Love grows on adjacent farms in Ireland in Wild Mountain Thyme, the latest from writer/director John Patrick Shanley. Rosemary and Anthony have known each other their entire lives. Their families lived right next to each other, and they both ended up staying around home and each other. Rosemary stayed because of her lifelong crush on…
In Japanese mythology, Ame no Sakahoko (“upturned sky-spear”) was a hoko or halberd used by the twin gods Izanagi and Izanami to calm the primordial chaos and create the earth. According to some legends, the weapon was later gifted to the god Ninigi-no-Mikoto, who was sent to earth as its ruler. It’s said that he…
“As long as it’s a love song.” Gravitas has unveiled an official trailer for an indie documentary titled Sing Me a Song, made by acclaimed French doc filmmaker Thomas Balmès (Bosnia Hotel, Maharadja Burger, Happiness). This originally premiered at the Toronto Film Festival last year, and arrives on VOD in the US in early January….
★★★ Directed by: #JoeMantello Written by: #MartCrowley and #NedMartel Read moreA Guide to The Perfect Bong Joon-ho MarathonStarring: #JimParsons, #ZacharyQuinto, #MattBomer, #AndrewRannells, #CharlieCarver, #RobindeJesús, #BrianHutchison, #MichaelBenjaminWashington, #TucWatkins Film Review by: Corey Bulloch Read moreRobert Stack Finally Solves a Mystery in ‘The Strange and Deadly Occurrence’A lot has changed since the debut of The Boys in…
Coinciding with our new column The Noirvember Files and timed for the month of Noirvember, this list digs even deeper into the film noir genre to explain five film noir subgenres and highlight examples of each. Before we can venture into the wider subgenre sandbox, we need to define what “film noir” is, exactly. Read…
“The Joneses” is a comedic ode to the fundamental nature of the real family unit — and not the artifice constructed by four traveling salesman. Let’s back up here. Read moreA Guide to The Perfect Bong Joon-ho Marathon German filmmaker Derrick Borte’s 2009 satire follows four individuals — forty-somethings Kate and Steve (Demi Moore, David…
★★★★★ Directed by: #SamAshurov, #RazaRizvi Read moreA Guide to The Perfect Bong Joon-ho MarathonWritten by: #SamAshurov, #RazaRizvi Starring: #MarcoBermudez, #AnaMonfared, #SydneyAmanuel Read moreRobert Stack Finally Solves a Mystery in ‘The Strange and Deadly Occurrence’Film Review by: Patrick Foley Wouldn’t it have been great to grow up in a coming-of-age movie? Even as a supporting character,…
Welcome to The Noirvember Files, a new series dropping the spotlight on essential film noir selections. The titles celebrated here exemplify the style and substance of cinema’s grimiest, most-relatable underbelly. In this entry, we take on a missing person’s case with the private eye of Night Moves. This Noirvember, get to know the leading man of…
The 12th chapter of “The Mandalorian” begins with, you guessed it, a detour. What else can you expect for a show that wants to be busy but also do its world-building and plot development in increments? At least this pit-stop back to square one comes with old friends Greef Karga (Carl Weathers) and Cara Dunne (Gina Carano)—characters…
★★★★★ Directed by: #SergioPablos & #CarlosMartinezLopez Read moreA Guide to The Perfect Bong Joon-ho MarathonWritten by: #SergioPablos, #JimMahoney & #ZachLewis Starring: #JasonSchwartzman, #JKSimmons, #RashidaJones, #JoanCusack & #WillSasso Read moreRobert Stack Finally Solves a Mystery in ‘The Strange and Deadly Occurrence’Film Review by Connor Slatkoff Sharpe It’s almost that time of year again. Cold spells are…
While Darius Marder‘s significant debut as a director is titled Sound of Metal, there’s an old Simon & Garfunkel tune I know that may fit the bill a bit better. The film, which follows a passioned drummer (Riz Ahmed) who loses himself soon after losing his hearing, spends a great deal of time in silence….
In 1861, photographer Carleton E. Watkins lugged his custom-made oversized camera, designed to shoot on unusually large glass plate negatives, measuring 18 by 22 inches, to Yosemite in California. It was roughly 2,000 pounds of photography equipment that went with him, on the backs of mules, through the challenging terrain. His “mammoth” photos, using a…
Once upon a time a new George Clooney movie mattered. Later, the same could be said of a Clooney directorial project. Read moreA Guide to The Perfect Bong Joon-ho MarathonNow? Yes, the press will crank up the publicity machine for Clooney’s new Netflix film, “The Midnight Sky,” debuting Dec. 23. Read moreRobert Stack Finally Solves…
“The handler of phoenix, vicious and relentless killer!” Whoa!! A trailer has emerged from the Tokyo Film Festival for a Korean action comedy film titled Slate, marking the feature directorial debut of filmmaker Jo Bareun. This is world premiering at TFF this year but has no other release dates set yet and hasn’t shown up…
“I thought I had it all…” Freestyle Digital Media has debuted a trailer for the indie documentary Doin’ My Drugs, from filmmaker Tyler Q. Rosen. The title is a reference not to drugs, but to medicine, as the doc is about a musician who has HIV. This first premiered at the CPH:DOX Film Festival last…
Today, Greenwich is generally associated with the prime meridian, but this was not always the case. In fact, before Greenwich, the Ferro meridian was known as the original prime meridian since the times of ancient Greece. Read moreA Guide to The Perfect Bong Joon-ho MarathonThe idea of using the westernmost point in the world for…
“Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom” is a celebration of three real-life Black artists and legends. There’s the blues singer, often referred to as the “Mother of the Blues,” whose name and song give the film its title. There’s the author, August Wilson who, inspired by Rainey and the era she found fame in, crafted his 1984…
The Sounding is a tribute to William Shakespeare first and foremost, though that adoration often gets in the way of its storytelling. It’s also a passion project from Catherine Eaton, who directs, produces, and co-writes, adapted to a feature from Eaton’s 2015 short. (Though it played at festivals back in 2017, the film is only…
Oklahoma City-based designer and sculptor Hugh Meade crafted this sculpture dubbed “Intersection Point Zero,” a double intersecting arch of rusted steel and bright aluminum. It was designed as a specific place marker for human concepts such as “logical thinking” and “creativity,” much like the Greenwich Prime Meridian is a globally recognized marker for time. The…
On the edge of the town of Craven Arms in Shropshire, England, this moated structure was constructed during the 13th-century by a rich wool merchant known as Laurence of Ludlow. Laurence also obtained a license from the king to fortify the manor house by crenelating the walls as a means of protection against marauding Welsh…
The author’s book of poetry about Malinda Russell, Grimoire, was published in September 2020. From the moment I held the reprint of Mrs. Malinda Russell’s A Domestic Cookbook: Containing A Careful Selection of Useful Receipts for the Kitchen, I was smitten. The 39-page volume is the first known cookbook written by a Black woman: Russell…