Just when we thought we’d seen the one billionth iteration of the auteur argument in cinema, now we have to deal with it on television. Look, I get it! Television is hard. It takes a lot of people to put out that 22-44 minutes of televised entertainment. Even in the …
Well, that was unexpected, wasn’t it? Another major terrorist attack on a Western city was probably inevitable, but it was still shocking. The coordinated attacks on various locations in Paris on a busy weekend, by all indications planned and carried out by members of ISIS, left over a hundred innocent …
Let’s talk about Hitler for a little bit. No, no, not about going back in time and killing the baby version of him. We can all agree that this is nice clean fun, and in terms of using it to retroactively secure our national security, Jeb Bush (pardon me, Jeb! Bush) …
During the Paris Commune of 1871 — one of the first and still one of the greatest attempts by ordinary people to throw off the rule of priests, bosses, and money-men and take control of their own lives — a group of Communards, mostly workers and craftsmen, set off towards …
As anyone who has spent any time on Facebook — a cohort that, at last count, includes 92% of the human population of Earth, including pre-technological hunter-gatherer tribes in central Africa and your mom — knows, Words With Friends is one of the most popular games in the history of …
While the visitor from abroad or the hinterlands will find New York a largely agreeable clime, from the silvered canyons of finance on Wall Street to the richly variegated taxi dispatch yards of Castle Hill Avenue, it cannot be denied that there are, in these uncertain economic times, organized groups …
It is often said of films — documentaries in particular — that they are either timeless and universal, or that they capture a very specific time and place. Chris Marker’s first feature film, Le Joli Mai (co-directed with cameraman Pierre Lhomme), manages the neat trick of being both of those things. …
The film that Robert Bresson made in 1983, L’Argent, would be the last he would ever make. It is, if nothing else, a movie made by a director in full command of his intentions, a work of art created by someone who knew exactly what he wanted to do and would …
So, yesterday, we talked about problematic art, and how it can be dealt with in a productive and respectful way and not in a way that’s just griping that doesn’t accomplish anything. Hooray! I’m solving all the world’s problems! Now let’s talk about the concept of “allies”. Like “problematic”, this …
“Little things that just don’t matter,” goes a Quasi lyric often quoted by my partner, “still could get me mad as a hatter”. Yes, folks, we’ve been putting it off for a long time, and I’m not any happier about it than you are, but it’s time we finally had …
The genius of Stan Lee — and he was a man possessed of genius, despite the bad press he’s generated in recent years since translating that genius into a fortune that was denied to many of his employees — is that he was able to see the way the wind …
There is much talk these days of the embarrassment of riches to be found on television these days; TV is the new cinema, as we are told by an endless succession of thinkpieces by TV critics eager to defend the importance of their jobs. This both is and is not …
Excitement is hardly in short supply this year when it comes to politics, but the Republican Party, apparently committed to its position as a third-place network who will throw absolutely anything at the viewing audience just to see what sticks, is offering us fare like those overstuffed modern dramas where something …
Last night, the Chicago Cubs were swept out of baseball’s post-season after being completely manhandled by the New York Mets, and today, they will prepare to do what they have done for the last 107 years: watch two other teams play in the World Series. I enjoyed watching the Cubs …
Chantal Akerman died two weeks ago. Her death was a shock to the film world, or at least that part of it that still considers cinema to be an art form and its geniuses worthy of commemoration; she was only 65 years old and in relatively good health, and she …
