All in the Family
If you had gone to a movie theater showing Before the Devil Knows You’re Dead in 2007 without knowing anything about it or who directed it, you’d probably think it was the work of a dynamic new...
View ArticleIn the Realm of Carson McCullers
When people talk about Southern Gothic literature, they are usually referring to writers such as William Faulkner, Tennessee Williams, Flannery O’Connor, Erskine Caldwell and Carson McCullers and...
View ArticlePedro Costa’s O Sangre
Most film aficionados known that the Cinema Novo movement of the 1960s in Brazil was influenced by both Neorealism and New Wave filmmakers but became an identifiable style of its own. Portugal also had...
View ArticleCity Unplugged
Movies about an ingenious heist or an elaborately staged robbery always come with set expectations from genre enthusiasts. Can they meet or surpass the gold bar standard set by earlier classics such as...
View ArticleQueen of the Roller Derby
Raquel Welch. Not a name that conjures up Oscar-winning movies. Instead, a vision of a cavegirl in a bikini comes to mind. Or maybe a buff female fitness instructor with a video line for women with...
View ArticleSun Tribe Redux
When Ishihara Shintaro died on February 1, 2022 at age 89, most obituaries focused on his career as a politician in Japan. He first served as a member of the House of Councillors (1968 to 1972) and...
View ArticleJoe Meek: Studio Recording Wizard
Most record collectors and music lovers of the baby boom generation fondly remember some of the top forty hits created by such innovative producers like Phil Spector, Bob Crewe and Eddie Kramer during...
View ArticleShattered Bodies, Shattered Souls
When director Fred Zinnemann left MGM Studios after his contract expired with Act of Violence in 1949, he embarked on a new career as an independent filmmaker. After trying to find a suitable movie...
View ArticleJohnny Rotten’s Alter Ego
Some movies fall through the cracks and then are rediscovered years later by movie geeks who are amazed that such formerly “lost films” even exist. Such is the case with Corrupt (1983), which was also...
View ArticleA Nouvelle Vague Musical?
Of the more than 120 movies and short films in director Jean-Luc Godard’s oeuvre, there is really nothing like Un Femme est une Femme (English title: A Woman is a Woman, 1961). What other Godard...
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