When you think of dinosaurs, you probably don’t think of something this big. In 2013 a shepherd in Argentina discovered a bone and called the authorities. When they explored this find, they discovered the bones of a rather large dinosaur. The excavation and study of this huge animal is the focus of the documentary Raising the Dinosaur Giant on PBS.

Sir David Attenborough narrates this amazing story. Attenborough, the brother of actor Richard Attenborough, is a lover of nature and history. Coincidentally, his brother starred in the film Jurassic Park, which was brought up at a press conference. “It’s just a coincidence that my brother should have taken the part of a paleontologist. He didn’t base it on me, but he based it on some of the paleontologists that I know,” explained Attenborough with a trace of whimsy.

This is a fascinating documentary for anyone interested in the history of this planet and dinosaurs in particular. The find in South America is the largest dinosaur ever discovered. It’s part of the plant-eating family known as “titanosaurs” and the excavation of this area where the first bone was discovered by chance yielded some incredible findings.

Dr. Diego Pol, Chief Paleontologist at MEF Museum in Patagonia, Argentina, explained, “These findings are very special because it is the first time we have a fairly complete skeleton of a giant dinosaur. So we have found over 200 bones of this animal. It’s a brand new species, and this represents about 70 percent of the skeleton, and that is pretty much what you need to really understand these animals as living organisms.”

What this film shows viewers is not only the excavation of the bones, but also how the dinosaur compares with animals living today. The thighbone is eight feet long. When they put the rest of the 70 percent of this animal together, they discovered the weight of the dinosaur was about 70 metric tons which is equal to 15 African elephants. This particular find produced the largest animal on the planet to date.

To put the skeleton together they used 3-D scanning to create replicas of the actual bones. That, along with CGI and animation, gives viewers a pretty good idea of this huge dinosaur that lived over a hundred million years ago. In fact, these particular bones were dated to 101.6 million years ago!

The excitement about this discovery is apparent with those involved in the excavation and this film. “The first time we went to the site when a rancher indicated to us that he had found some bones, we started to uncover a really, really large bone,” Dr. Pol told the media. “It was a femur, the thigh bone. So it was after three days working there we realized that this was probably the largest dinosaur bone ever found. That was a very special moment.” Attenborough was also excited about this discovery, which is evident in the film. He was enthusiastic as he told the media, “It is thrilling, and to be there when it’s being discovered is a great thrill… So I had a ball. I just enjoyed myself every second of it while I was there.”

As viewers see in this film, to understand how this dinosaur moved and lived is not simple. They studied how elephants today carry such large weight on their bodies. This is one of many interesting ways the scientists learned about the life and anatomy of this large titanosaur.

What is also amazing about this film is how complete the discovery was. They found a large area covered with dinosaur eggshells and even an egg with an embryo inside. That was able to tell the scientists what a titanosaur skin looked like which they used to create a complete and most accurate animation of the dinosaur.

“Dinosaurs lived in every continent and especially titanosaurs, the family to which the new species belongs, was in all continents, including Antarctica, so Africa, South America, North America, Asia. They were really conquering the entire planet for millions and millions of years,” explained Pol. The discovery off this new species is one more piece of the puzzle of the history of the planet.

This documentary provides the most accurate look at the life of the titanosaur on the planet 100 million years ago and how many of today’s animals mimic those huge dinosaurs. Raising the Dinosaur Giant premiers on PBS’ Nature February 17, 2016.

About the Author

Francine Brokaw has been covering all aspects of the entertainment industry for 20 years. She also writes about products and travel. She has been published in national and international newspapers and magazines as well as Internet websites. She has written her own book, Beyond the Red Carpet The World of Entertainment Journalists, from Sourced Media Books.

Follow her on Twitter

Worth the two decade wait, HBO’s new series Vinyl transports viewers back to 1973 New York City’s music scene starting this Sunday. Light years removed from today’s sanitized image, it was a time when the Big Apple was riddled with crime, the streets were grimy, and the birthing of punk, disco and hip hop threatened to destroy rock ‘n’ roll’s domination on the music charts.

The impetus for Vinyl can be traced back to 1996 when Rolling Stones’ frontman Mick Jagger pitched Academy Award winner director Martin Scorsese the idea of collaborating on a movie about the vintage music industry. It wasn’t a hard sell because music had always been an integral element in Scorsese’s films stretching back to Mean Streets. Five different scripts were written, revised and discarded. In 2007, Terence Winter, who was working with Scorsese as show runner for HBO’s Boardwalk Empire, climbed onboard.

Shortly afterwards, the economy collapsed and it became painfully clear that movie studios weren’t interested in making a three hour, 40 year-spanning epic period piece about the music business. No longer second best to feature films, television had by then attained a level of respectability and profitability. So shifting gears, Winter reinvented the story, and wrote the pilot for what would become the arc of Season One of Vinyl.

Sharing with a group of journalists, Winter, who wrote the screenplay for The Wolf of Wall Street, provided some insight on the series’ protagonist Richie Finestra’s mentality. “In terms of what’s on the page, we are starting with an extremely unreliable narrator who starts the piece off by telling you that this is his story clouded by lost brain cells, self aggrandizement and some b——t. So right out of the gate you know you are in the hands of somebody who might not be remembering things exactly as they happened. This gives us creative license going into the piece to push the bounds of reality.”

Heading the cast is handsome, charismatic Bobby Cannavale as record producer Finestra. Fans of Boardwalk Empire will remember his Emmy winning turn as the short fused mobster Gyp Roselli. The beleaguered music executive is desperately trying to sell his label, American Century Music, to the German media conglomerate Polygram. He aptly describes his occupation, “I’m in a business where professional interaction has a personal component.”

