…. and Ty Burr has the best editorial use of an illustration photo.
A couple of things:
1) Went recently to the Kendall to see Jean-Pierre Melville’s Army of Shadows, a late 60s film about the French Resistance. Superb. Somehow, Melville brings to bear all the poetic realism and existential beauty of the French gangster genre to the historical film. Simone Signoret gives a great performance as well. Go […]
Maybe it’s because I’m not a huge Searchers - or John Ford - fan that this A.O. Scott claim struck me as wrong-headed in the extreme.
Ernest Hemingway once said that all of American literature could be traced back to one book, Mark Twain’s “Huckleberry Finn,” and something similar might be said of American cinema and […]
Perusing the IMDB user comments (on the film Privelege), I encountered the following:
A film society at my school showed this movie for free in a lecture hall last night. Though nothing beats a free movie, the guy running the whole thing introduced it as one that had been totally panned by critics, never released on […]
I have a personal genre of films that I’m especially fond of: movies that are uninspiring throughout their duration but have some sort of fantastic payoff at the end. There are, of course, a myriad of ways the start of the film can be uninspiring. Some, like Antonioni’s Passenger, use narrative tedium as a foil against the […]
This weekend sees the annual Independent Film Festival Boston screening at independent venue around the city, mostly north of the river. The Globe critics have their suggestions at their blog and an article on the offerings. Cynthia Rockwell is posting her reviews. Self-Reliant Film highly recommends LOL and has an interview with the filmmakers.
This seems […]
It’s not exactly billed as such - it excludes Hollywood and other large-scale studio productions - but Paul gives us a tough name-the-films quiz that does touch upon much of the film canon. I think I have 20 answers out of 33 so far, will have to see if I can figure out more.
A note in the Globe detailed a party celebrating film production in Massachusetts:
Boston will never be a Hollywood back lot, but tax incentives aimed at bringing more movie and TV deals to the Bay State may be helping. At a party Monday to celebrate the new law, people in high places were predicting the Hub […]
Much thanks to Diana at Causeway Film, who not only informs me that the world now has a blog devoted to Carrie Bradshaw’s questions (hello, Jennifer!), but also warns me of a possible film adaptation of Battle of Algiers, with Tom Cruise. As James Wolcott is wont to say, it’s futile asking if they have […]
Is it really possible that we’re already to Final Destination 3, but only at Big Momma’s House 2?
My friend Paul, an independent filmmaker formerly in Knoxville, now based in Philadelphia, has started a blog that, even if I didn’t know him, I’d hearily recommend to those interested in independent film. Self-Reliant Filmmaking is a compendium of news, advice, reflections on distribution and commentary on filmmaking aesthetics. The best place to start may […]
Diana gives an excellent list of recommended holiday films, including my favorite, Christmas in Conneticut. I’ve yet to see horror flick You Better Watch Out (a.k.a Christmas Evil), but sadly, Netflix doesn’t carry it.
Any favorites you’d add?
Charley at Blue Mass points me to Weekly Dig editor Joe Keohane’s screed against Cambridge film audiences. (Disclosure: I’m acquainted with Joe.) As someone who’s railed against Cambridge Film Audience Syndrome (CFAS) for some time, I’m glad to see others share my annoyance.
Big news today (from here, via Universal Hub) is the Brattle Theatre’s call for help, specifically a warning that if it doesn’t meet $400,000 fundraising goal it’s going to shut its doors. Part of it’s a story of the changes Harvard Square has seen, facing both "mallification" and retail recession. As their website complains,
BFF and […]
Today I remember why Dave Kehr’s Tuesday column is my favorite feature in the Times:
"Rear Window" is yellowish and grainy, and "Vertigo" has mysteriously shifted to a reddish purple. But the biggest problem is the completely factitious surround soundtrack that has been grafted to "Vertigo," a spectacular betrayal of Hitchcock’s intentions that I’ve come to […]