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Recent Film FeaturesFriday, September 5 2008
Sex on the BeachThough 1980s bikini films seem objectifying and antifeminist, they offer a utopian space where class and gender hierarchies begin to dissolve. Wednesday, September 3 2008
Stark Reality: A Different Hero for Different TimesBucking the trend of an outsider given an opportunity to overcome ordinariness, millionaire Tony Stark (Iron Man) seems like the least sympathetic of heroes. But his all-too-familiar flaws reveal a more than heroic depth of character, and he offers readers an entirely different form of escapism. Friday, August 22 2008
Yukio Mishima, of Love and DeathDeath and sex were verboten, and Mishima took it upon himself to be a virtuosic provocateur; part passionate expressive modernist, part fervent traditionalist. Thursday, August 14 2008
A Fairy Tale Childhood: An Interview with Guy MaddinThe Canadian cult director talks to PopMatters about family, childhood, memory and his cinematic Gesamptkunstwerks that often look like damaged artifacts dredged up from an archive of lost 1920s and '30s film.
Life Into Art: Strange Culture and the Measure of Documentary FilmStrange Culture is a critical entry point into the current discussion of what makes a documentary a documentary, most notably because it announces its own subjectivity in a clear and provocative way. Thursday, July 24 2008
Give ‘Em HelveticaThe famed font aspires to eerie emptiness of meaning. Now, has it persuaded us to do the same? Friday, June 27 2008
High and Low: Film Forum Presents: NakadaiNew York’s Film Forum offers an ambitious and inspired film series this summer, dedicated to the films of Japanese actor Tatsuya Nakadai. The series is as entertaining, provocative, and intricate as its subject. Thursday, June 26 2008
Finding Common GroundCaetano Veloso’s 1973 album Araçá Azul is as defiantly unconventional and challenging as Godard’s pioneering New Wave classic Breathless (1960), altering the possibilities and expectations of his chosen medium. Monday, June 23 2008
Alan CummingStage, TV and film actor, model, Tony Award-winner and new Masterpiece Mystery! host Alan Cumming speaks with PopMatters 20 Questions about Dionysus, the prudency of using prophylactics, and Leon, the singing Chihuahua. Thursday, June 19 2008
The Technology of the Occult: Méliès and the Invention of FilmLike any illusionist, Méliès created wonderment with only the slightest of pretense, creating a filmic language that continues to be explored and exploited today. Friday, June 13 2008
Stranded in the Middle of Nowhere: One Adolescent’s Experience of Gregg ArakiRecently popularized for the success of Mysterious Skin (2006), filmmaker Gregg Araki has exposed the Gen Y-er longing for tenderness in a world drowned in pop culture and violence to movies such as Nowhere, the personal savior of the 26-year-old Justin Dimos. Wednesday, June 11 2008
The Phantasmagoric Phantom CarriageThe Phantom Carriage was truly revolutionary in the way it exploited the unique features of motion pictures, and clearly anticipated the sophisticated narrative and visual structure of modern films. Wednesday, May 28 2008
Tanna FrederickTanna Frederick speaks with PopMatters 20 Questions about the cat's meow, the best hot chocolate money can buy, and her intriguingly dexterous toes. Thursday, May 22 2008
American Gangster: Motives, Outsiders, & BrandingAmerican Gangster struggles to find fresh ways to tell its story within the confines of the traditional crime drama. Impossible, maybe, but entertaining nonetheless. Friday, May 16 2008
Independent Film Festival of Boston 2008The Independent Film Festival of Boston brought a slew of new features, documentaries, and shorts to Beantown for the sixth year. PopMatters has all the highlights (and lowlights) from films that tackled everything from vanishing languages to fashion design. Thursday, May 8 2008
Reflections: Interview with Gaetano Capizzi, Director of Cinemabiente"Cinemabiente means films that reflect the world, or act like a mirror of society. At the same time, they cause the viewer to reflect." Friday, April 25 2008
Always Trying to Waste Me: The Rolling Stones’ “Cocksucker Blues”Onan rejoices. Dionysus despairs. Robert Frank, the Rolling Stones, and Cocksucker Blues -- a polarizing document for upwards of 35-years, now -- unreleased, and perhaps unreleasable. Friday, April 18 2008
On Independent Vision, Art and Democracy: The Full Frame Documentary Film Festival 2008Full Frame’s exclusive focus on documentary films makes it gravitate toward academic and humanitarian affiliations, providing badly needed brain-stimulation for our otherwise comatose democracy. Wednesday, April 16 2008
State of the Slasher AddressAuthor Stephen Graham Jones looks into the disappointments of the Prom Night remake, finds pause to reflect back on the past of the slasher film, and sees a glimmer of hope for the future. Friday, April 11 2008
State of Grace: How Buddhist Teachings Transformed a Maximum Security Prison in AlabamaIn her new documentary, Jenny Phillips frames the daily, shackled grind of prisoners' lives with social injustices, but also investigates what it is like to be a prisoner doing hard time in the South choosing to practice guided Buddhist meditation techniques. |
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