The Liberators (Bryant, 2016)
Pop quiz: You find out your father/brother/uncle/neighbor stole a bunch of priceless religious artifacts from an abbey in Nazi Germany. What do you do?
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Phil’s Camino — Sneak Peek
Phil’s Camino gets its premiere at SXSW this month. From the film’s press release: Directed by filmmaker, pilgrim and author, Annie O’Neil and filmmaker Jessica Lewis, the engaging films tells… Continue reading "Phil’s Camino — Sneak Peek"
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An Inconvenient Truth (Guggenheim, 2006) — 10 Years Later
In HBO’s psychotherapy melodrama In Treatment, Paul Weston (Gabriel Byrne) shares a counselor’s riddle with a patient: “Why doesn’t a cigarette smoker think a cigarette can kill him?”… Continue reading "An Inconvenient Truth (Guggenheim, 2006) — 10 Years Later"
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The Devil Wears Prada (Frankel, 2006) — 10 Years Later
It’s morning in Manhattan and the legion of the city’s models rise. They dress in a beautiful catalog of lingerie, skirts and stilettos and open their cabinets full of luxury makeup and eyeliner. When they hail taxis with cutting precision, they clutch their designer purses in their other arms. All of this opening scene takes place to the sound of KT Tunstall 2005 pop hit, “Suddenly I See,” which is perhaps a little too on the mark. We hear lyrics like, “She’s a beautiful girl / and everything around her is a silver pool of light,” and “Suddenly I see / This is what I want to be,” and we can’t help but wonder if The Devil Wears Prada will be 109 minutes of glorifying the fashion industry.
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“Telling a Great Story” — An Interview with Disney’s Mark Henn
There is a certain stigma attached to adults watching animated films, as if they are doing something that is only for children. Henn works to change that misconception, “We create films that are hopefully enjoyed by everybody.”
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Is Snow White Still Essential?
When was the last time you actually watched Snow White?
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My Best Picture Choice: Room
By any standard, Room is a film full of meaning. But compared to the other contenders for Best Picture, including Spotlight, The Big Short and The Revenant, Room possesses a singularly ambitious vision.
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My Best Picture Choice: Mad Max: Fury Road
The sheer spectacle of Fury Road is almost on the scale of grand opera; it's dominated and driven forward by form and design.
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Breathe (Laurent, 2015)
Friendships are often an incalculable mix of ecstasy and disillusionment.
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My Best Picture Choice: Spotlight
The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences announced its nominees for the Oscars this week. With the exception of the omission of Todd Haynes’s Carol (a film I… Continue reading "My Best Picture Choice: Spotlight"