I published a new In the Frame piece at The Escapist on Friday. Since Antebellum has been out for two weeks now, it seemed fair to discuss the movie’s twist – and, in particular, what it is that makes a “good” twist and how such a twist serves the movie of which it is part.
Arguably, any movie with a twist has to be two movies: the movie that the audience watches for the first time blind, and the one that they rewatch knowing the twist. As such, for a movie with a twist to be truly good, it has to succeed as two (occasionally wildly) different movies. That’s a lot of pressure, and illustrates why truly great twists are so rare and why they are often elevated to the status of cinematic legend. However, a bad twist can ultimately undercut both of the movies that it needs to be, making the failure even more noticeable.
You can read the piece here, or click the picture below.
I published a new In the Frame piece at The Escapist this evening. Because the Monday column is now published with a companion video, we thought it might be worth trying something a bit more visual than usual. Because TENET is still in wide release, we thought it might be interesting to try something visual that was related to Christopher Nolan.
The Dark Knight is an interesting film for a number of reasons. Interestingly, it is the rare Christopher Nolan movie that is almost entirely linear. Nolan’s other films tend to jump around a lot in time, but The Dark Knight progresses quite clearly from beginning to end. This is interesting, because it serves to provide an interesting and compelling contrast to the Joker. Because The Dark Knight is so linear, there’s an interesting tension as the Joker struggles to take control of the narrative and bend the view to his perspective. Sometimes in a very literal manner.
You can read the piece here, or click the picture below.
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 the Monday article, and be released on the magazine’s YouTube channel the following week.
With that in mind, here is last week’s episode, covering Ryan Coogler’s use of childish wonder in Black Panther. You can watch the pilot video here, and read the companion article here.
In truth, this is at best a simple solution to a complex problem. After all, fans have hardly proven themselves willing to offer movies the benefit of the doubt because they were “planned” in advance. The Star Wars prequel trilogy was not greeted with any greater warmth or understanding because George Lucas knew where he was going. Instead, the problem is that The Rise of Skywalker needed a strong vision of what it wanted to be and what it wanted to say.
You can read the piece here, or click the picture below.
I published a new In the Frame piece at The Escapist this evening. With the tragic passing of Chadwick Boseman over a week ago, I have been thinking a lot about Black Panther. In particular, what makes it special.
It isn’t simply that Black Panther was the first superhero movie on this scale to feature a predominantly black cast from a black director. It was also the extent to which director Ryan Coogler understood the power of superheroes. Very few superhero movies are written with an understanding of what superheroes represent and why they are important, instead often falling into the trap of power fantasies rather than empowerment fantasies. Black Panther is the rare superhero movie that dares to see its world through the eyes of a child, and is more powerful for that.
You can read the piece here, or click the picture below.
I published a new piece at The Escapist earlier today. With the release of TENET, it seemed worth taking a look at some of the core themes of the film.
TENET has most frequently been discussed in the context of its relationship to Inception, but it is perhaps most interesting to discuss in relation to Interstellar. Both of those films are about the relationship between the present and the future, exploring the dynamic between mankind and a projected future version of themselves. Interstellar is a story about the hope held by the future, but TENET offers a more cynical perspective.
You can read the piece here, or click the picture below.
I published a new In the Frame piece at The Escapist this evening. The teaser for Denis Villeneuve’s Dune playing in cinemas, and with the film celebrating its fifth anniversary this September, I thought it was worth taking a look back at Denis Villeneuve’s Sicario.
Sicario is a film about boundaries – both literal and metaphorical. Set at the edge of the frontier, on the Mexican border, it is story about blurred lines and brutal transgressions waged as part of a murky war with extremely abstract objectives without a singular and clearly defined enemy. As such, it becomes a story about the idea of war waged on the idea of the frontier, a grim and cynical update of both the western and the war movie for the twenty-first century.
You can read the piece here, or click the picture below.
I have actually already reviewed TENET for this blog. However, given the state of the pandemic in the United States, The Escapist did not feel comfortable asking its writers to attend cinema screenings. As I am based in a country that is dealing with the crisis (relatively) well, I have stepped into the gap to provide written reviews for movies not receiving a streaming release.
This is unlikely to be a long-term dynamic, but I was flattered at the invitation and was happy to substitute in for this particular situation. This is a very unusual time. The review is much more conventional and concise than the reviews on this site, and even has a numerical score attached. I feel like a proper film critic. You can read the review here, or click the picture below.
I published a new piece at The Escapist earlier today. Nightcrawler is streaming on Netflix, so it seemed like a nice opportunity to revisit the film.
Nightcrawler is very obviously a loving homage to seventies American cinema, and a commentary on the scrambling at the margins of the post-recession economy. However, writer and director Dan Gilroy frames his story in such a way as to evoke classic vampire movies. At its core, Nightcrawler is the tale of a bloodthirsty parasite prowling the streets of Los Angeles at night, but there’s more to it than that. Nightcrawler is a biting satire and a gritty drama, but it also understands the horror of the situation that it depicts.
You can read the piece here, or click the picture below.
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