Edward G. Robinson and Loretta Young in The Hatchet Man (1932) A Book Review Essay by Matthew Sorrento. Author Philippa Gates doesn’t excuse or shy away from the racist stereotyping of the Chinese but pinpoints issues of complexity.” Though this ambitious study doesn’t mention the issue by name, Philippa Gates’ […]
Deceptive Simplicity: John Crye on Chance
By Robin Gregory. I cannot grow as a human being if I do not observe and explore and attempt to explain my own life to myself, to understand my own patterns of behavior. I think the same can be said of humanity at large.” We’ve been warned by Hollywood bigwigs […]
Intimate, Disappearing Environments: The Philadelphia Environmental Film Festival 2020
Honeyland By T.R. Merchant-Knudsen. From the carefully curated selection of films and grouped programs… there were a variety of options for viewers, from talks with directors and conservationists, shorts that highlighted issues from around the globe, and feature films at the edge of documentary filmmaking. At the beginning of 2020 […]
Welcome to Full MAGA Cardiac Arrest: Cactus Jack
By Elias Savada. The combination of hallucinogenic talk radio sketches and Taxi Driver‘s Travis Bickle on steroids affords actor R. Michael Gull to follow the filmmakers’ urgings: ‘Let’s just make some shit in our basement … and show hate like it really is.’” I’m still trying to wrap my head […]
The End Goes On – Apocalypse TV: Essays on Society and Self at the End of the World
The Leftovers (HBO, 2014-17) A Book Review by Thomas Puhr. While the collection lacks cohesion, the entries are consistently strong when considered in isolation; consequently, Apocalypse TV might work best as a media studies reference tool or even as a springboard into future projects.” Television shows about the apocalypse remain a hot […]
Instinct and Intimacy: Svetlana Cvetko on Show Me What You Got
By Zoe Kurland. There are all these little surprises because it’s all happening as it’s happening in real life among a group of people. That was the intention behind my style of shooting.” In an early scene in Svetlana Cvetko’s Show Me What You Got, Marcelo (Mattia Minasi), the son […]
The Slow Burn of Jordan Graham’s Sator
By Elias Savada. Graham plays you with creaking floorboards, flashlights shining in dusty interiors, and just plain gloom.” Fans of last year’s Tenet know that its title connects to the Sator Square, the ancient stone with early Christian contexts. Filmmaker Jordan Graham takes a different (and much lower budget) approach […]
Facts over Glory – Bumpy Road: the Making, Flop, and Revival of Two-Lane Blacktop
A Book Review by Tanja Bresan. Townsend successfully rips out the sentimentally and nostalgia of the counterculture era in which the film is set, serving cold facts…. reading the events [with] a sobering effect.” Sylvia Townsend’s production history Bumpy Road: The Making, Flop and Revival of Two-Lane Blacktop (Mississippi, 2019) […]
A Tragic Icon of Iranian Cinema – Bahram Beyzaie: A Mosaic of Metaphors
By Ali Moosavi. Bahman Maghsoudlou has produced such a comprehensive, yet intimate portrait of this great and tragic icon of the Iranian Cinema.” Ask any scholar of the Iranian Cinema to name the top five Iranian directors from the advent of cinema in Iran till now and Bahram Beyzaie will […]
Creation from Abandonment and Abuse: Nora Unkel’s A Nightmare Wakes
by Jeffrey Andrew Weinstock. Mary Shelley’s nightmare wakes, explains the film, because her life was a waking nightmare.” The events surrounding the birth of Mary Shelley’s 1818 novel Frankenstein are almost as famous as the novel itself. During the rainy summer of 1816, the scandalous Lord Byron played host to […]