I’m thrilled to be launching movie reviews on The Escapist. Over the coming weeks and months, I will be joining a set of contributors in adding these reviews to the channel. For the moment, I’m honoured to contribute a three-minute film review of Army of Thieves, which will release on Netflix this weekend.
Filed under: Non-Review Reviews | Tagged: 3mr, army of thieves, escapist, film, Movie, review, the escapist, three minute review | Leave a comment »
The X-Cast is covering the seventh season of The X-Files. It is a season that arrives at an interesting point in the larger arc of the series, with the creative team trying to both prepare for the end of the show without actually committing to it. En Ami is an interesting episode in that regard.
Creditted to actor William B. Davis, En Ami is an episode focusing on the Cigarette-Smoking Man. It is not the first episode to focus on the character, as Musings of a Cigarette-Smoking Man had aired three seasons earlier. However, like both David Duchovny and Gillian Anderson, Davis seemed to be taking advantage of the show winding down to put his own authorial stamp on the character that he had played since The Pilot. The result is interesting and contradictory, complicated and compelling. It’s messy, but it’s also fascinating.
You can listen to the episode here, or click the link below.
Filed under: Podcasts!, The X-Files | Tagged: bill davis, david duchovny, davis, en ami, gillian anderson, sarah blair, sarah l. blair, the cigarette-smoking man, the x-cast, the x-files, William B. Davis, x-cast | Leave a comment »
I published a new In the Frame piece at The Escapist yesterday evening. The latest trailer for The Batman has reopened a familair debate within fandom around a sensitive topic: the question of a grim and gritty Batman.
Certain fans react strongly against takes on comic book characters that do not match their own particular tastes. In particular, there’s a tendency to react strongly to interpretations of the Caped Crusader that emphasise the character as grounded and pulpy, to act as if these takes exist at the expense of others. In reality, there is a rich variety of takes on the Dark Knight in popular culture, of various shapes and sizes. There is a Batman for all seasons, and often these arguments feel less about trying to argue for more diverse takes on classic characters and instead about arguing that there is only one right take.
You can read the piece here, or click the picture below.
Filed under: Movies | Tagged: batman, dark and edgy, escapist, grim and gritty, grimdark, in the frame, matt reeves, Robert Pattinson, the batman, the caped crusader, the escapist | Leave a comment »
Hosted by Andrew Quinn and Darren Mooney, and this week with special guests Doctor Bernice Murphy and Joey Keogh, The 250 is a weekly trip through some of the best (and worst) movies ever made, as voted for by Internet Movie Database Users. New episodes are released Saturdays at 6pm GMT.
So this week, a Halloween treat: Hal Warren’s Manos: The Hands of Fate.
A young family gets lost while taking a roadtrip through Texas. They end up driving down a dead-end road when they discover a strange lodge, maintained by an even stranger figure. Ignoring this mysterious guardian’s advice, the family decides to spend the night at this remote house. They have no idea what awaits them.
At time of recording, it was ranked 3rd on the list of the worst movies of all time on the Internet Movie Database.
Filed under: The Bottom 100 | Tagged: america, bad movies, bernice murphy, bottom 100, cults, doctor bernice murphy, harold p. warren, horror, independent cinema, joey keogh, manos, manos: the hands of fate, The 250, the texas chain saw massacre | Leave a comment »
I published a new In the Frame piece at The Escapist this evening. With the release of Dune, it seemed like a good opportunity to take a look at the new film.
Dune is an epic science-fiction story. It is a classic of the genre. One of the reasons that it has held up for so any decades is because its themes remain universal. Dune is essentially a story about what it means to be human. In particular, it interrogates that question through a postcolonial lens. The default logic of these sorts of narratives asks the oppressed to assert their dignity and humanity. (Even Denis Villeneuve’s last film, Blade Runner 2049, is about a synthetic human proving his humanity.) In contrast, Dune inverts this by directing challenging the humanity of those who would indulge in colonialism and imperialism.
You can read the piece here, or click the picture below.
Filed under: Movies | Tagged: animals, chosen one, colonialism, dune, Frank Herbert, humanity, imperialism, in the frame, paul atreides, the escapist | Leave a comment »
I’m thrilled to be launching movie reviews on The Escapist. Over the coming weeks and months, I will be joining a set of contributors in adding these reviews to the channel. For the moment, I’m honoured to contribute a three-minute film review of The Last Duel, which released theatrically worldwide last weekend.
