Christopher Smith’s “The Banishing,” premiering today on Shudder after a brief fest run, has the stately style and tone of a classical period piece, but it’s also kind of insane. It blends what one would expect from something like “The Haunting of Bly Manor” (and there’s a dose of Mike Flanagan’s “Oculus” along the way…

Since it first opened in 2000, Tateishi Burger has been a favorite of those who enjoy oddities, which are known in Japan as “B-spots.” Located in a quiet neighborhood, its raggedy façade may not lure in a lot of passersby, but it never ceases to attract said B-spot enthusiasts from around the country. Read moreA Guide…

Few humans live in the Falkland Islands, an archipelago in the Atlantic Ocean off the southern coast of Argentina. But there is a lot of wildlife, especially seabirds, including the largest breeding population of black-browed albatrosses in the world. Considered endangered as recently as 2013, the numbers of these big migrators have since rebounded, and…

The cancellation of the 2020 San Francisco International Film Festival was one of the things that really let me know that COVID was happening and here to stay. Attending the longest-running festival in the Western hemisphere is one of the highlights of living in the Bay Area; it’s something I always look forward to and…

When he was about nine or 10 years old, Devadatta Rajadhyaksha read the book The Adventures of Dennis, by Victor Dragunsky. Rajadhyaksha was mesmerized by naughty little Dennis, who kept grass snakes, lizards, and frogs in his pockets, made funny faces in front of the mirror, and liked to hop and skip. The book was…

“This city chews ’em up, and it spits ’em out.” Saban Films + Paramount have released an official trailer for yet another small town football underdog sports story called Under the Stadium Lights, also known as Brother’s Keeper. The film tells the true story of the 2009 Abilene High School Football team. After a crushing…

Late night shows often burst out of the gate with all the celebrity firepower they can muster. For Chevy Chase, that meant corralling on-screen partner Goldie Hawn, along with fellow Oscar winner Whoopi Goldberg, for his anticipated 1993 debut. We all know what happened next. Suffice to say the Chevy Chase Theatre is known more…

The Nave de Motores de Pacífico (Pacifico Engine Shed) was designed by the Spanish architect Antonio Palacios. It is an outstanding example of clarity and functionality, and a perfect model of industrial building in the 1920s. Read moreA Guide to The Perfect Bong Joon-ho MarathonThe engine shed was built in 1922 and 1923 and started…

Like partners doing a tango, two rivers in Nunavut, Canada, become a single unit without losing their individual appearance as they move sinuously across the tundra. The darker Back River flows north toward the Arctic Ocean. Along the way, its tributary, the Hayes River, a light, milky blue, joins it but remains visually distinct for…

★★★★ Directed by: #AdamBailey Read moreA Guide to The Perfect Bong Joon-ho MarathonWritten by: #SophieDutton Starring: #EmillieThomasCurtis, #MarkLewisJones, #SharonMorgan Read moreRobert Stack Finally Solves a Mystery in ‘The Strange and Deadly Occurrence’Short Film Review by Taryll Baker Winter is fast approaching, and everyone is getting ready for a nice long sleep… but a certain Little…

Why are we still doing this? Aren’t we past this? Hasn’t culture evolved to a point where autism is given better representation? We’ve come so far in trying to push back against homophobia, transphobia, racism, and sexism in film. But here we are again, once more saddled with another ableist film. So why are we…

The word Spelter means commercial or smelted zinc. Beginning in 1910, workers from Spain were brought to this company town in West Virginia to operate a new zinc smelter. Read moreA Guide to The Perfect Bong Joon-ho MarathonOver the next 90 years, some four billion pounds of slab zinc were produced, along with 400 million…

The Moorten Family Botanical Gardens was created to share the beauty and extraordinary varieties of desert plants with everyone who visits. It was established in 1938 by Chester “Cactus Slim” Moorten and his wife, Patricia, and features desert trees, plants, and cacti come from around the world and range in size from miniature to giants. Read…

Until it was restored in 1994, this first century Roman theatre in Spain was a magnificent ruin visible on the hillside from a long distance. Though the restoration has made it functional once again, it has covered up much of this historic structure.  Read moreA Guide to The Perfect Bong Joon-ho MarathonThe theatre was originally…

Irish doctoral student Fionnan O’Connor has been chasing ghosts. He is not pursuing the spectres of deceased warriors or poets, but rather forgotten Irish drinks. In a personal quest that has taken him from quiet university libraries to modern distilleries, he is determined to revive rare spirits made using old-fashioned methods and ingredients, specifically pot-still…

There’s nothing to do but waste time in Limbo, the latest from writer/director Ben Sharrock. It’s never easy to wait, but it’s excruciating when you’re waiting to hear about something as life-altering as your asylum application. That’s exactly the situation Omar finds himself in, forced to wile away time in a strange but quiet part of…

Located in an unassuming suburb of Hof, Fernweh Park is an eclectic collection of thousands of city and street signs from all corners of the world. The park takes its name from the German word Fernweh (literally: “far away-pain”), which is the exact opposite of homesickness (Heimweh), and means “a painful longingness to travel”—proving again…

By their very nature, spy series require a certain amount of twists and turns. Secret motives, double crosses, and hidden identities are all necessary aspects of the genre, and “Spy City,” which premieres on AMC+ on April 15, rightly possesses them. As MI6 spy Fielding Scott, Dominic Cooper is in Daniel Craig-James Bond mode, all…

When the first royal palace of modern Greece was being designed, Queen Amalia assumed oversight of the design of the Royal Gardens. Upon seeing Amalia’s proposed design King Otto, a hunting enthusiast, noticed that the far end of the gardens were near an area he had hunted birds in the past. Based on this, Otto…

As with any artist, a great tofu maker relies on his instincts. And for Lin Yih-Cheng, those instincts kick in when the soy milk begins to curdle in the hot wok. He prods the half-liquid, half-solid mush gently with the tip of his spoon, and adds a bit more coagulant—a solution that looks just like…

Lou Simon, who is making a name for herself in the indie horror film world as The Mistress of Suspense, has had a long battle with getting her film Agoraphobia released in the United States but it has finally made its way to streaming services. She gave us an inside scoop on the nightmare that…