In Real Life: ‘Slender Man’ and the Clash of Media
“Just as the internet unleashed the Slenderman, it is culpable in bringing forth another seductive monster who uses this technology to warp minds and sow division…”
In Kubrick’s Shadow: Tony Zierra’s ‘Filmworker’
“Zierra builds several excellent sequences detailing Vitali’s sponge-like thirst for film production knowledge and the benefits it yielded (and continues to yield), including a virtually perfect and encyclopedic recall regarding Kubrick’s exacting color timing specifications.”
Vague Visages Is FilmStruck: Jeremy Carr on Steve James’ ‘Hoop Dreams’
“As much as ‘Hoop Dreams’ concerns the sports-centric plight of William and Arthur, it is perhaps even more significantly an illustrative case study of what perpetually imperils men (and women) of a certain social, economic and racial constitution.”
In the Shadow of ‘The Hairy Bird’
“Given what we now know about Weinstein’s welding of harassment, assault and power to control the women in his professional orbit, it’s uncanny that a seemingly frivolous film about a girls boarding school could share such parallels with the #MeToo movement.”
‘First Man’: Damien Chazelle and Ryan Gosling Take a Moonwalk
“I kept imagining an alternate, 84-minute version of the movie made by Chazelle in his early 20s for 60,000 dollars, and decided it would almost certainly be more interesting and entertaining than the 2018 number that cost more than 60 million bucks.”
How to Lose Control: Understanding Children and Insecurity with ‘The New Man’
Ella Kemp Interviews ‘The New Man’ Filmmakers/Subjects Devorah Baum and Josh Appignanesi
Looking Back at Steven Soderbergh’s ‘sex, lies, and videotape’
“Despite its salacious subject matter — sexuality, infidelity and voyeurism — the movie contains shockingly few sex scenes, but still remains erotically charged nearly 30 years later.”
Empathy Through Voyeurism: ‘Bad Times at the El Royale’ Review
“Goddard delineates his film from its influences by focusing almost exclusively on character. Rather than a story filled with twists and turns and manipulation of the audience, ‘Bad Times at the El Royale’ presents each character’s story as a solo vignette, before tying it into the overarching drama.”
Sensual Synths and Death Drones: Listening to ‘It Follows’
“The quickening tempo of non-diegetic, alienating sounds should not be simply viewed as part of a film score, but as an access point into the fear-induced perspectives of the victims within this film world.”
Someone Else’s War: A Reckoning with Clint Eastwood’s ‘American Sniper’
“Movies aren’t proverbs — their morals are questionable, their questions are impossible to answer. This is the case for good films, at least.”