Movie critics (and this includes me) are too easily tempted into being snarky, sarcastic, and arrogant. We rush to be the first to call things “the best” this, and “the most” that, and the ___________ of the year, and the __________ to beat in 2009, and a _____________ like no other. I’m wearying more and more of critics who merely shout about what they don’t like, or who pretend the authority to make claims about a film’s place in history... Read more
Ebert has just published one of his most thought-provoking, personal, revealing commentaries. I hope you’ll read the whole thing. Read more
Lighthouse Academy has discovered Cyndere’s Midnight. And I’m grateful for the kind words she’s posted. Read more
Michael Leary of film-think links to CT Movies’ 10 Most Redeeming Films of 2008. And then he responds: As a matter of fact, I also consider “redemption” to be a controlling critical factor in what I think of as “good” or “bad” cinema. But I would want to expand it, even redeem the term “redemptive” from the way it is so easily tossed about in evangelical cultural criticism. By now it is subject to Walker Percy’s condemnation of how generic... Read more
Director Michael Radford, who cast Al Pacino as Shylock in The Merchant of Venice, has cast him again… this time as Lear. This is interesting, since Anthony Hopkins and Ian McKellen have also played Lear within the past several months. (Remember this report from last May?) Read more
1. I found some time during my travels to jot down thoughts on an overlooked, underrated fantasy film — Penelope — and its relationship with other “Beauty and the Beast” tales. 2 Someday, Charlie Kaufman will make a movie about the career of Terry Gilliam, depicting the astonishing, relentless calamities that befall the imaginative director. Everyone knows that Heath Ledger died in the middle of filming Gilliam’s upcoming picture. If you’ve seen Lost in La Mancha, you know what I... Read more
Author and blogger Michael Dubruiel died today. He was an inspiring writer. Please pray for his wife, one of my favorite bloggers, Amy Welborn, and for their young children. Amy shared this heartbreaking news on her site today. Read more
Shusaku Endo’s Silence is the most harrowing novel I’ve ever read (yes, even harsher than The Road), and one of the most moving and profound. I’ve been reading about Martin Scorsese’s plans to make a film version for several years now, trying to imagine how anyone could translate that riveting nightmare of a story to the big screen. Well, if he’s going to do it, he certainly moving in the right direction. This news is going to make it hard... Read more
UPDATE: OKAY, OKAY… so the YouTube link is dead. Who cares? Now you can see it in HD on Apple’s trailers page. Read more
Jake Chism at The Christian Manifesto asked me a bunch of questions… and I answered them. Lo and behold, here’s the conversation, chock full-o revelations about Cyndere’s Midnight, my favorite movie of 2008 (which won’t be released until 2009, if it is ever released at all), Read more
Looking Closer
Ad-Free & Subscriber Log-In