I barely follow it, and even I know it’s been a helluva week for country music. I’m sure there are still plenty of practitioners of the form still relying on pickup truck cliches and jingoistic garbage to propel their creativity, … Continue reading This Week’s Model — Eric Church, “Stick That in Your Country Song”
#28 — Snowpiercer (Bong Joon Ho, 2013) Most of the films of director Bong Joon Ho have been wholly original works, suffused with inspiration drawn from serious study of film, perhaps, but springing start to finish from his whirring brain. … Continue reading Top Fifty Films of the 10s — Number Twenty-Eight
Ashes and Embers (Haile Gerima, 1982). Made around forty years ago, Haile Gerima’s experimental drama opens with Black men driving in a city who get pulled over police officers that immediately escalate the situation, presuming guilt as a default for … Continue reading Then Playing — Ashes and Embers; Brewster McCloud; A Star is Born
#29 — American Hustle (David O. Russell, 2013) Rife with absurdity and energized by misguided bravado and crass capitalistic scheming, David O. Russell’s darkly comic rendering of the FBI’s Abscam sting operation would feel off if it didn’t have “American” … Continue reading Top Fifty Films of the 10s — Number Twenty-Nine
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. The official announcement of … Continue reading Laughing Matters — Meet The CONAN Staff: Conor Oberst – Production Assistant
494. Neil Young & Crazy Horse, Rust Never Sleeps (1979) Neil Young had a record to promote when he went on the road in 1978. With backing band Crazy Horse sharing the bus, Young undertook a monthlong trek meant to … Continue reading College Countdown: CMJ Top 1000, 1979 – 1989 — #494 to #492
MLB Is Crumbling. Blame the Owners by Stephanie Apstein I’ve a fan of baseball since I was a kid, when WGN’s afternoon airings of Chicago Cubs games hooked me. But I’ve also been highly aware for many years that the … Continue reading Outside Reading — After the Boys of Summer Have Gone edition
I cede the floor to some individuals who’ve been explaining the real deal for thirty-five years. Continue reading This Week’s Model — Public Enemy, “State of the Union (STFU)”
If there’s one thing that’s absolutely certain about a project that was developed by Oliver Stone and then given to Spike Lee to rework, it’s that the resulting film is not going to lack for ideas or ambition. Da 5 … Continue reading Now Playing — Da 5 Bloods
#30 — The Farewell (Lulu Wang, 2019) The best movies sit and resonate with a viewer, as if taking up permanent residence in the soul. Even as I write that, I understand the sentimental is almost unbearably syrupy, instilling in … Continue reading Top Fifty Films of the 10s — Number Thirty
