Savant's new reviews today are

The "holiday" season is upon us, with all its attendant pressure. People in demanding jobs or concentrating on school finals don't even get to think about celebrating until a few days before Christmas, and for that deserve all the cheer they can get. Savant has been so caught up that he's had to skip most of the special screenings of new movies, although he's still planning to get out to see King Kong next Saturday. The web is fairly well split between people grumbling that it never should have been remade, and hecklers happy to hear rumors that the film "is in trouble." Savant has a Qué será será attitude about all that, having already lived through the shameful 1976 de Laurentiis Petrox-Kong fiasco. Whatever happens, I'm sure the new movie won't put me to sleep.

DVDTalk has been amazing this fall in terms of sourcing Savant with screeners for all the pricey special discs that came out. I have to admit that I barely keep up with new movies -- saw the new Pride and Prejudice a couple of nights ago and thought it was entertaining enough -- but am rabid about the old films. With 1800 reviews in the Savant database, the site is starting to become a good overall resource. I'll have to keep that in mind while compiling my 'Best of 2005' article due in on the 15th. Thanks for reading and don't sweat the holidays ... Glenn Erickson