Sam Raimi’s Spider-Man (2002): There’s No “There” There
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[…]
Category: Genres
Recalling the Dream of Parenthood in Raising Arizona
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
Diamonds in the Toilet: Andy Warhol’s The Chelsea Girls
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[…]
At last, a Cool British Film: 24 Hour Party People
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 Revolution Starts with Glitter! David Weissman and Bill Weber’s Documentary The Cockettes
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
Looking Back at the Fabulous Invalid: TV Broadcasts of June Moon, Awake and Sing!, The Human Voice, and The Journey of the Fifth Horse, now on DVD
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?” Chaplin, Keaton, Lloyd, and Langdon: The Great Silent Clowns Reformatted
“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[…]
Anti-Heroics: The Superman Films of Richard Lester
“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
Reggae Heaven: Rockers (1978) on DVD
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[…]
Why Won’t You Love Me? Richard Glatzer’s The Fluffer
Sean, meet Johnny Rebel’s cock. Johnny Rebel’s cock, meet Sean. Fluffing, like that other impolite f-word felching, was once an obscure term, the exclusive province of pornhounds and industry insiders.[…]
Experimental & Underground · Reviews · SF & Fantasy
It’s Alive! Jan Svankmajer’s Little Otik (Otesánek)
If only “little” Otik had stayed that way! Despite its tortured history, Eastern Europe, but particularly Czechoslovakia, has managed to produce an almost uninterrupted flow of the world’s great animation[…]
Fred and Ginger: Together Again, yet Not Quite Carefree
“Colorblind,” and maybe just a little bit tone-deaf Breaking up is hard to do. But getting back together, well, that’s even harder. After the semi-failure of Shall We Dance in[…]
Activist & Political · LGBT & Queer
All Is Fair in Love and War Videos: GLBT Men and Women in the Military
Don’t ask, don’t tell, but do watch “If they took all the gays and lesbians out of the military there wouldn’t be enough people left to defend Rhode Island!” —[…]
Asian · Essays · Exploitation & Erotica · Reviews
The Japanese Pink Film: Tandem, The Bedroom, and The Dream of Garuda on DVD
All jargon and no authenticity? Of the vast numbers of corporate-made genre films that flooded Japanin the 1970s, Donald Richie once remarked that the “West knows nothing of these pictures,[…]
Activist & Political · Reviews
The Clinton Syndrome, or the Survival Legacy: Wag the Dog
Revisiting the failure of Wag the Dog and other, more troubling failures “And the public, by and large, seems willing to live with the fact that the most powerful man in the[…]
African American · Directors · Producers & Studios
Independent Black Filmmakers Take on Hollywood: The Distribution of Black Films
For many black auteurs seeking distribution, working around the system has proven as rewarding – and necessary – as working within it Since the popularity and commercial success of films[…]
Luis Buñuel’s That Obscure Object of Desire on DVD
The longest episode of foreplay in cinema history? Pierre Louys’ novel The Woman and the Puppet, first published in 1898, has been a popular source for cinema, with at least[…]
Gregory La Cava’s My Man Godfrey on DVD
The Criterion Collection offers another scrumptious golden-era DVD Criterion has spruced up the peerless 1936 Universal comedy My Man Godfrey and given it a bright new sheen. The digital transfer[…]
LGBT & Queer · Reviews · SF & Fantasy
Queer for the Rings: Frodo and Sam Find Fellowship
Pretty boys in danger: How yummy! Poor Frodo Baggins! He spends almost all his time in The Fellowship of the Ring 1) anticipating penetration; 2) suffering penetration; or 3) recovering[…]
Mastering Middle Earth: Fellowship of the Ring
Peter Jackson’s adaptation of Tolkien’s classic soars despite its flaws There’s a very obvious problem when transferring any book to the big screen, namely that some of us may already[…]
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