A Double Dysfunctional Mickey Xmas
I’ve survived the family Xmas, and what saved us was the power of the movies. This got me to thinking about all the best dysfunctional family holiday films–I don’t mean[…]
Category: Movies
A Muppet Christmas: Letters from Another Era
The by now hideously distended Muppet franchise received another subpar entry on network television last night in the form of “A Muppet Christmas: Letters to Santa”. Is anyone else willing[…]
Turn Off at Synecdoche
Charlie Kaufman’s Synecdoche, New York is not one of those films (e.g., Baz Luhrman’s Australia) that lurches toward the audience with its metaphorical arms wide open, shouting “Love me!” On[…]
Actors & Personalities · Reviews
Links: Fifteen years in the wilderness, THIRTEEN & the womb of fear
Time keeps on slippin’ and the internet expands fast as the universe itself, which means we should all link to each other, lest distance grow long. I’ve had transcendence on[…]
Smoking in the rain outside the House of Demme
Finally saw RACHEL GETTING MARRIED, which is like a Demme film reunion party that everyone’s invited to, but after you leave, you never see any of them again. And there’s[…]
The Amnesiac Bond
I’ve been revisiting the Sean Connery Bonds lately, on widescreen projection, where the immaculate detail and lush photography of airports, country roads, mosques, and Ealing Studio interiors come alive. But[…]
“She’s Gone to the ends of the universe…. on STP.” – Late Tonight, on TCM, do tape it, flower-bama
If you can’t remember, I’ll tell you, tonight is that greatest of all time travel movies, La Jatee (1961) at 1 AM EST on Turner Classic Movies. It’s short, it’s[…]
The Volleyball in the Void: Tom Hanks Is Cast Away
Pascal . . . Kierkegaard . . . Nietzsche . . . Zemeckis?
Crime · Music & Musicals · Reviews
Early Jeanne, Early Louis, Early Miles: Louis Malle’s Elevator to the Gallows
“Paris at night in black-and-white with Miles on the soundtrack? It’s a perfect fit.”
Music in the Making: Highlights from the 2008 Melbourne International Film Festival
“The surprise musical number can represent a facile avoidance of complexity, a moment of true strangeness, or a way of harmonizing existing, underlying themes.”
Festivals & Awards · LGBT & Queer
Queer Angles: The 2008 Portland Lesbian and Gay Film Festival
Feisty orthodox Jewish dykes, globe-trotting ladyboys, fascistic Armani queens you know, the gang
Festivals & Awards · LGBT & Queer
What’s Up, QDoc? Portland’s 2008 Queer Documentary Festival
Seeing queer lives from the U.S. and Canada to South Africa and Iran
Faust Goes to Hollywood: Revisiting John Frankenheimer’s Seconds
“Think, for Pete’s sake. What have you got now?”
Quickies: Random Short Reviews from Affinity to Cthulhu to War Dance
“Don’t these children deserve the respect of a beautiful film?”
Vicky and Woody and François: On Woody Allen’s Vicky Cristina Barcelona
The return of Jules and Jim?
Activist & Political · African American · Reviews
Sinful Remake: The Women Problem
“Wife, get a real life for yourself. Career woman, the career isn’t everything. Hussy, men still marry ladies. Lesbian, explore your ‘male’ issues … “
Bright Sights: Recent DVDs: The Italian, Traffic in Souls, Privilege, Wings, The Ascent, Tropical Malady, Valerie and Her Week of Wonders, J’Accuse
The Italian (Reginald Barker, 1915) and Traffic in Souls (George Loane Tucker, 1913) The Italian of producer Thomas Ince’s 1915 film is Beppo Donnetti, played by George Beban in a performance[…]
Synecdoche, Mon Amour
How to describe the films of Charlie Kaufman . . . Ingmar Bergman with laughs? Close, but that makes Kaufman sound too much like Woody Allen, a useful comparison maybe,[…]
Til The End of Time (1946)
Before standardizing the topography of noir with Murder My Sweet, Edward Dmytryk made the nervy little “coming home from the war” film Til the End of Time. A lower budgeted[…]
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