a B+ from Charles Manson in response to a script she mailed into the infamous inmate, with special permission, some time ago. However, the note - signed by rumored intermediary Kenny Callihan - goes on to add that "a few things could have been deleted."

When actor Christian McKay took on the role of an elderly Orson Welles in ROSEBUD, a 2007 one-man New York show imported from the Edinburgh Fringe Festival, he received two highly unconventional votes of confidence beyond those of the gushing critics.

A former associate of the mercurial legend, apparently referencing an unsettled debt, accosted McKay outside the theater, shouting, 'You owe me $25,000!' On another occasion, a tearful 85-year-old woman whose affair with Welles ended when he left her for actress Dolores Del Rio told McKay that he had brought Welles back to life.

"Hello, my name is Richard Horgan and I'm an awardsaholic."

If there were such a thing as Academy Awards Anonymous (AAA) support groups, holding weekly L.A. chapter meetings and offering up sponsors like Leonard Maltin, then I would no doubt have to seriously consider joining the ranks. That's because until recently, I was one of those people who droned on professionally for months and months... and months about which pictures, actors, actresses, directors and screenwriters had the best shot at an Oscar and-or Golden Globe.

As a highly successful stage and screen actor, Alfred Molina is used to a posh, globetrotting lifestyle of top-notch restaurants, grand hotels, red carpets and limo rides, For example, when FilmStew caught up with the 56-year-old London native at Toronto's Signatures Restaurant, a fresh brewed cappuccino appeared before he had a chance to place an order.

Nevertheless, as someone who is only too aware of how seductive such a pampered life can be, Molina has developed a unique strategy for keeping himself grounded. When he is on the road, he hand washes his underclothes and socks. "I've got no problem with spending two hundred dollars for a bottle of wine, but I'm buggered if I'm going to spend three dollars and fifty cents just to get a pair of socks laundered. It's ridiculous," he laughs.