Announcing My 2023 Movie Retrospective: Italian Neorealism
The more I’ve read about the movement — or oeuvre — or feeling, labeled “Italian neorealism,” particularly in recent months, the less of a grasp I feel I have on […]
Tag Archives: war
The Class of 2021: My Favorite Movies
A short story about breath: Having become fully vaccinated against COVID-19 a month ago, I’ve begun taking regular trips to the movie theater again. Few topics are as perennially popular […]
“We’ll Take a Cup of Kindness Yet” — My 10 Favorite Capra Movies
There’s no denying that the year 2020 was a fallow period for my blogging efforts. A set of new routines brought on by both personal and global events made it […]
Announcing My 2021 Movie Retrospective: The Films of Frank Capra
The director of my current choice for “favorite movie of all time” was a paradigmatic American success story: a Sicilian immigrant who rose through the ranks of a booming industry […]
Double Feature: For Sama and A Diary for Timothy
The shot lasts only about seventeen seconds, a simple downward tilt. First we see Sama, the young daughter of journalist and filmmaker Waad al-Kateab, being held by her father, Hamza, […]
Overdue: A City of Sadness
Here begins a new blog series, in which I pick at a list of movies that I’ve never seen before but really should have by now. The parameters are just […]
Tracing the Influence of Grand Illusion
Earlier this month, the Oscars happened, at which, to my great surprise and delight, Bong Joon-ho’s Parasite took home Best Picture in addition to three other awards. It bested eight competitors, […]
Double Feature: With Barton Fink In a Lonely Place
Welcome to Hollywood: where art goes to die, or so the story goes. Of all cinematic craftspeople, the writer is typically the most prone to cynicism, because the average screenwriter […]
“Every Soda Jerk in This Country’s Got an Idea He’s Somebody” — Class in The Best Years of Our Lives
William Wyler’s The Best Years of Our Lives is fondly remembered as an honest and heartfelt look at the struggles of returning veterans. More than seventy years later, not only have […]
Double Feature: Sans Soleil and Cameraperson
“Everything interested him.” These words are spoken by the unseen narrator early on in Chris Marker’s Sans Soleil. The “him” of the sentence is essentially Marker, though the speaker always refers […]
Geppetto's Clocks 