Jacob

By Jacob Mertens. The modern blockbuster has become a strange, new beast before our eyes. In the nascent days of the Star Trek series, the fantasy of galactic travel could only prove as tangible as limited special effects technology allowed. Now, the aesthetics of the science fiction film take on […]

By Jacob Mertens. It was the summer before my sophomore year at high school, and I sat in a rundown bargain theater that only showed films months past their theatrical release. My mother had dragged me to a strange film called Moulin Rouge! (2001), and if I am to be […]

By Jacob Mertens. A stretch of cute neighborhoods with picket fences, green lawns. A traveling carnival filled with trailers and sideshow burnouts. A shack buried out in the forest, surrounded by pine trees and old cars sinking back into nature. Ultimately, it does not matter what you call home, it […]

By Jacob Mertens. Many hinge the success and failure of a superhero film on whether villains can entice and excite the audience, or whether heroes can effectively transcend their humanity and conquer the odds. These are irrelevant concerns when placed next to the crucial component of all great action films: […]

By Jacob Mertens. As far as rallying cries go, I suppose you can do worse than “spring break forever.” Even so, as Spring Breakers’ enigmatic Alien (James Franco) intones the words over and over, each syllable clawing through the speakers in the character’s arresting drawl, the sentiment becomes more of […]

By Jacob Mertens. Could you survive a Christmas holiday season without any products made in China? As far as opening conceits go, Xmas Without China offers its audience a compelling quandary. Following this premise, one might imagine a film that lives up to the honored tradition of documentary satire, in […]

By Jacob Mertens. A half-naked child streaks across the lawn chased by several twenty-something supervisors. They catch hold of him before he crosses property lines, holding his arms and legs down, letting him calm until he can return to his room under his own power. Shortly thereafter he does, and […]

By Jacob Mertens. Five friends camp out in a cabin, helping one of their own detox from drugs, only to find foul murder indelicately staged in the basement. Skinned cats hang from the ceiling, blood trails across the floor, and a pile of cinder speaks to some terrible crime committed. […]

By Jacob Mertens. In the summer of 2008, the Great Sichuan Earthquake rattled China’s cage and left a death toll of nearly seventy thousand people. Within this massive scope of destruction, the city of Beichan, once home to twenty thousand, was obliterated in a fleeting moment. The earthquake wiped Beichan […]