Celebrity Culture · Crime · Digital · Drama · Societal Trends
The Bling Ring’s impossible challenge for us is to reject the moralizing. We feel superior to the teenagers because of the celebrity issue. The four girls and boy represent our[…]
Activist & Political · African American · Essays · Franchises & Series · Race · SF & Fantasy · SF/Fantasy · Societal Trends
If Deep Space 9 demonstrates how the casting of African American commanders in chief – and their election – may constitute or create a backlash disguised as “progress,” it has[…]
Celebrity Culture · Counterculture · Music & Musicals · Production History · Societal Trends · Youth
A rewatch benumbed to this flash and flare reveals the stark morbidity of Head. Throughout the movie the Monkees are assaulted, hunted, and caged. Words fail, fists fail. The film[…]
Franchises & Series · Philosophy · SF & Fantasy · Societal Trends
The Batman (2022) fulfills complex, necessary roles in society. The intricate power relations of the film, as a part of mass media, are directly related to those in the spectacle[…]
#MeToo · Animation · Animators · News · Production History · Societal Trends
Docter and Lasseter were part of the Pixar Braintrust, a group of aging white men that held creative control of Pixar’s productions. The original members – Lasseter, Docter, Andrew Stanton[…]
Covid-19 · Digital · Documentaries · Festivals & Awards · Pandemic · Societal Trends · TV & Streaming · Videos
YouTube is a global idea farm, not unlike Big Agriculture: welcome, user, to your pre-fab silo, built “just for you” by YouTube’s secret algorithm. That algorithm loads about 70% of[…]
Activist & Political · African American · Essays · Societal Trends
Editor’s Note: As part of Bright Lights’ ongoing campaign to challenge dogmatic viewpoints and advocate for nuanced analysis of cultural controversies, we present Graham Daseler’s powerful discussion of one of[…]
Documentaries · Migration · Societal Trends
From the documentary’s beginning until its closing credits, the Central American migrants who journey across Mexico are filmed accomplishing everyday yet extraordinary tasks. Most specifically, they are filmed taking part[…]
Experimental & Underground · Horror · New Media · Societal Trends · Theory · Thrillers & Action · TV & Streaming
The encounter between the lead characters and The Circle evokes a wider sense of anxiety regarding the extent to which we upload information about every area of our lives into[…]
Activist & Political · African American · Societal Trends
Fredric March stands alongside four other mid-century drum majors for civil rights during the 1943 national radio broadcast of “Race-Relations Sunday.” Left to right: concert soprano Dorothy Maynor, actor Canada[…]
Activist & Political · Asian · Drama · Societal Trends
Hu Bo leaves us suspended over this bleak interregnum – where the old has gone but the new is not yet born. His death too, leaves a similar blank spot.[…]
Movie Databases · Societal Trends · Statistics
No film on the list embodies a retreat into populist myth as totally or as troublingly as Forrest Gump (1994). Though critically and popularly lauded at its release (winning the[…]
