By Christopher Sharrett. I commented early this week on the ruthlessness of death. The occasion was my remembrance of Larry Cohen, a crucial figure of the American independent cinema. And now, we have word of the loss of Agnes Varda, a person I always thought pivotal to the European cinema. […]
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 […]
Film Scratches: Poetry of the Downtrodden – Short Films of Jeremy Gluck (2017)
February 20, 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. Jeremy Gluck is a Canadian-born artist living in Wales. Two of his recent short films have an unusual way to combine […]
Film Scratches: Remixing as Distillation – Praxis Selection from Index
February 20, 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. Index, the DVD label that specializes in collections of experimental work by Austrian artists, has assembled this 97 minute selection from […]
Film Scratches: Meta-Fetishes – Flowers and Bottoms (2016)
January 7, 2019
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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 Flowers and Bottoms, an amusingly strange six minute film by Christos Massalas, we begin by watching the back of a […]
Film Scratches: A Quest on Wheels – The Oneiric Bicycle (2016)
January 7, 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 Oneiric Bicycle, Sam Klickner’s 22 minute surreal fable, we see a young bicyclist (Natalie Miller) wearing a red scarf […]
Film Scratches: Compelling Mystery – The Visiting Lament (2016)
January 7, 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 Visiting Lament, Sam Klickner’s breathtaking five minute short, he uses a simple composition of figures in a blank, grey […]
Of Masculinity, Mortgages, Moral Redemption, and MeToo: My “Practically Perfect” Thoughts on Mary Poppins Returns
By Elizabeth Toohey. Because I wasn’t planning to write about Mary Poppins Returns, but only to watch it recreationally with my six-year old, I did something verboten for a reviewer, which was to read a few reviews before actually viewing the film. Manohla Dargis’ scathing pan of the sequel for the […]