A collection of 12 posts
Middlebrow movies weren’t just two-hour escape pods, they functioned as a civic glue, a source of shared language, cross-generational references, and indeed, contemporary American myth.
Stanley Kubrick’s comic masterpiece ‘Dr Strangelove’ remains a potent allegory for our times.
Pasolini's 1964 film reimagines the gospels as fundamentally Jewish stories.
‘Psycho’ deserves recognition as a classic film for the festive season.
A new book looks back on the making of Billy Wilder’s American classic.
Before Han Solo and Indiana Jones, there was another Harrison Ford, a star of silent cinema.
‘Rebel Without a Cause’ remains a landmark classic, seventy years after its release.
Against long odds and in the face of exclusionary casting, Anna May Wong bequeathed us an extraordinary cinematic legacy.
An account of all the lives Corman touched, the careers he helped to jump-start, and the genres he pioneered would fill several books.
Peter Benchley’s ‘Jaws’ turns 50.
Most new movies feature neither good storytelling nor innovative filmmaking. Instead, they rely on the nostalgia of ready-made fan bases.
Meg Smaker’s film about the rehabilitation of former Guantanamo terror suspects was nuanced and sympathetic. But the mob didn’t care.