Friday, April 4 2008
The Ice Storm
The general fuzzed-out sense of malaise that Lee is able to tap into while exploring the Nixon-era sexual revolution (and repression and adventure), creates a point of view that both ruthlessly observes and empathizes with these alien suburbanites.
Friday, June 22 2007
Part 5: The Return of the Auteur
That noise you heard near the start of the new millennium was the creative din of a brash new breed of filmmakers tearing down the traditions of mainstream moviemaking. Their motion picture mission statements -- including the ones featured on this list -- remain the rulebook for new generations of anxious film artists.
Wednesday, June 6 2007
Kids’ DVDs: June 2007
Given that babies and young children love nothing more than repetition, repetition, and... um.... repetition, I can't understand why even the pointiest of heads would think children between the ages of six months and three years could possible need 23 different Baby Einstein DVDs.
Monday, April 16 2007
Bobby (2006)
As reporter Warren Wilson remembers, "That would have been less of an impact on me, had I been shot [as he nearly was], than Kennedy being killed, stopped, in a moment in America's history, when we needed him and his advocacy more than ever before."
Tuesday, November 21 2006
Happy Feet (2006)
The penguins learn to refine their engrained vocal skills not in the interest of spiritual uplift or any such, but, basically, to get laid.
Thursday, November 16 2006
Bobby (2006)
With Kennedy serving as a symbol for what might have been, Bobby illustrates the problems he identifies.
Tuesday, August 16 2005
Sin City (2005)
Like the guys, the girls are undone by their reliance on conventional male power signs.
Friday, April 1 2005
Sin City (2005)
Distraught, ornery, self-critical, these heroes are certainly more "anti" types than straight-ahead.
Tuesday, October 5 2004
Deep Impact: Special Collector’s Edition (1998)
Mimi Leder's Deep Impact is both less and more than a science fiction-styled disaster melodrama.
Thursday, March 18 2004
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004)
At once abstract and heartfelt, sincere and weirdly charming, the film unhinges conventions of linear narrative along with romantic comedy.
