By Dana Weidman. Halston, the new documentary from director Frédéric Tcheng (Dior and I) starts with a credit stating that the “following film is documentary. However, the narrator is a fictional character.” In the opening, Tcheng uses news clips to build a brief history of the iconic dress designer’s rise […]
Researcher Beware! – Frankly: Unmasking Frank Capra by Joseph McBride
June 8, 2019
A Book Review Essay by Tony Williams. Joseph McBride’s latest mammoth book, well-written and copiously documented as usual, is an unusual production in the field of cinema studies. It is a companion volume to his earlier 1992 text, Frank Capra: The Catastrophe of Success, which took issue with the traditional estimation of […]
“If You Don’t Learn from the Greats, You’d Be Stupid”: An Interview with Cinematographer Robin Vidgeon
David A. Ellis
June 6, 2019
By David A. Ellis. Robin Vidgeon BSC born in August 1939 is a retired cinematographer. For many years he was a focus puller, working with the late cinematographer Douglas Slocombe and camera operator Bernard (Chic) Waterson. His last outing with them was on Steven Spielberg’s Indiana Jones and the Temple […]
DocuChronicles – Elsa Flores Almaraz on Carlos Almaraz: Playing With Fire
June 5, 2019
DocuChronicles is a blog dedicated to independent documentary cinema by filmmaker Marjorie Sturm. It includes a mix of reviews, interviews, and longer pieces. By Marjorie Sturm. The 2019 documentary Carlos Almaraz: Playing With Fire portrays the dramatic life of an artist. Co-directors/artists Elsa Flores Almaraz (whose late husband is the subject) and […]
Reassessing Blue Velvet: a Criterion Collection Release
Christopher Sharrett
June 4, 2019
By Christopher Sharrett. I have had a difficult history with David Lynch’s breakthrough film Blue Velvet (1986), and for that matter, much of the director’s work. At first, I thought the film a good antidote to the “morning in America” claptrap that was a major feature of the Reagan era […]
Film Scratches: Symphony of Bugs – Flesh City (2019)
June 3, 2019
Film Scratches focuses on the world of experimental and avant-garde film, especially as practiced by individual artists. It features a mixture of reviews, interviews, and essays. A Review by David Finkelstein. In the opening sequence of Flesh City, an engrossing new experimental/punk/horror feature by Thorsten Fleisch, we observe a series of brutal, […]
Kal-El Spelled Badly Is Brightburn
Elias Savada
June 3, 2019
By Elias Savada. Here’s a twist on one of those what if comic book, sci-fi scenarios. What if an alien baby (conveniently human in form) crashes to Earth and becomes an evil superhero. A real vindictive one. His small, single occupancy spacecraft arrives not in Superman’s adopted hometown of Smallville, […]
The De Palma Basics: Domino
Ali Moosavi
June 2, 2019
By Ali Moosavi. I have been an ardent Brian De Palma fan ever since watching Phantom of the Paradise at the cinemas in 1974. That was 45 years ago; he was a 33-year-old director making his eighth feature film in six years and I was a teenage movie fan. Flash […]
“Brooksie” Revisited: Beggars of Life (1928) from Kino Lorber and Beggars of Life: A Companion to the 1928 Film by Thomas Gladysz
Tony Williams
May 30, 2019
A Film/Book Review by Tony Williams. While we eagerly await the Criterion release of The Sound of Music with audio-commentary by Quentin Tarantino, joking aside, it is pleasurable to see Kino-Lorber’s latest contribution to a prestigious film repertoire needing release to a wider audience rather than already seen “usual suspects.” […]
Scholar, Lawyer, Catcher, Spy: The Spy Behind Home Plate
May 29, 2019
By Elias Savada. I can’t take credit for creating that tagline, but it is a perfect John Le Carré allusion. It’s from author Nicholas Dawidoff (who appears in this film), who used it as a title for a 1992 article for Sports Illustrated about a most unusual renaissance man. Aviva Kempner, […]