Review: Bong Joon-ho’s ‘Parasite’ (Black and White Edition)
“The black and white edition of ‘Parasite’ is a gift, and the real beacon shining brightly in the dark.”
Easy Riders, Paper Moons: The Trouble with Classifying Peter Bogdanovich
“If New Hollywood was an attempt to shape the future in novel ways, Bogdanovich was manifestly more interested in looking back, in reaction over revolution, in conforming his artistic impulses to an unambiguously Golden Age Hollywood influence.”
Review: Dave Franco’s ‘The Rental’
“The ideas present are intriguing, however The Rental’s ultimate staying power is questionable.”
Review: Joko Anwar’s ‘Impetigore’
“Indonesian horror has been gradually finding its feet over the past few years, and ‘Impetigore’ shows that we’ve barely even scratched the surface.”
Collecting Movies with Mallory O’Meara
Greg Carlson Interviews Mallory O’Meara (‘The Lady from the Black Lagoon’) About Movie Collecting
Exploring Gender in Masaaki Yuasa’s ‘The Night Is Short, Walk on Girl’
“‘The Night Is Short, Walk on Girl’ feels like an inadvertent political statement, a continuation of the status quo in the romantic comedy genre. Still, there is something there.”
Why Criticism: Film as a Business First
“Film criticism unable to confront film’s relationship to business is destined to fail and will continue to reproduce the same tired critiques of cinema.”
Lodge Kerrigan’s ‘Clean, Shaven’ and the Cinematic Virtue of Empathy
“‘Clean, Shaven’ depicts a culture in which there is little empathy for the mentally ill, perhaps because it is a culture influenced by fictional portrayals in which people like Peter are predominately unfeeling mad killers.”
Local Heroes: Elle Haywood on Arts Picturehouse Cambridge
“Arts Picturehouse Cambridge unearthed the feisty, passionate person that I am today, and made me want to help change the cinematic landscape for the better.”
Review: Natalie Erika James’ ‘Relic’
“A haunting study of Grecian prophecies and inherited mental illness, ‘Relic’ makes beasts of the mind.”
A Stirring Tale of Friendship: Kelly Reichardt’s ‘First Cow’
“Behold the elegance and oft-cited aesthetic minimalism with which Reichardt unfolds so many thoughts and ideas about race, representation and gender.”
Review: Aaron Schneider’s ‘Greyhound’
“Greyhound’s inability to venture further into the depths of wartime psychology leaves it susceptible to being forgotten just as quickly as it emerged.”
The Disaster Area: From ‘Airport’ to ‘Airplane!’ – Part Four
Part Four of a Four-Part Disaster Movie Series by Bill Bria
Review: Natalie Erika James’ ‘Relic’
“James’ arresting, emotional and attention-grabbing film understands that what’s most frightening is barely glimpsed and feels disarmingly normal.”
Understanding Nobuhiko Ōbayashi: From ‘House’ to ‘Hanagatami’
“No director has been able to replicate Nobuhiko Ōbayashi’s iridescent, hallucinatory and infectious passion for film.”
‘But I’m a Cheerleader’: Celebrating 20 Years of Style and Sincerity
“In cinema, it’s tough to depict sincerity without it coming across as contrived or sickly-sweet, but it’s a feeling that myself and many others yearn for, especially when it comes together as beautifully as it does in ‘But I’m a Cheerleader.'”
Review: Jeffrey A. Brown’s ‘The Beach House’
“‘The Beach House’ signals an exciting new star in horror.”
Review: Spike Jonze’s ‘Beastie Boys Story’
“If you listen to Beastie Boys, Jonze’s technique — a familiar blend of rough and smooth, high tech and low tech — comes correct. If you don’t listen to Beastie Boys, the movie serves as a biographical and musical introduction.”
Review: Boaz Yakin’s ‘Aviva’
“Aviva and Eden’s dances — together and apart — mobilize Yakin’s film, and function as bodily mirrors and emotional mirages; gain and loss, self and love.”
Review: Shannon Murphy’s ‘Babyteeth’
“Much of Babyteeth’s vitality can be located in the way each of the central characters is so fully realized.”