Less Is Less: The 44th New York Film Festival
Past trumps present in this unremarkable fest If, as proclaimed by its director Richard Peña, the New York Film Festival is a “kind of report on the state of cinema,”[…]
Actors & Personalities · Artists · Directors · Interviews · Movies
What’s Wrong with Fast Food? A Conversation with Richard Linklater and Eric Schlosser on Fast Food Nation
With additional comments by Catalina Sandino Moreno and Ethan Hawke Introduction The distributor’s website describes Richard Linklater’s Fast Food Nation, a dramatic feature based on Eric Schlosser’s best-selling book, as[…]
No Tobacco Juice, but Funny! Monster House, Rockin’ in 3-D!
Bob Zemeckis and Stephen Spielberg want your money. Give it to them. It’s sad but true: no one does spit tobacco juice on the audience in Monster House. But even[…]
Hating Marie: Why the French Still Don’t Like Her
Bring us the head of Sofia Coppola, ‘k? Of all cinema publics, France holds the reputation for the most cinephiles, for being the home of the invention of the “auteur.”[…]
On the Prowl with MadCat: On the 2006 MadCat International Women’s Film Festival
Provocative and visionary! The MadCat Women’s International Film Festival is based in San Francisco, but one hesitates to call it a “San Francisco festival.” Programmed for the past ten years (this September[…]
Artists · Directors · Interviews · Movies · Reviews
Returning to Life: Talking with Almodovar, Penelope Cruz, and Carmen Maura at Cannes
“I do not have the serenity of women. But I admire it.” Pedro Almodovar’s new film Volver (Return) features an unusual number of deaths. Penelope Cruz, in the best performance[…]
Doug McGrath’s Infamous: The Best Truman Capote Movie I’ve Seen All Year!
If you must see only one Truman Capote movie in your life, let it be this one Do I really want to see a movie about Truman Capote leaving Manhattan[…]
The Departed: Crime All the Time
Scorsese gets all Irish on our asses, and it works I admit it. I thought Marty had lost it. I thought he had gone all lazy and cute and Hollywood,[…]
Artists · Interviews · Stars · Writers & Critics
Cruising with Camille: An Interview with Camille Paglia
“Please note that even Margo Channing, threatening a ‘bumpy night’ for her hapless guests, merely fumingly forecasts. It’s a gesture of mind, not body.” Introduction Camille Paglia, the scholar and[…]
Trailer Trash: Dumpster Diving with Jenni Olson
High camp in three minutes or less The idea that bigger is better may play better in the lexicon of size queens than in le cinema contemporaire. Hollywood’s insistence on[…]
Documentaries · Genres · Movies · Reviews
Cultural Equity: On the Documentary Lomax the Songhunter
“Every smallest branch of the human family at one time or another has carved its dreams out of the rock on which it has lived.” – Alan Lomax It was a remarkable[…]
Chicago, je t’aime: The 42nd Chicago International Film Festival
“There are things you shouldn’t sell” For the festival’s 42nd annual opening night, the 3,000-seat Chicago Theatre threw open its doors and watched the convergence on the red carpet as[…]
From Aaron Spelling’s Vault of Horror: Charlie’s Angels on DVD!
“I expect to be erect any time now.” “An eighth-grader’s mind trapped in an eighth-grader’s body.” That’s how one critic summed up Aaron Spelling. Aaron had him killed, of course.[…]
Attack (1956)
When Jack Palance’s Lieutenant Joe Costa suddenly returns from what seemed a certain death in Robert Aldrich’s Attack (1956) – his left arm hanging lifeless, rendered to ground beef by[…]
One night on the Sleazoid Express
Tom Sutpen’s classy review of Sleazoid Express, by Bill Landis and Michelle Clifford, certainly brought back the memories, to wit: After I came back from Vietnam in December 1969 I[…]
Great Blog Topic – Monologues
Edward Copeland at The House Next Door has written a great post concerning film monologues. After considering what makes a great film monologue, he describes in detail 5 stellar examples.[…]
The Noir Portraiture of Stacy Lande
Painting influences film. Film influences painting. The portraits of Los Angeles painter and performance artist Stacy Lande (pronounced, “lan-dee”) appear equally influenced by 19th Century Symbolism, 20th Century Expressionism, and[…]
Exploitation & Erotica · Writers & Critics
Sleazoid Express (2002)
Here in America we have something that, with the straightest of faces, we call our Film Heritage. What people usually mean when they invoke this solemn, unconscionably sentimental honorific is[…]
Let’s Hear It For Phoenix!
While the rest of the blogosphere is celebrating director Robert Aldrich, I thought I’d put in a word for one of my favorite – and least discussed – Aldrich films,[…]
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