8 years ago
FullWidth (10 posts found)
Adam McKay: From “The Other Guys” To “The Big Short”
Director Adam McKay’s jump from some of the most notorious bro comedies of the millennia (Anchorman, Talladega Nights) to The Big Short, a film about the global economic recession, might seem extreme even to discerning moviegoers. But those familiar with McKay...
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Adult Beginners: “The Silence of the Lambs”
Every other week, Alissa Wilkinson looks back at an iconic piece of cinema in the Adult Beginners column. The twist? She's watching each of these films for the first time, approaching them with fresh eyes and mature context. This week, she's discussing The Sil...
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Adult Beginners: “Chinatown”
Every other week, Alissa Wilkinson looks back at an iconic piece of cinema in the Adult Beginners column. The twist? She's watching each of these films for the first time, approaching them with fresh eyes and mature context. This week, she's discussing Chinato...
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Through a Glass Lovingly: The Cinematography of Todd Haynes
In Todd Haynes’ Carol, the only time we are with Therese Belivet (Rooney Mara) is in the car on the way to Carol Aird’s (Cate Blanchett) home in New Jersey. By “with,” this means when the audience is truly given the opportunity to grasp her mentality and emoti...
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How Timothy Dalton’s James Bond Was The Proto-Daniel Craig
“You were fantastic. We’re free!” Kara Milovy, the blonde sniper-rifle-holstering cellist swoons. “Kara, we’re inside a Russian airbase in the middle of Afghanistan,” James Bond retorts.
From other mouths, perhaps even Roger Moore’s, the latter line’s quippis...
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The Kingdom of the Sick on Film in 2015
If we ask the movies of 2015 to tell us what a person dealing with mental health issues looks like, who looks back at us? It could be Sarah Silverman’s character in I Smile Back, a suburban housewife afflicted with addiction and possible manic depression. Or i...
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On The Rhythms of Sorkinese
In Steve Jobs, director Danny Boyle’s most overt visual showcase is relegated to the film’s transitions. Set backstage at three different tech product launches, the film makes two major leaps forward in time between 1984 and 1988 and again between 1988 and 199...
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In Defense of Steven Spielberg’s “Hook”
Two children stand on a stage, sweetly fumbling their lines. “Don’t you know what a kiss is?” says one of the children. “I shall, if you give one to me,” says the other, before being handed a thimble. So begins Steven Spielberg’s 1991 film, Hook, adapting the ...
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“That’s Italian!”: On the 25th Anniversary of “GoodFellas”
I was fifteen years old on September 21st, 1990 – the day Martin Scorsese’s GoodFellas opened in theatres -- and a full two carloads of us had negotiated the necessary curfew extensions to go see a 10:30 PM show at the Showcase multiplex in Revere, a suburb ju...
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How M. Night Shyamalan Lost His Place In The Cinematic World
There was a time when M. Night Shyamalan was not a joke: when each new film of his didn’t offer a better punch line; when you were sure something like the trailer for his latest film, The Visit, wasn’t meant to be funny; when his name wasn’t literally laughabl...
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