A compulsive liar by nature, he’s selfish, sexist, anti-Semitic, and has an unquenchable appetite for sex and drugs. And has little regard for human decency having already ruined the career of blues singer Lester Grimes (Ato Essandoh) without a pang of guilt. He’s even become an accessory to a murder that’s so gory that even a hardened homicide detective would flinch away in disgust.

As the series opens, Finestra is dialing the car phone of his green Mercedes to confess his role in the crime, but fate intervenes as some guy walks on his car while heading to yesteryear’s famed Mercer Arts Center. Rickie follows the guy into the venue and becomes instantly mesmerized by David Johannsen’s New York Dolls playing their classic “Personality Crisis.” It’s raw, pulsating and also hypnotic, judging from the response of the packed, gyrating crowd. In that split second, Finestra envisions both the future of his label and his own personal redemption.

Cannavale seems born to play this role, but a large measure of credit rightfully belongs to his fellow actors, who in many cases have virtually reinvented themselves. For starters, there’s Ray Romano as Zak Yankovich, Richie’s head of promotions, who with just a few fine strokes has totally demolished his Everyone Loves Raymond image. Hang in for Episode Seven if any trace of resistance exists.

There’s no denying that actress Olivia Wilde is beautiful, but too often in the past she’s been delegated to the role of eye candy. As Richie’s wife Devon, a former Andy Warhol Factory girl, Wilde is given a free reign and the prerequisite script to explore unchartered emotional territory. Minus the pompadour and leather jacket, Andrew Dice Clay checks in as Frank “Buck” Rogers, a disc jockey, played with signature bravado, while supplying some comic relief is Max Casella as Julia “Julie” Silver, the label’s head of A&R.

That sneering young rocker named Kip Stevens, the lead singer of Nasty Bits, might understandably look familiar. In real life, he’s Jagger’s son James. Determined to ride on the coat tails of Stevens’ emerging notoriety is Juno Temp as Jamie Vine, an A& R assistant, who still lives with her conservative aunt. Reinforcing the time period are cameos by celebrity look-alikes Zebedee Row as Robert Plant, Dustin Ingram as Alice Cooper, along with Matt Bogart as Robert Goulet.

Ironically, HBO doesn’t have a monopoly on the 1970’s. Netflix will be debuting The Get Down from creators Baz Luhrmann, while Showtime moves the action to Los Angeles’ comedy scene with I’m Dying Up Here. Vinyl premiers Sunday, February 14, 2016 on HBO with a season run of 10 episodes.

About the Author
Winnie Bonelli is a former entertainment editor for a daily metropolitan New York City area newspaper. She is passionate about movies and television and loves to take readers behind the scenes.

Hallmark Channel’s Countdown to Valentine’s Day caps off with a romantic original movie starring Erika Christensen and Paul Greene. Anything for Love is filled with emotions and fun and is a pleasing way to end the countdown. Valentine’s Day is a day to celebrate love and this movie does exactly that.

Katherine (Christensen) is a high-powered executive running a real estate development company. Her father who still has some part in it built the company, however Katherine is really at the helm. She has no time for men. Her life is her job, which she really enjoys. She loves the thrill of putting together deals and seeing them through.

Jack (Greene) is a male nurse who also enjoys his job even though some patients cringe at the fact he is a nurse. In today’s world it’s hard to imagine people with these outdated ideas, but hey, that’s the premise of the film.

Katherine never dates except the one man her father thinks would be a good match for her. The thing is, she doesn’t love him. And Jack discovers women are turned off by the fact he is a nurse and not a doctor. Katherine wants someone to love her who isn’t aware of her high financial standing and Jack wants someone to love him for himself and not the fact he has no desire to become a doctor.

Enter the Internet. Katherine’s executive assistant Debbie (Ali Liebert) puts together a profile for her boss on a dating website. Katherine doesn’t want anyone to find out who she is until she gets to know them, so they enter Debbie’s name and occupation. And Jack is putting in his own profile on the same website however his friend changes his occupation from nurse to doctor without Jack’s knowledge.

The two are instantly attracted to each other, but as they get better acquainted and begin to fall in love, they wrestle with their own consciences. When is the right time to tell the truth about who they are? They try to come clean several times, but it’s too difficult. The feelings they have for each other are strong and keep both of them from divulging their secrets.

As we all know, secrets have a way of coming out and when Katherine’s father ends up in the hospital where Jack works, well, you can guess what happens.

Okay, so the ending is predictable. But it’s Valentine’s Day and this is exactly the kind of movie we love from Hallmark Channel. It has fun, whimsy, characters we can empathize with, and yes, an adorable leading man.

Christensen is delightful as the executive juggling her job with her second life with Jack as her own executive assistant. And Greene is wonderful as the nurse who really likes taking care of his patients.

Anything for Love concludes the Valentine’s Day marathon on Hallmark Channel. Start your day with Appetite for Love, then stay tuned for Valentine Ever After, followed by All Things Valentine, then Dater’s Handbook. Finally enjoy the world premier of Anything for Love.

About the Author

Francine Brokaw has been covering all aspects of the entertainment industry for 20 years. She also writes about products and travel. She has been published in national and international newspapers and magazines as well as Internet websites. She has written her own book, Beyond the Red Carpet The World of Entertainment Journalists, from Sourced Media Books.

Follow her on Twitter