One era’s trash is another era’s treasure. This becomes truer the deeper we get into the era of computers and automated, technology-assisted production. I’ve been thinking about this because of the existence of the nostalgia cable network MeTV Toons. It runs nothing but older animation—mainly stuff produced between the 1940s and the 1990s for movie … Read more
“Bringing Out the Dead” does not assert itself as an obviously religious film. and yet, it is borne from the ideological conflict of wrath versus compassion that separates the Old and the New Testament. Here, in the early ’90s, New York is an urban cesspool of sin, destitution, and suffering—it is ready for a biblical … Read more
Ryan Reynolds has taken to social media to share a new Deadpool & Wolverine deleted scene, featuring music from Nickelback and Deadpool annoying his companion. What happens in the Deadpool & Wolverine deleted scene? The scene — which is more of an unfinished rough “quasi-edited” montage, according to Reynolds’ post — sees Reynolds’ Deadpool badgering … Read more
As the United States slowly moves away from Christopher Columbus Day and the myth of Thanksgiving, we have an opportunity to learn about the history and contemporary lives of Indigenous people instead. Film and TV have shaped much of our knowledge of Indigenous cultures worldwide. And with the recent popularity of mainstream films like “Killers … Read more
“That’s the ugliest thing I’ve ever seen in my whole life!” a little girl (Bethany Simons-Denville) exclaims. She shouts it at the audience, who, in “Seed of Chucky”‘s first-person opening scene, takes a queer kid’s point-of-view. As she throws them into a toy chest, it’s like we fall into a closet. The kid comes out … Read more
“Godzilla Minus One” was already one of the best Godzilla movies, for the way it used the kaiju movie template to tell a story that was essentially a sweeping melodrama about surviving wars and other catastrophes. The announcement that it was going to be released in a black-and-white version was tantalizing, and the result is … Read more
Don Hertzfeldt’s “ME” is available on Vimeo On-Demand. Don Hertzfeldt’s “ME” will feel familiar to the filmmaker’s fans and admirers, with its expressive stick figures serving as our protagonists, its depiction of technological breakthroughs that cause societal disarray, and journeys through time and space that warrant repeated viewings just to take in all the ideas … Read more
In the early 2000s, it was James Wan and Leigh Whannell’s smash hit “Saw” that was credited (or by less generous critics, blamed) for helping popularize the prevalence of so-called “torture porn.” Raw, visceral, and scrappy, the low-budget cop thriller captivated audiences with its jarring, nightmarish torture sequences, going on to spawn ten sequels (and … Read more
Zohra Lampert’s Jessica in 1971’s “Let’s Scare Jessica to Death” smiles as she suffers horrors. Not because she’s particularly brave or placid — on the contrary, she’s terrified more often than not — but because she knows what will happen if she tells her husband Duncan (Barton Heyman) or their friend Woody (Kevin O’Connor) about … Read more
Due to the highly publicized conversations between Roger Ebert and Gene Siskel, especially in the early ‘80s, about the moral boundaries of horror movies, Roger is often accused of disliking the genre. Nothing could be further from the truth. Not only did he give his highest rating to future classics like “Dawn of the Dead,” … Read more