|Finn Odum| Author’s note: This essay contains discussions of fictional suicide and real-life suicidal ideation. I. Citalopram On a relatively warm Monday evening last September, while on a short walk to see Kenji Misumi’s Ken at the Trylon, I found myself struggling to cross the street… Continue reading
|Ben Tuthill| The first time I watched Beau Travail, I cried for ten minutes straight. I watched it alone. I didn’t understand the plot very well. I knew that the final scene was famous, but when it happened I didn’t really get it. I started crying right about the moment the first credits hit… Continue reading
|Reid Lemker| If you learn one thing after watching Alfred Hitchcock’s 1941 film Suspicion, it should be this: don’t ever go out with a guy that refers to you as “Monkeyface.” I don’t care where they are from, how much money they claim they have, or even if they look like a young… Continue reading
On the surface, Ida Lupino’s The Hitch-Hiker (1953) is a ripped-from-the-headlines thriller about a homicidal maniac who hitches a ride with two friends on their way to Mexicali as murder looms just around the corner. Even the onscreen title that opens the film indicates its true… Continue reading
|Chris Ryba-Tures| “My fear is that my sons will never understand me,” says the Khitan General, his war council babbling all around him while the stone-faced barbarian, Conan, sits cross-legged on a table centered in their yurt. It feels like a throwaway line at first, a bit of conversational… Continue reading
