“Is it just me, or is Michael Bay giving a deliberate middle finger to the Coen Brothers?”

The most difficult part of writing a review for True Grit, the latest film from Joel and Ethan Coen, is resisting the urge to follow every sentence of praise, however moderated, with the word “but.”

Author’s note–this isn’t a review of the film, really. It’s a meditation spurred by seeing the film. If a critical judgment is implied by the nature of the meditation…c’est la vie. If some of my …

I never did attend film school or seminary, or design my own college major combining my two primary interests. And 25 years later, I’m not convinced Blood Simple is any more spiritually significant than any other noir-ish thriller that visits biblically proportioned consequences on the black hearts of its protagonists.

But God bless Cathleen Falsani for trying to convince me it is.