Posts By David Pountain

“It’s no use talking to me about art, I make pictures to pay the rent.” With all due respect to a legendary filmmaker, that famous quote from director John Ford is complete and utter hogwash. Ford may have been openly resentful of any analysis of his works and distrustful of intellectualism but his copious collection of films betrays a passion… Read more »

Looking at the ten films featured on this list, one can identify two distinct patterns regarding what’s happened to the western in the last fifteen years. The first is that westerns have become louder, pushing the genre’s exhilarating gunplay to explosive extremes in order to keep up with the modern day blockbuster. The second is that westerns have become quieter,… Read more »

There is a scene in the notoriously ugly 2003 Cat in the Hat film which sees the unintentionally scary titular feline zipping down a purple slide with the two children. When the young boy compares the experience to a ride at an amusement park, the Cat’s response is to look directly into the camera as he exclaims, “You mean like… Read more »