La La Land movie review: city of stars, shining just for us
A marvel. Funny and exuberant and bittersweet and cliché-busting and unexpected as hell. We are going to need more movies like this one.
Gene Kelly
Hail, Caesar! movie review: far from perfect, but pretty swell
Full of the Coen Brothers’ usual exuberant joie de cinema, and a helluva lot of fun, but too scattershot to ever settle on saying the things it has to say.
The Artist (review)
Who does this? Who makes a black-and-white movie in the 21st century? Who makes a silent film in the 21st century? The Artist: Not in 3D, not in IMAX, not even in widescreen!
question of the day: What makes a movie star a movie star, and has this changed over the Hollywood century?
Dave Beauchene at PopTometry suggests that movie stars should only be movie stars if there can be unanimous agreement on their objectively superior talent. What’s more, this was once true, and has been lost. I couldn’t disagree more.
female gazing extra: “Men in Film”
A hundred years of handsome Hollywood hotties, from Douglas Fairbanks Sr. to George Clooney, in three and a half minutes…
Unleashed and Crash (review)
With its clear and obvious choices — think Eddie Izzard’s ‘cake? or death?’ bit — *Unleashed* really is a fairy tale next to *Crash,* where half the time when you think you’ve got a grasp on what’s the ‘right’ thing to do and the ‘right’ way to live, you turn out to be wrong, even if the other guy is wrong, too.
An American in Paris (review)
As if there was any doubt that An American in Paris was nothing but an excuse for some fabulous singing and dancing, the film wraps up with a spectacular 18-minute ballet sequence. It’s got only the vaguest connection to plot or character, but it’s a gorgeous piece of filmmaking.
