(“New To Me” is a column wherein your intrepid reviewer watches the classics — both mainstream and cult — in an effort to fill in the holes in his pop culture literacy and avoid the garbage that generally defines modern cinema. Related thoughts below. See other entries here.) Movies like this make it hard to be a […]
Some films are muddy. They give us good guys who are kinda bad or bad guys who are kinda good. They obscure the conflict. They make us guess. They confuse us. They dare us to unravel them. The Stoning of Soraya M. is not one of those films. Yet, it delivers us a stunning lesson on the slippery […]
The opening scene gives us Paul Aufiero (Patton Oswalt), a parking lot attendant ticket taker, confined to his cage, meticulously scribbling something while reading, “I can’t tell you how sick I am.” From this point on, the audience wonders whether Paul is all there, or if he is so socially awkward that his only way to communicate […]
As most pre-pubescent adolescents do, I wanted to be a super hero. My attire was a black cloak – an old Halloween costume from an early obsession with the Grim Reaper; its hood was large enough to cast a shadow over my face, but allowed enough horizontal space so that I could see clearly without an impeded […]
Mar25
New to Me: Oldboy
(“New To Me” is a column wherein your intrepid reviewer watches the classics — both mainstream and cult — in an effort to fill in the holes in his pop culture literacy and avoid the garbage that generally defines modern cinema. Related thoughts below. See other entries here.) For the uninitiated, Oldboy is a Korean film with a […]
(“Chew on This” is Bill Coffin’s column on horror cinema, analyzing the some of best movies the genre has to offer, new and old.) Here’s the thing: I love zombie movies. I always have. I always will. As far as horror movies go, this genre is my favorite because it mines a theme that I find deeply disturbing: […]
[Editor’s note: Michael Moore’s latest documentary, Capitalism: A Love Story, comes out on DVD today. Tim Adkins wrote a great essay/review about it a while back and we figured today was a good time to revisit it here.] The Revolution, according to Michael Moore, has come. It may not be time to pick up the gun. But […]
In Brooklyn’s Finest, Anthony Fuqua applies his wonky, gritty vision of police-realism to a triumvirate of NYPD officers whose fates will eventually intermingle prior to the unnecessarily frozen and symbolism-riddled final frame that captures Eddie’s eyes, filled with pent-up rage that is snuffed by twenty two years of learned indifference and futility sullenly staring at the audience. Translation: […]
(“New To Me” is a column wherein your intrepid reviewer watches the classics — both mainstream and cult — in an effort to fill in the holes in his pop culture literacy and avoid the garbage that generally defines modern cinema. Related thoughts below. See other entries here.) Obviously, Gone with the Wind is a Big Fucking Deal. […]
The power of disasters and the potential of an apocalypse fascinate movie goers, usually during times of strife or near the end of a decade. In the eighties, forty-six movies were released that focused on the dissolution of society as we know it, and most dealt with the threat or the consequence of nuclear war – alluding […]