Tagging up on yesterday’s post, what can movies teach us about our past? To borrow a line from William Faulkner: The past isn’t dead; it hasn’t even passed. Spike Lee’s Do the Right Thing from 1989 is a masterpiece. Made over 30 … Continue reading DO THE RIGHT THING
What can movies tell us about the world we live in? Have lived in? Will live in? Siegfried Kracauer’s seminal 1947 study, From Caligari to Hitler: A Psychological History of the German Film, puts forth that the roots of the National … Continue reading FORBIDDEN FILMS
Yesterday was the first time my wife and I got to visit the library since mid-March. Granted, we sat in our car and waited until a librarian came out and put our holds in the trunk, but it’s a start. … Continue reading EX LIBRIS: THE NEW YORK PUBLIC LIBRARY
One of the best movies from 2019 is now on Netflix. Sure, the world out there ain’t a barrel of laughs, but why not spend a couple of hours with Howard Ratner (Adam Sandler)? Sure, he’s a low-level crook and a … Continue reading UNCUT GEMS
On this week’s edition of After Image, I chat with Metro Arts’ producer Veronica Straight-Lingo to talk about Shirley, about the writer Shirley Jackson, two of Josephine Decker’s previous films, and recommend a few more movies about writers—Veronica even tosses … Continue reading
Though it doesn’t open for another week (June 5 to be precise), Shirley has stirred my mind with images of writers hunched over desks, pounding out prose one painful character at a time. A window into my personal life, perhaps? … Continue reading This week in Film — SHIRLEY and Writers on Screen
For a lot of people, movies and TV have been the only window into the lives of others these past 10 or so weeks. For some, movies and TV are the only window into the lives of others. They learn … Continue reading LIFE, ANIMATED
If you haven’t seen Blow the Man Down, then you really ought to remedy that. It’s on Amazon Prime, go ahead, I’ll wait. If you have seen Blow the Man Down, you know how good Morgan Saylor is as Mary Beth. An … Continue reading WHITE GIRL
Marion Michael Robinson, aka John Wayne, aka The Duke, was born in Winterset, Iowa on May 26, 1907. If he were alive today, he would be 113. But he’s not. Wayne died on June 11, 1979, at the age of … Continue reading THE MAN WHO SHOT LIBERTY VALANCE
Hollywood is littered with war movies. And many of them are great. TCM host weekend long marathons of them every Memorial Day, and 2020 is no different. Tonight at 6 p.m. ET, TCM screens The Best Years of Our Lives, … Continue reading THE BEST YEARS OF OUR LIVES
