Quite often, movies, books, music, television shows, and other pieces of pop culture serve as a reflection of the time when they were made. Sometimes they are very much rooted in that time, and no longer feel relevant in the decades that follow. Occasionally, though, they maintain every ounce of the power they were infused with when they were first […]
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Often, this column tends to focus on moments, scenes, or sequences that serve as a capsule or summation of the larger themes presented in a particular film. However, there is something to be said of moments that stand out simply because they are beautiful, touching, or powerful all on their own. These are the moments that often take our breath […]
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In my last column, I discussed how cinema is essentially a medium that is built upon its own history, with countless directors using their own films as excuses to pay homage to those that inspired them. Whether it come in the form of lifting a particular bit of technical flair like a camera movement or editing choice, or the outright […]
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Over the last decade and change, movie goers have been overwhelmed by a deluge of superhero movies. Most of them have been good to great, while others are best forgotten altogether. At any rate, it’s a good time to be a comic book fan who also happens to love movies. While Bryan Singer’s seminal X-Men flick is usually considered to […]
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It is a common practice for filmmakers to pay homage to the films and filmmakers that inspired them. From Star Wars to Boogie Nights, from Dressed to Kill to Sukiyaki Western Django, and from Night of the Living Dead to Pulp Fiction, cinema history can be read as a long list of directors who are showing respect to those who […]
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These days, it seems like you can’t spit without hitting a found-footage horror film. The odds of hitting a good one (or even a truly great one) are much, MUCH slimmer, but because they are cheap to make and they usually rake in the dough, Hollywood (not to mention all those young up and coming horror directors out there who […]
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Joseph Hall once wrote “Death borders upon our birth, and our cradle stands in the grave.” In other words, like it or not, death is an inevitability for all of us. Therefore, it should come as no surprise that death features prominently in popular culture. Countless films, books, poems, and songs feature death as a prominent theme, often in an […]
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Cinema is an interesting art form, in that it is made up of a number of other art forms, including theater, painting, music, and writing (among others). Not all films can be considered art, nor should they all strive to be, but when they do rise to that level, they become something that can help us better understand ourselves, and […]
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There is a long tradition of films that mix horror and comedy, going at least all the way back to the Harold Lloyd film Haunted Spooks (1920). Sometimes it works (An American Werewolf in London, Shaun of the Dead), but quite often it doesn’t (Dracula: Dead and Loving It, Evil Toons). The reason so many films that attempt to mix […]
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It’s March, which means it’s time for St. Patrick’s Day, the annual celebration of all things Irish. It also means that spring is in the air, and as Alfred Lord Tennyson (or was it Lord Alfred Hayes…I can never remember) taught us, that’s the time when a young man’s fancy lightly turns to thoughts of love. So as a way […]
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