For his first five films, writer/director James Gray set his stories in New York City. Makes sense, considering Gray is a born and raised New Yorker, but with his two most recent films, Gray looks far beyond the Burroughs. Releasing … Continue reading THE LOST CITY OF Z
With the 46th annual Telluride Film Festival opening next weekend (Aug. 30–Sept. 2), now seems like a fine time to dig into TFF’s past and highlight a few recent masterpieces. Let’s start with 2017’s First Reformed, a movie whose righteous … Continue reading FIRST REFORMED
On August 1, 2019, D(onn) A(lan) Pennebaker, Penny to most, died. He was 94. A true titan of cinema, Pennebaker leaves behind a plethora of work, almost all of it falling under the category of Direct Cinema. His purpose was … Continue reading D. A. Pennebaker
As the decade comes to a close, the mind turns to the best films of the 2010s, and 2013’s Inside Llewyn Davis easily makes the shortlist. A Sisyphean story of a struggling folk musician searching for authenticity in 1961 Greenwich … Continue reading INSIDE LLEWYN DAVIS
The Last Black Man in San Francisco’s Jimmie Fails and Montgomery Allen are Estragon and Vladimir. Only they’re not waiting for Godot; they’re waiting for the bus. Neither comes. Unlike Samuel Beckett’s two heroes, Fails and Allen get up and … Continue reading THE LAST BLACK MAN IN SAN FRANCISCO
With the fourth round of the 2019 French Open underway, this weekend seems like the perfect time to re-visit one of 2018’s lesser-seen, but exquisitely constructed, documentaries, John McEnroe: In the Realm of Perfection (L’empire de la perfection). Directed by … Continue reading JOHN MCENROE: IN THE REALM OF PERFECTION
Every year is a great year for the movies, but when was the best? Was it 1939, the year Hollywood gave us The Wizard of Oz, Gone with the Wind, and Mr. Smith Goes to Washington? Or was it the great global year … Continue reading 2018: An Embarrassment of Riches
As far as the filmmakers behind The Only Living Boy in New York want you to think, Thomas Webb (Callum Turner) is your typical New Yorker. He feels he was born a few decades too late—he would have preferred the gritty, hard-scrabble … Continue reading THE ONLY LIVING BOY IN NEW YORK
Michael J. Cinema 