Emily
Emily confirms that the influence of the Marvel Cinematic Universe also extends to biographical dramas. Written and directed by Frances O’Connor, perhaps best known as an actor in films such as...
View ArticleRevisit: In the Bedroom
Todd Field is a filmmaker fascinated by the ambiguities by which people live their lives and the hidden qualities bubbling beneath their surfaces. His willingness to forgo a defined plot structure in...
View ArticleA Radiant Girl
We do not receive any sort of indication of the time or place in which A Radiant Girl is set until a surprising (and double-digit) number of minutes into Sandrine Kiberlain’s directorial debut. For...
View ArticleThe Integrity of Joseph Chambers
The thing about integrity is that you can only verify it when it is tested. To go unchallenged, to not have any opportunity to know your worth, means no way of knowing whether you have character or...
View ArticleCriminally Underrated: A Guy Thing
Underrated is a relative term, and probably nobody, certainly not this writer, would argue that Chris Koch’s A Guy Thing isn’t a bit goofy and kind of lame in lots of little ways; but it has its own...
View ArticlePacifiction
Pacifiction is the kind of rare film whose thematic dialectic is conducted almost entirely on aesthetic grounds. While Albert Serra’s film plays out over a series of extended, studied dialogue scenes,...
View ArticleCocaine Bear
Wet Hot American Summer, the 2001 cult comedy co-starring Elizabeth Banks, opens with the song “Jane” by Jefferson Starship. You may recall that Banks played Lindsay, a horny camp counselor who makes...
View ArticleOeuvre: Scorsese: The Departed
The Departed is a Boston-based film about the Irish mob. The only two Scorsese-affiliated words in that sentence are “film” and “mob”; throughout its action-filled runtime, The Departed always feels...
View ArticleLinoleum
On a long enough timeline, critics develop a complicated relationship toward sincerity. They’ve seen it all, which means it takes a lot for them to have a genuine emotional response. This is why it is...
View ArticleReturn to Seoul
There’s a subtle but significant metaphor underpinning the events of Return to Seoul, an immersive and affecting fish-out-of-water drama written and directed by Davy Chou. While negotiating the...
View ArticleGod’s Time
Samuel L. Jackson as a spiritually reformed assassin in Pulp Fiction presented us with the idea that a professional killer could see the error of his ways after experiencing a religious awakening. But...
View ArticleRevisit: Gleaming the Cube
In skateboarding culture there’s always the possibility of gleaming the cube. The phrase, while slightly nonsensical, is a skater’s way of talking about pushing yourself to the brink. Obviously, this...
View ArticleJuniper
A straightforward study of two characters with a world of pain and regret between them, Juniper works almost entirely because of the two performances at its center – and two other strong performances...
View ArticleThe Year of the Dog
It’s hard to criticize a well-meaning labor of love like The Year of the Dog. Shot in rural Montana, the recovery drama is the brainchild of Rob Grabow, whose bio notes that he made a million dollars...
View ArticleHoly Hell! A Mighty Wind turns 20
One of the reasons the mockumentary work of Christopher Guest works as well as it does is because he’s so talented at knowing what kind of windows to peer through. From the dog show weirdos of Best in...
View ArticleOeuvre: Scorsese: Shine a Light
Filmed in 2006 and released in 2008, Shine a Light is the first concert film directed by Martin Scorsese since The Last Waltz. In some ways, it represents a return to his roots, since he edited the...
View ArticleCreed III
In a weird way, the Rocky and Creed films fulfill the same need as Star Wars. Although the latter has far more spinoffs, both franchises began around the same period and offer the same essential...
View ArticlePalm Trees and Power Lines
People often equate the experience of watching something where a disastrous conclusion seems inevitable to witnessing a car crash in slow motion. Much media hinges on this morbid relationship. The...
View ArticleChildren of the Corn
For as long as Children of the Corn has been a horror franchise, there has been a fundamental misunderstanding about its existence. Directors cannot fathom why the story is scary, and each subsequent...
View ArticleTransfusion
For the majority of moviegoers, the Sam Worthington seen most recently was augmented by blue VFX and a fighting Stephen Lang on a distant alien planet. But besides his Avatar commitment, the actor has...
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