By Alexandra Heller-Nicholas. As far as emotional fidelity is concerned, The Substance is a documentary. No other film I have ever seen so perfectly captures my subjective experience of the culturally enforced dissociation that happens en masse when, as a woman, your body starts to age.” I recently turned 50. […]
In a Motley Assortment: On Filmmaker Joanna Hogg
By Shonni Enelow. Hogg’s films present rich and compelling psychological characters while eschewing that legibility of motive.” Hogg’s films capture the tones and rhythms of contemporary relation quite differently from other historical realisms. The half-spoken, half-interrupted speech of her characters, the way they repeat themselves, revise their words, in conjunction […]
Lost and Found: In Praise of Josh’s Blair Witch Mix (1999)
By Alexandra Heller-Nicholas. The Blair Witch Project – Josh’s Blair Witch Mix (1999) can be found online in full at Archive.org here. The essence of The Blair Witch Project that has made it so compulsively alluring for me has largely remained as elusive to me as ever. And then I […]
The Miyazaki Interlude: The Conscious and Unconscious Intervals of The Boy and the Heron (2023)
By David Ryan. Miyazaki moves beyond illustrating simple contrasts by creating relationships in apposition (not opposition), and this interdependency often encourages experiential growth for his younger protagonists.” Writer-director Hayao Miyazaki’s films are carefully planned adventures into the realms of innocence and experience. His abstract themes and dense stories have garnered […]
Docu-mania: The Introduction to Crafting Contemporary Documentaries and Docuseries for Global Screens
By Phoebe Hart. Crafting Contemporary Documentaries and Docuseries for Global Screens delves into the processes by which the study participants, all creative practitioners, learn skills and acquire inspiration and mastery, and specific rituals and habits of practice.” Since its inception, the documentary film has steadily grown in form and reception, […]
The Triple Protagonist Film: Challengers, Sex, and Gender
By David Greven. Echoing classical Hollywood and classical myth, the triple protagonist film of the present breaks new ground while reinforcing longstanding myths about sexuality and gender stereotypes.” In Luca Guadagnino’s great films, such as Call Me By Your Name (2017), Bones and All (2022), and I Am Love (2009), […]
“A Dying Man, Scared of the Dark”: Don Siegel’s The Shootist (Arrow Video)
By Jeremy Carr. Just as crucial to The Shootist is what Books leaves behind, which, prior to the beginning of the film, was nothing more than his dubious exploits and the tales that followed. By the end of the film, though, there is something more.” It obviously isn’t necessary to […]
Everyone’s Cinema Scholar: Remembering David Bordwell (1947-2024)
Film International editors, contributors, and correspondents offer personal tributes and commentary on the late scholar of cinema. I regret never having the pleasure of meeting David Bordwell. My only interaction with him was a lively email exchange little over 10 years ago. I was planning an article on the early […]
Laughter over Comedy: from the Introduction to Death by Laughter: Female Hysteria in Early Cinema
By Maggie Hennefeld. Imagine being so hilarious that your jokes, impressions, or other repartee literally caused someone to laugh themselves to death.1 —“Does Your Stand-Up Act Need Death by Laughter Insurance?,” Trusted Choice, insurance web advertisement, August 10, 2019 Imagine being so wild and free that your laughter literally killed […]
Rebel Revelations – Mavericks: Interviews with the World’s Iconoclast Filmmakers
A Book Review by Jeremy Carr. The variance of the interviews in Mavericks is part of what makes the book such an engaging read. No two are exactly alike, and any given conversation yields surprising and rewarding conclusions.” Gerald Peary makes it clear, from the very beginning, what readers can […]