L'Uomo delle stelle (1995) (The Star Maker) is directed and co-authored by Giuseppe Tornatore, and is a companion piece to his acclaimed Cinema Paradiso. Both films are about movies, and take place in post WW II Sicily. In this film, Joe Morelli (Sergio Castellitto) is a con man who tours Sicily in a truck plastered with movie posters, and claims to be a talent scout for Universal Films, Rome. For a small processing fee, he shoots screen tests, which, he promises, will go to the studio. People are eager to buy into this dream. One mother even screws him to pay for her daughters screen test.

In another scene, he is hired to film the corpse of a Mafia Don, who never permitted photographs when he was alive. A young girl, raised by nuns, and probably the daughter of one of them, also wants to escape the small town to a movie career. Beata (Tiziana Lodato) earns the money for the screen test by stripping for a man whose house she cleans. When Morelli leaves town, she follows him. The two become intimate, and then he is arrested.

Lodato shows full frontal in the strip scene, breasts trying to talk Morelli into taking her with him, and breasts again losing her virginity to Morelli. IMDB readers have this at 6.9 of 10. Ebert awards three stars, and Berardinelli 3 1/2. Rotten Tomatoes has it 67% positive, with the same score from the top critics. It was nominated for Best Foreign Language Film Oscar, and won several Italian awards. The film was beautifully filmed, and the score by Ennio Morricone helped set the tone. I found it a little slow starting, but there are several aspects of the film that make it worth watching. First, of course, is the nudity. Performances by the two leads were top notch. The film is an interesting perspective on post WW II Italy, and especially Sicily, and many of the characters who pay for a screen test are fascinating. B-

Movies and TV:

Here is one more episode of Red Shoe Diaries new to DVD

• Kathrin Nicholson in "The Ex" (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9)

Updates:

• Honte's Swedish and International Celebrity site is updated

Other crap

• Courtney Love naked in public again
• Responding to pressure from the international community, the U.N. ordered enigmatic candy maker William "Willy" Wonka to submit to chocolate-factory inspections.
• Encyclopedia Britannica lists mankind's greatest inventions - including the Zamboni! It is surprisingly inaccurate for something coming from Britannica. For example, it lists American Thomas Edison as the inventor of the motion picture camera in 1891, ignoring the facts that (1) Edison had almost nothing to do with it - the entire core of the Edison corporation motion picture technology was purchased from other men - mostly Thomas Armat, who also sold Mr. Edison the right to claim the invention in marketing circulars (2) the first reported successful demonstration of motion picture projection was on May 4, 1880 - eleven years before the Edison "invention" - and it was a Brit who actually created the first projected motion pictures (a fact the Britannica might well be proud of). Noted loony Eadward Muybridge was the man, and he filmed thousands of scenes in the 1880s - including the first nudes before Tommy Boy got around to inventing the technology.
• Al Sharpton offers his rebuttal to the State of the Union address, to a wild, cheering audience. Maybe not. (I know it sounds boring. You have to see the picture, which is both funny and sad.)
• Supply limited! The country of Iraq currently for sale at e-bay.
• If you read this story to the end, you'll see that Pam Anderson may join the girls for the sequel to the Miller Lite catfight
• If your are going to be in Austin this weekend - my regular Blockbuster guy is in a movie premiere - DIG ...  Alamo Draft House, Sunday 3: 00 ($15 with free pizza) or  5:00 (five bucks, no pizza). Is it any good? Who knows? Who cares? How often do you get to a world premiere with free pizza?
• NEW Playboy editor James Kaminsky has booted corpulent cutie Carnie Wilson from the magazine because she's too tubby. Insiders say Wilson had been slated for a spread in Playboy's April issue. http://www.pagesix.com/pagesix/pagesix.htm (URL may change by the time you read it)
• According to Weekly World New, Brisbane, Australia's Griffith University offers a degree in stripping. "It's a powerful form of expression, just like art, music or writing. Colleges teach courses in all those other creative subjects, so I figured why not stripping." Successful students receive a B.S.A. Bachelor of Sexual Arts.
  • NOTE: Appears Bogus. I looked at the catalogue from Griffith University, typed in "sexual" in the search box, and got only one response - Graduate Certificate in Sexual Health Nursing. Here's the link, if you want to try.

Here are the latest movie reviews available at scoopy.com.

• The yellow asterisks indicate that I wrote the review, and am deluded into thinking it includes humor.
• If there is a white asterisk, it means that there isn't any significant humor, but I inexplicably determined there might be something else of interest.
• A blue asterisk indicates the review is written by Tuna (or Lawdog or Junior or C2000 or Realist or ICMS or Mick Locke, or somebody else besides me)
• If there is no asterisk, I wrote it, but am too ashamed to admit it.

Seven more babes from "The Mummy's Kiss".

Veteran B movie babe Regina Russell and crossover pornstar Diana Espen (aka April Flowers and April Summers) play coeds who like the professor almost as much as they like one another. Some topless teasing in the classroom is followed by some real friendly, full-frontal activities in the bedroom.

• Diana Espen
• Regina Russell
• Regina Russell and Diana Espen (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6)

Okay, then, we have Aysia Lee as the prof's teaching assistant, getting her topped ripped off in a catfight.

• Aysia Lee

Elina Madison, Rhoda Jordan and Rosalyn Macie as coeds who also try to get into the professor's pants by taking off their tops. These gals have done some work in Hollywood before. BTW, the coed teasing and a little smoochie-face is all the boy-girl action in this movie. That's kinda weird, I thought: 90 minutes of girls doing girls and none of the old girl-boy tango. Not that I'm complaining.

• Elina Madison
• Rhoda Jordan (1, 2)
• Rosalyn Macie (1, 2)

Well, growing tired of the modern day junk, we once again cranked up the time machine and returned to 1974 and a look at the women of a cult classic "Big Bad Mama". You just have to love a movie where everybody gets naked.

• First up is Robbie Lee with a boob flopping out of her blouse while looking out of a car window. (1, 2, 3)

• Next is veteran actress Sally Kirkland showing us boobs and bun. Sally made a career out of exposing her body for year to come. (1, 2, 3)

• Then it's Susan Sennett doing the bedroom scene with Tom Skerritt and showing boobs and bun. (1, 2, 3)

• We did several of Angie Dickinson's generous exposure on the 20th of this month, but here's another kind of dark scene of Angie doing the deed with Fun House hero...William Shatner. (1, 2)

There's one more to go of Joan Prather of "Eight is Enough" fame, but we will save that for next time (translated into I ran out of time), but it's a goody as she not only gets naked, but is a "Babe in Bondage".

THIEVES IGNORE CASH, STEAL LEGOS
Leggo My Lego! - Police in Offenbach, Germany, are looking for some thieves who broke into a child's nursery, ignored cash and computers, and stole all the Legos, even one piece that was propping up an alarm clock with a missing leg. A police spokesman said they don't know why the thieves took only Legos, "but it will help them pass the time of day in jail once we have caught them."

I'm not sure if your viewers are aware of this, but I stumbled across quite a find the other day. Fashon TV is a French station has a website that broadcasts it's show online. Every night for a half hour at midnight Paris time (5pm here in the midwest) the show is especially interesting. They show lingerie and other risque clothing on the runway. Nudity abounds! There's nothing wrong with half-dressed supermodels walking the runway.

The link is www.ftv.fr/FashionTV.htm. Hope you enjoy!

Uncle Gimpy