There is a fine line between “thorough analysis” and “looking too deeply” when it comes to watching movies. After all, perceiving “The Care Bears Movie” as a Deep State psychedelic-warfare training video is an all too common conclusion made by many a cinephile. Nonetheless, if a movie is well made, its politics, a catch-all term for themes and ideas, can… Read more »
First of all, I’d like to say that I, too, am not the biggest fan of saying something that people hold dear is “overrated.” Especially a performance, for I am neither a performer nor an academic in the field of performing arts. I am most definitely not Stanislavski. My knowledge is limited to reading books about acting and watching films…. Read more »
Some actors are lucky enough to be one of almost every movie goers’ favorite actors. Marlon Brando, Al Pacino, Robert De Niro… these are some pretty heavy names, and you can also add to this list an actor that belongs to a younger generation. This actor would be none other than Edward Norton. Usually dubbed as the best actor of… Read more »
In Eleanor Coppola’s documentary Heart of Darkness, her husband Francis laments, “Nothing is so terrible as a pretentious movie. I mean a movie that aspires for something really terrific and doesn’t pull it off is shit, it’s scum…and everyone will walk on it as such.” Of course Coppola is saying that he’d rather make a pretentious film than one that… Read more »
Even the greatest filmmakers are not infallible. A director with the sharpest eye and the clearest creative vision and the strongest command of the form can still fall into some of the traps that make a bad movie. You can never be entirely certain what will click with an audience or what the critics will be looking out for or… Read more »
Nowadays, it’s fun to say “Interstellar” is the film that’s the most incredibly complex, philosophical, and hard to understand. It’s also fun to know that such statement is a fallacy, be it a good movie or not. When discussing difficult cinema, we’re referencing art and poetry. Surrealism, experimentation, fantasy, and puzzles. These are the subjects we are presenting in this… Read more »
There are many different approaches one can have when making a film, and one can certainly stick to the script and to whatever gets planned in pre-production. Many directors are known for wanting to plan in advance everything that will end up in the film, down to the last line. But sometimes, a great cinematic moment comes from something that… Read more »
There are hundreds, if not thousands, of films made and released each year. It’s impossible to see them all, no matter how hard you tried. Some films are lucky enough to become cult classics and build a fanbase which appreciates and spreads high praises for the films. However this is not and cannot always be the case. So many films… Read more »
Some horror movies are considered greats, and some are considered just plain awful. Much of the time, critics and audiences agree on which films belong in these categories. Every now and then, there are films that many find to be brilliant works within the genre, while others are left scratching their heads wondering why everyone is head over heels for… Read more »
Each decade has its own classics, sequels and rip-offs of those classics, trademarks and clichés. The 1990s were the era of serial killers, as Jonathan Demme and David Fincher pushed the boundaries in their respective hits, “Silence of the Lambs” and “Se7en”, studious were interested in to give us more. Nowadays sex don’t sell as major studios try to avoid… Read more »
In the jewelry world its Tiffany. In the auto world its Rolls Royce. In old Hollywood it was MGM. There is always a gold standard bearer of some kind in virtually every field one might mention. In the world of home video, at least in the countries in which this company markets its line, that standard bearer is The Criterion… Read more »
Well, Valentine’s Day isn’t around the corner, but that doesn’t mean that we can’t celebrate the neural chemical reaction we have all come to interpret as “love”. We watch violent films as an escapism. We sit through horror films to experience that we never wish to witness in real life. We put on comedies to get a good laugh. Sometimes,… Read more »
Film is an artistic medium, and like all artistic mediums, there is the potential to use subtext and allegories and re-appropriation of concepts to make a point about society or politics or religion or culture or the media or, well, pretty much anything. There are plenty of socially conscious directors, like Martin Scorsese or Oliver Stone, who are always looking… Read more »
The 21st century has been very diverse for the world of cinema. On one hand, we got lots of multi-million dollar blockbusters and superhero movies, which have flooded movie theatres. Unfortunately most of them were just money-making tools, rather than being a piece of art, but on the other hand, we got widely different types of beautiful movies from older… Read more »
Psychological horrors have become something special over the last few years. Not that they ever went into obscurity, but over the last five years or so, there’s been an unbelievable release of uncompromising and challenging psychological horrors that offer an alternative for those looking for something “more meaningful” to their horror. Of late, the perceived success of a horror film… Read more »
As you will know, the medium of cinema can often stir quite the debate. Audiences analyse and enjoy films in different ways, so it comes as no surprise that two people can watch a film together and feel completely oppositional feelings towards it. Yet, this doesn’t have to be seen as a negative thing. Often, the best films to discuss… Read more »
