By Elias Savada. The Kimpton Hotel Monaco is just 9 blocks east of the White House, the work place of Stephen K. Bannon, a friend and strategist of the Commander in-Chief until his banishment from official duties in 2017. He still haunts the Capitol Hill neighborhood where he lives and […]
“Movies No Genre Wants to Own Up to” – Blood Hunger: The Films of José Larraz (Arrow Video)
Rod Lott
March 26, 2019
By Rod Lott. Death aside, it’s a good time to be José Ramón Larraz. The Spanish director finally gets his due, a quarter-century after Cathal Tohill and Pete Tombs made the case for it in their seminal book, Immoral Tales: European Sex and Horror Movies, 1956-1984. The seeds they planted […]
Wildlife: Family in the Dark
Christopher Sharrett
March 25, 2019
By Christopher Sharrett. Among the few films that impressed me last season was Paul Dano’s first film as director, Wildlife, based on a book (which I have not read) by Richard Ford. The film received some applause when it opened, then vanished, to be covered over by the rubbish […]
Larry Cohen, 1936-2019
March 25, 2019
By Christopher Sharrett. Death is ruthless, but it seems to have been especially vicious lately. We have received word that Larry Cohen, the last of the great quartet of 60s-70s horror film innovators, has died. A statement about the full contributions of Cohen will be forthcoming in the print edition […]
Film Scratches: Exuberant Nihilism – Nihelious (2017)
March 23, 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 deliriously kitschy world of Nihelious, a 10 and a half minute animated look at love and marriage […]
Film Scratches: Suspending the Rules – Poetry of Dreams (2017)
March 23, 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. Poetry of Dreams is a short film, just over two minutes long, by Hayk Matevosyan, an Armenian-born artist based […]
A “Spinster’s” Last Stand: Woman at War
Michael Sandlin
March 22, 2019
By Michael Sandlin. Icelandic director Benedikt Erlingsson, in his sophomore directorial effort Woman at War, imagines the chaos that ensues when a middle-aged spinster’s frustrated motherly instincts compete with her radical eco-political commitment to defeat her country’s pollution-friendly patriarchy. Much like Erlingsson’s bizarre equinophilic tale Of Horses and Men (2014), Woman […]
The Uncanny Invades: Jordan Peele’s Us
Matthew Sorrento
March 22, 2019
By Matthew Sorrento. The most unfortunate aspect of Jordan Peele’s Get Out was its creator’s attempt at self-criticism. Some months after the film’s release, Peele accepted an offer from Reddit to respond to member theories on the film. In the video, he is welcoming and down-to-earth but swiftly dismisses a theory […]
Idris at the Helm: Yardie
Ali Moosavi
March 14, 2019
By Ali Moosavi. The media have been so preoccupied with whether or not Idris Elba will become the next James Bond that somehow his first venture into directing, Yardie, has been kept largely under the radar. Yardie is an adaptation of the novel of the same name by Victor Headley. […]
“What Might Have Been”: The Magnificent Ambersons (Criterion Collection)
March 14, 2019
By Tony Williams. “Anybody who does things their own way while they’re working with a corporation is going to be problematic.” – Jonathan Rosenbaum, audio-commentary, The Magnificent Ambersons Criterion Collection DVD When Criterion rises to the appropriate occasion of combining the best type of digital restoration with the most appropriate supplementary features, […]