#15 — Mad Max: Fury Road (George Miller, 2015) If George Miller was going to go back the Wasteland, he was going to get everything he could out the post-apocalyptic landscape. Mad Max: Fury Road was released thirty years after … Continue reading Top Fifty Films of the 10s — Number Fifteen
Sometimes comedy illuminates hard truths with a pointed urgency that other means can’t quite achieve. Sometimes comedy is just funny. This series of posts is mostly about the former instances, but the latter is valuable, too. A few years ago, … Continue reading Laughing Matters — Saturday Night Live, “White Like Me”
458. Beat Farmers, Tales of the New West (1985) Drummer Country Dick Montana and and Jerry Raney kicked around in various San Diego bands for years before they started playing together. They recruited guitarist Buddy Blue and bassist Rolle Dexter … Continue reading College Countdown: CMJ Top 1000, 1979 – 1989 — #458 to #456
How Conspiracy Theories Are Shaping the 2020 Election—and Shaking the Foundation of American Democracy by Charlotte Alter Admitting that there is no shortage of social-breakdown symptoms to fret about right now, I’m beginning to believe that the mainstreaming of nonsensical … Continue reading Outside Reading — The Brain Likes Crazy edition
Janelle Monáe does not stand down. Throughout this tumultuous year, she has taken her prominent platform as a responsibility. She may be on the entertainment talk circuit to promote an Amazon series or a psychological horror film, but she takes … Continue reading This Week’s Model — Janelle Monáe, “Turntables”
#16 — Selma (Ava DuVernay, 2014) Ava DuVernay’s Selma is a proper history lesson. Attaching that description to a film usually signifies dreary dryness and a plodding pace as the filmmakers labor to impart lessons more than shape action or … Continue reading Top Fifty Films of the 10s — Number Sixteen
Je Tu Il Elle (Chantal Akerman, 1974). Esoteric and aloof, Chantal Akerman’s early feature is exactly what I thought all French cinema was like until I actually, you know, watched some of it. Je Tu Il Elle is almost amusing … Continue reading Then Playing — Je Tu Il Elle; Dark Places; The Decline of Western Civilization
#17 — The End of the Tour (James Ponsoldt, 2015) When it was announced that Jason Segel was hired to play writer David Foster Wallace in James Ponsoldt’s The End of the Tour, the brays of outrage were drowned out … Continue reading Top Fifty Films of the 10s — Number Seventeen
La Ciénaga (Lucrecia Martel, 2001). This loose, impressionistic drama craftily captures the complexity of life itself, where outcomes can be shocking and predictable at the same time. There are incidents aplenty in this story of family, but the film is … Continue reading Then Playing — La Ciénaga; Seven Beauties; Merrily We Go to Hell
461. Peter Schilling, Error in the System (1983) For someone making arch synth-pop in the early nineteen-eighties, it was probably pretty obvious which established artist could be pilfered from most productively. German performer Peter Schilling muscled his way into the … Continue reading College Countdown: CMJ Top 1000, 1979 – 1989 — #461 to #459
Coffee for Two 