I will focus on films that contain both of the following markers: (1) an American character exhibits daring but reckless behavior, which triggers continuing, gory disaster for a multinational group;[…]
What’s in the bag is Marcello Clerici, and the bag, not surprisingly, is empty. * * * Upon its release in 1970, how many of us were prepared for The[…]
Historical & Epic · Producers & Studios · War
Introduction Hell’s Angels, Howard Hughes’s 1930 film, was praised for its aerial photography and derided for its story. “War Brings Out What People Really Are” surveys critical films Hollywood produced[…]
Directors · Documentaries · Experimental & Underground · War
Despite the reputation that Alain Resnais has garnered as “cinema’s definitive artist of postwar trauma,” few scholars have undertaken a detailed comparative analysis of his two works that broach this[…]
Activist & Political · Actors & Personalities · War
Angelina Jolie may be among our best hopes to end the cruel and vile practice of mass rape in conflict. She has a bully pulpit as a rich and famous[…]
Activist & Political · Uncategorized · War
“Does it all come down to the injustice of 3,000 people dying on 9/11? But at some level everybody went through that. Yet few of us thereafter felt the need to cast off every other human part of ourselves in order to find ‘justice,’ whatever that means in such contexts.”
“If Bigelow is not assembling the story, who is? The darkest implication of this is that Zero Dark Thirty takes no stand on the events of the last decade because the sources on which it relies believe that there is no stand to take. Her sources believe that the existence of war is a value-free fact; so this is what Bigelow believes.”
“Aldo Raine is nothing more than Adolf Hitler wrapped in an American flag.”
Asian · Historical & Epic · War
“The monumental approach, as one would guess, takes history as something to be inspired by, as a record of human greatness that serves to encourage similar greatness by individuals in future times; in the case of City of Life and Death, it is the various acts of compassion and solidarity that play this role.”
Actors & Personalities · Essays · War
“I read so much about immigrants, how they must adjust to customs and the words of foreign lands. Maybe because I was never treated like an immigrant! Nobody made excuses for me. Not then – not now. Nobody cares about my roots.”1 – Marlene Dietrich, April 15, 1985
“There are truths that can only be revealed on condition of having been discovered.”– Wajdi Mouawad, Incendies (2003)
Genres · Production History · War
“With flags fluttering, the cast stoically stands at attention, with tears streaming down their stiff upper lips. Even with their country’s destruction, the boys reflect a military mentality, still in service to their country.”
Essays · Historical & Epic · War
In which Tarantino reshapes Shakespeare, World War II movies, Leni Riefenstahl, Spaghetti Westerns, and more, under the deft guidance of that Italian master Ovid
Actors & Personalities · Comedy · Directors · War
“In the seventeenth chapter of St. Luke it is written, the kingdom of Godis within man, not one man or a group of men but in all men.”
“The very idea of losing is hateful to Americans.”
“This is the World War II film confronting its Jungian shadow, acknowledging its darkest impulses and finally purging them.”
Activist & Political · Reviews · War
“Chew popcorn to avoid grinding teeth, comrades.”
Reviews · Thrillers & Action · War
“Tarantino thus concedes some of his omnipotence to the medium he so deftly manipulates.”
“Jancsó’s controlled aesthetic acts as a dissonance that vibrates expressively with scenes of violence, torture, and shame.”
Documentaries · Festivals & Awards · War
“Each work limns a moral dilemma that has no discernible answer.”