Filed under: On Second Thought | Tagged: 3 minute review, 3mr, adam driver, ben affleck, jodie comer, matt damon, review, ridley scott, the escapist, the last duel, three minute review | Leave a comment »
The French Dispatch is a sweet and sincere love letter to a certain kind of journalistic endeavour, and to the creative process beyond that. Unfortunately, it’s also incredibly disjointed and uneven.
To be fair, these structural problems come with the format. Wes Anderson has constructed his latest film as an anthology, one loosely designed to mirror the flow of a magazine like The New Yorker. The film is comprised of an opening obituary, a travellogue, and three short stories, all designed to emulate the structure of reading a classic journalistic magazine. It’s an interesting and ambitious approach to structuring a movie, one not without challenges and one that allows Anderson the opportunity to lean into his already heightened sensibility.
That is a lot of Wes Anderson.
However, as with many anthology films, The French Dispatch suffers from an unevenness in terms of pacing. As one might expect from an anthology directed by a filmmaker as distinctive as Anderson, The French Dispatch does maintain a consistent tone across its various elements, but it also suffers from stopping and starting five times over. It doesn’t help that each of the three stories flows in much the same way, playing on many of the same tropes of Anderson’s storytelling, starting with Anderson’s signature arch detachment and inevitably puncturing it with small glimpses of humanity.
The appeal of a magazine like the fictional French Dispatch is a diversity of voices and perspectives. The film positions itself as a celebration of the individual journalists relating their stories to the audience, finding their own ways into these narratives and sharing something over themselves with the world. However, while the film does afford some shading of the characters themselves in the framing sections and within the narrative, the stories themselves all feel like they are cut from the same clothe. They are even similar in stylistic terms, mostly shot in black-and-white Academy ratio, occasionally breaking that for dramatic effect.
Stu(dent)ing resentment…
To be fair, this isn’t a fatal problem. Anderson remains a director with a strong aesthetic and keen sense of humour. His worlds are elaborately constructed, both rich and textured. For all that Anderson’s rigid formalism can seem twee or arch, his films are often possessed of a real heart, one that is all the more effective for sneaking up on the audience through these otherwise carrefully composed surroundings and often caricatured characters. The French Dispatch is no different. It is a film with charm to spare, and with a genuine heart beneath it.
Still, for all that The French Dispatch is a celebration of artistic freedom and discovery, and a passionate argument for an editorial hand the encourages distinct voices and approaches over one that imposes a consistent style, by the time the third story is finished, it feels too much the work of a singular voice working a familiar framework.
The Wright stuff.
Filed under: Non-Review Reviews | Tagged: Bill Murray, film, Jeffrey Wright, Movie, non-review review, review, the french dispatch, the new yorker, wes anderson | Leave a comment »
So, as I have mentioned before, I am launching a new video series as a companion piece to In the Frame at The Escapist. The video will typically launch with every second Monday’s article, and be released on the magazine’s YouTube channel the following week. This is kinda cool, because we’re helping relaunch the magazine’s film content – so if you can throw a subscription our way, it would mean a lot.
With the release of Halloween Kills, it seemed like a good opportunity to take a look back at the larger Halloween franchise. In particular, the enduring and lasting appeal of Michael Myers as a character. What is it that makes Michael Myers such an icon of horror cinema?
Filed under: On Second Thought | Tagged: halloween, horror, in the frame, John Carpenter, michael myers, omar ahmed, rob zombie, serial killers, slasher | Leave a comment »
I published a new In the Frame piece at The Escapist this evening. With the release of Halloween Kills, it seemed like a good opportunity to take a look at the larger Halloween franchise.
What is it that makes Michael Myers such an enduring and unsettling figure? Why has the character remained so popular and iconic across four decades? Why are audiences constantly drawn to the serial killer, who is remarkably straightforward in many ways? Indeed, it seems like the relative simplicity of Michael Myers is part of the appeal. Myers is somewhat uncomplicated as far as slasher movie antagonists go. However, he is also fundamentally unknowable, and all the more effective for that.
You can read the piece here, or click the picture below.
Filed under: On Second Thought | Tagged: david gordon green, halloween, halloween kills, horror, John Carpenter, laurie strode, michael myers, mystery, serial killer, slasher, uncanny | Leave a comment »
I’m thrilled to be launching movie reviews on The Escapist. Over the coming weeks and months, I will be joining a set of contributors in adding these reviews to the channel. For the moment, I’m honoured to contribute a three-minute film review of Halloween Kills, which released theatrically and on Peacock this weekend.
Filed under: On Second Thought | Tagged: 3mr, david gordon green, guns, halloween kills, John Carpenter, laurie strode, michael myers, nihilism, review, slasher movies, the escapist, three minute review, vigilantism | Leave a comment »
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