May
The party scenes in Gatsby were exhilarating. I went into the theater anticipating that I’d hate the movie but I found it thoroughly enjoyable.
I also thought the contemporary soundtrack was a good choice as it’s difficult to convey how fun and crazy jazz music was to an audience filled with teenagers who listen to Skrillex.
Very strange to see an Indian actor portraying a Jewish gangster but I suppose they wanted to avoid Fitzgerald’s anti-Semitism.
Apr
Dirty Wars - Trailer
“If children are terrorists, then we are all terrorists.”
Apr
Apr
I’m pretty sure I lost count of how many times I lost it while making this. That, and I may have ruined the movie.
LOLZ
Mar
Dirty Girls
This is an awesome short documentary from 1996 about a group of 8th grade riot grrrls, their feminist zine, and the scorn they receive from their classmates.
Mar
Almost Famous - Tiny Dancer
Oh man, greatest movie ever. “You are home.”
Mar
Someone finally made a documentary about cats on the internet. Here’s the trailer.
Feb
Kristen Stewart— on crutches, with a bruised arm, maybe stoned on pharmaceuticals— still totally rocked it tonight.
Y’all just h8ers.
Feb
According to White House records, Jimmy Carter watched 480 films during his four years in the White House — around 2.5 movies a week.
The first one he watched: All the President’s Men, about the Watergate scandal that sank Nixon. He also became the first president to watch an X-rated movie in the mansion: Midnight Cowboy, which today doesn’t seem like much, but in 1969 shocked audiences with its sex scenes and drug use. (By the time Carter saw it, the rating had been changed to R.)
The Presidents’ favorite films seem to say much about their personalities. Most enjoyed war movies, westerns, and other “rah-rah” fare. Obama’s favorites (Casablanca, Godfather, etc.) indicate he’s tasteful yet in line with the consensus view (those two films are routinely cited as among the “best ever”). But Carter watching Midnight Cowboy is pretty sweet. Props to the peanut farmer.
(via brooklynmutt)
Feb
If you have never seen any films by Costa-Gavras, I would highly recommend doing so, particularly if politics and history interest you. Pauline Kael said of Z, Gavras’s best-known work, that it is ”almost intolerably exciting - a political thriller that builds up so much tension that you’ll probably feel all knotted up by the time it’s over” and Christopher Hitchens called it “the greatest of all sixties movies.” Gavras’s perspective isn’t always agreeable (he seems to go out of his way to stereotype a villainous thug in Z as a child-molesting homosexual), but Gavras’s work includes some of the most layered, insightful, and confrontational political films one can experience.
Dec
Dec
Dec
Poster for Steven Soderbergh’s Side Effects
