Moral Permission to Murder
Dostoevsky and the case of Luigi Mangione.
Julia Friedman, David Hawkes
· 6 min read
Art and Culture
A collection of 726 posts
The Eerie Beauty of ‘Flow’
Gints Zilbalodis’s beautiful dystopian story feels like the start of a new era in cinema, or at least the invitation to one.
Roy Wayne Meredith III
· 5 min read
Savage Entertainment
A new version of Tinto Brass and Bob Guccione’s notorious 1979 film ‘Caligula’ provides a valuable record of one of the most fascinating disasters in cinema history.
Jaspreet Singh Boparai
· 30 min read
Megalopolis: Bloated, Outré—and Brilliant
Like a Hieronymus Bosch painting, it’s chaos alright—but it’s a dazzling chaos.
Ralph Leonard
· 8 min read
Decline and Folly
‘Megalopolis’ and the rise and fall of Francis Ford Coppola.
Oliver Jia
· 13 min read
The Baby Gate. A Memoir.
So that’s how a fatherhood ends. A few UPCs, like those you find on packs of toilet tissue, delivered via email.
Steve Salerno
· 23 min read
‘Bright Lights, Big City’ at Forty
Jay McInerney’s debut novel was the first work of fiction to explore yuppie culture, and its success changed American publishing.
Kevin Mims
· 16 min read
All Hail the New Flesh
For all its decorative asides about predatory male sexuality, ‘The Substance’ is most coherently understood as a morality tale about the folly of feminist illusions.
Charlotte Allen
· 11 min read
Sonny Side Up
Al Pacino’s personal life has been a bit of a train wreck, but his new memoir leaves no doubt that acting has been the most important thing in his life.
Kevin Mims
· 21 min read
Reading Nietzsche in Amsterdam
Lale Gül’s autobiographical novel about a young Muslim woman living in the Netherlands has led to death threats and ostracism. But it is a work of admirable intelligence and courage.
Brad Strotten
· 7 min read
A Joke Too Far?
Todd Phillips’s unfairly reviled sequel raises interesting questions about the artistic licence auteurs take with well-known properties.
Allan Stratton
· 11 min read
Blonde on Blonde
Andrew Dominik’s much-maligned film about the life and death of a screen icon claws through the sentimental myth-making in search of terrible truths.
Charlotte Allen
· 32 min read
Culture of Complaint and the New Deal Murals
Art in public spaces will always be scrutinised for the propriety of its iconography, and it will remain under attack as long as its guardians are willing to pander to the narcissistic impulses of the activists.
Julia Friedman
· 7 min read
Tales of Creation and Adaptation
The journey of two novels from mind to page to silver screen.
Allan Stratton
· 22 min read
Death of a Repentant Iconoclast
Steve Albini and the new problem with music.
Ari Gandsman
· 25 min read