Every now and then when teaching film, you get to introduce a budding cinephile to Citizen Kane for the first time. It is not uncommon in my experience for their initial response to it to …

A well deserved Academy Award (for best documentary) went to Gibney’s investigation into the policies and practices that created the Abu Ghraib scandal. Eschewing sensationalistic tactics and avoiding an over-reliance on the photos themselves (which …

Question: What do the following actors have in common?: Jack Lemmon, Billy Crystal, Keanu Reeves, Nathan Lane, Robin Williams, Alicia Silverstone.

Answer: They were all exposed trying to do Shakespeare.

What makes the film’s ending so sad and tragic is that I’m not sure that the characters themselves know. One can only spend so much time trying to keep truth hidden before one begins to lose the ability to recognize what it is.

A lot of critical ink has been used to talk about how politically brave the film is, given that the outcome of the war was in no ways assured in 1940. So I was ready for the political satire and the humanistic speech at the end. Here’s what I wasn’t ready for–how darn funny the film can be.

There is no way this film should be this good. A retelling of Herman Melville’s “Billy Budd” set in the French Foreign Legion, directed by a woman born in France, and culminating with an electric break dance by the Claggart character (Denis Lavant as Galoup)? Are you kidding me?