LGBT & Queer · Reviews · Uncategorized
Surprise – it could be a lot worse. In a February 2002 commentary for her syndicated column “Lesbian Notions,” Paula Martinac recalls her angst at browsing through her local lesbian[…]
There are drag queens and then there are drag princesses Why would an eight-year-old boy want to wear a dress? “Scotsmen wear dresses, they’re called kilts. King Tut wore a[…]
Hollywood shows some unsuspected radical tendencies – after eight years of Clintonian “liberalism” “Hollywood is at its best when it is relating to a progressive left political force that’s already[…]
Essays · Historical & Epic · Reviews
Parker’s “ode to bathroom humor” plumbs surprising depths Contemporary American comedy evades realistic treatment of social issues, opting instead for escape from these issues. That the bulk of racial representation[…]
“There she is, in all her beads and ribbons!” How Manhattan is Nothing Sacred? To be more Manhattan, it would have to be Manhattan. Because once more we’re on that[…]
In which Harryhausen’s most poignant monster mixes it up After pioneering French filmmaker Georges Mêlies, there are few special effects icons left to trip over on your way to current[…]
Documentaries · Noir · Reviews
In DVD land, the world’s your oyster – pearls included (sometimes) Cuban Story (Victor Pahlen, 1959) By the mid-1950s, Errol Flynn was enjoying the low high life of a bloated[…]
Actors & Personalities · Music & Musicals
Fred dies, Ginger cries The Story of Vernon and Irene Castle is the not very graceful swan song of the Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers musicals of the thirties.1 Carefree,[…]
Two of the most elusive auteurs tell all, or at least some. ROBERT BRESSON: WITHOUT A TRACE A documentary about Robert Bresson (1901?-1999), with the director cooperating – indeed, appearing[…]
Ida Lupino: Mother of Us All! “Any rocks up there to give you a problem, darlin’? Now, Walter baby, while we’re here we might as well take the posse through.[…]
Girlflesh ‘n boyflesh ‘n apocalypse [Warning: Spoilers!] It’s hard to keep your thinking cap on when you’re watching Teenage Caveman, directed by the notorious Larry Clark, the famed photographer/director whose[…]
Why Tobey Maguire has us by the testicles and why he isn’t going to let go Whence Spider-Man? Whence, indeed, and whither? It has come to pass in these United[…]
Of babynappings and bodily fluids, Coens and Kubricks In Raising Arizona (1987), a blatantly obscure graffiti can be seen in the lavatory wall behind escaped convicts, Hale and Evelle (John[…]
Experimental & Underground · LGBT & Queer · Reviews
Warhol’s timeless, trashy “girls” come a-callin’ More talked about than seen since its debut, The Chelsea Girls, Andy Warhol’s infamous double-projected dive into a demimonde he created, is getting a[…]
Dogme meets the Manchester music scene in this well-wrought biopic British cinema has moved on in the last decade – its heritage dramas now tend to have a modernistic twist,[…]
Documentaries · Experimental & Underground · LGBT & Queer · Reviews
The legendary campsters of the counterculture take a bow in this diverting documentary The Cockettes – fondly, if sometimes barely remembered as curios in the camp canon – are reborn[…]
Music & Musicals · TV & Streaming
There was a time, America, a time when public television consisted of more than Antiques Roadshow, women in pantsuits explaining how to feel good about yourself, and reruns of inane[…]
Actors & Personalities · Directors · Silents
“Why are they all ugly little men?” asked Cindy, after I’d dragged her to three solid weeks of Charlie Chaplin, Buster Keaton, Harry Langdon, and Harold Lloyd at a silent[…]
“While the first Superman film, directed by Richard Donner (on which Lester served as an uncredited producer), is essentially reverential and respectful towards the subject, Lester’s attitude in his second[…]
African American · Music & Musicals · Reviews
It’s the culture, stupid. One of the best sequences found in Theodore Bafaloukos’ meditation on Rastafarian culture known as Rockers comes when the motley crew of world-class musicians that litter[…]
