|Nicole Rojas-Oltmanns| Geena Davis, who plays Thelma, remarked, “After Thelma and Louise (1991, directed by Ridley Scott), people said things would improve for women in film. They didn’t.”¹ So, in 2004 she created The Geena Davis Institute to better understand disparities… Continue reading
|Patrick Clifford| The first frames of Steven Spielberg’s first film, Duel, are black. Total darkness. Before we see anything, we hear footsteps, a car door opening, and a car starting. I love this movie. It’s a great ride. Released in 1971, it has everything that made the 70s, Hollywood’s greatest… Continue reading
|Phil Kolas| I’ve been writing haikus, lately. There’s something so completely stupid and perfect about every single one of them. They are utterly impossible to do incorrectly, as long as you can count to 17. It is an unmissable endeavor. It is a great gift granted to every human being that… Continue reading
|Chris Polley| Planting a flagpole in the ground? That’s a phallus. Shredding a guitar on stage? That’s a phallus. Cocking a revolver and pointing it at a cashier with a lusty grin of power and control on your face, side by side with your gun-toting lover? You better believe that’s a phallus. Continue reading
|Penny Folger| It’s difficult to measure the kind of influence a film like Gun Crazy has had. Like so many great films, it flopped upon its initial release in 1950. It was the only movie ever made by its B-movie producers, the King Brothers, that actually lost money. The industry thought of… Continue reading
|Sophie Durbin| Please bear with me as I begin this piece with (yes) a quick detour. I’ve always been fascinated by Low Production Values. I capitalize these words because I thought they were an official proper noun for an actual artistic style for many years. As a kid, I was fascinated by… Continue reading
|Nate Logsdon| Fate’s Finger Fate can put the finger on you or me. Awful chump to throw away all that dough. No. Not yet, darling. Tomorrow. Maybe. Why you dope. Where did you leave his body? Suppose he doesn’t die… He will, I know. Fate can put the finger on you or me. Another one… Continue reading
|Doug Carmoody| In the years prior to her leading role in Fritz Lang’s You Only Live Once, Sylvia Sidney had endured a barrage of difficult on-screen romantic partners. She was impregnated and drowned by her boyfriend in An American Tragedy, bullied into a life of alcoholism and infidelity… Continue reading
