An Exit Through the Boundaries of Documentary
“Functionless art is simply tolerated vandalism.” – Peter Steele (1962-2010) From here comes a rich smell drawn from a load of bullshit. And in no way am I demeaning the practice of street art by[…]
Bigger Than Life’s Sci-Fi Twin
No one with eyes and a brain could seriously dispute Nicholas Ray’s role as the primary auteur of Bigger Than Life. All you need to do is watch Ray’s Rebel[…]
Look of Love: The Secret in Their Eyes
Recently retired law clerk Benjamin Esposito (Ricardo DarÃn) can’t shake the memory of the 1974 Morales rape and murder case. Never mind that 25 years have passed: for Benjamin, the[…]
Girlies and Spider Babies living down the Lane
This spring, I’m all about homicidal nymphets, and wouldn’t you know it, so is Stacie Ponder at Final Girl, who’s hosting a big SPIDER BABY event at her Final Girl[…]
The Pervert’s Guide to The Birds: Of Hitchcock, Žižek, the Maternal Superego, and Critical Confusion
“It is the search for explanation itself and the experience of the alien, disturbing, and frightening that thrills audiences.” In The Pervert’s Guide to Cinema, directed and produced by Sophie Fiennes,[…]
Hot Tube Time Machine – Fun, but Repeating on Itself
When asked about the John Hughes films in a recent NY Times interview, John Cusack played the highbrow card. Besides Sixteen Candles, in which he had a minor role, Cusack[…]
Eastern European Animation Dept. – Renaissance (Walerian Borowczyk, 1963)
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UAirHKywhSc”>http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UAirHKywhSc] I think this is one of the greatest short films ever made. Containing not a word of spoken dialogue. Not only is the stop motion animation exquisite and amusing,[…]
New Directors / New Films 2010
The unpredictable, occasionally thrilling New Directors / New Films fest opens in New York City today. Locals are, of course, the immediate beneficiaries of this annual collaboration between the Film[…]
Valentine’s Day: It Sucks Being a Woman
“Traditional gender roles seem to be in no danger of evolving.” Simone de Beauvoir laid it out in The Second Sex: “One is not born, but rather becomes a woman.” Indeed,[…]
Music & Musicals · Reviews · Uncategorized
The Runaways Get Bio-Picked
If the brief stardom of Buddy Holly and the even briefer star of Ritchie Valens should get the Hollywood biopic treatment, then why not the first all-girl balls-out rock act?[…]
Profondamente Italiano: Mid-August Lunch (Pranzo di Ferragosto)
If you want an idea of real Roman life, look no further than Mid-August Lunch (2008). Gianni (Gianni Di Gregorio, who directed, scripted and stars) and his 93-year-old mother Valeria[…]
Peter Graves – The Night of the Hunter
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6mi2Dusyg5A In a film career that spanned more than half a century, the late Peter Graves (1926-2010) was a dependable leading man, often at his best in non-leading roles, who[…]
Poster Comparison No. 8 – The Holy Man and the Cataclysm
I like these two movie posters, one for Roland Emmerich’s 2012 (2009), the other for Cecil B. DeMille’s The Ten Commandments (1956), and I suspect their similarity is anything but[…]
Revanche (Criterion Collection)
Austrian filmmaker Götz Spielmann likes to capture rooms and the lives within. His camera remains stable or abruptly shifts, as if just discovering the element central to the layout. At[…]
Activist & Political · Festivals & Awards
Oscars II: On The Hurt Locker
As a tonic to all the hoopla surrounding The Hurt Locker and its Oscar win as Best Picture, we’re reprinting BL writer Jay Rothermel’s provocative review of the film, originally[…]
Oscars I: That Damn Helen Mirren!
I mean, DAME Helen Mirren. (Photo via Associated Press. Joke via Oscar co-host, Steve Martin.) Very happy for Kat B and The Hurt Locker. Worst Award of the Evening – The[…]
Charge of the White Elephant
What Jacksin’s doin’ with line and cullah goes beyond abstrackshin.
Book review: Chaplin, by Simon Louvish
Chaplin: The Tramp’s Odyssey, by Simon Louvish. New York: Thomas Dunne Books, St. Martin’s Press, 2009. Hardcover. $27.99. 412pp. ISBN 987-0-312-58169-5. Do we really need another book about Charlie Chaplin?[…]
Book review: Thank Heaven, by Leslie Caron
Thank Heaven: A Memoir, by Leslie Caron. New York: Viking, 2009. Paperback $25.95, 288pp. ISBN: 0-67002-134-2. When Leslie Caron came to Los Angeles in 2009 on a book tour for her[…]
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