Surely Michael Shannon will get the chance to play a nice, normal guy in a prominent role one of these days. He’ll get cast as someone who clearly sees reality just as it is and faces no burdensome difficulty brought … Continue reading Well all right, you gave it all up for a dream, fate proved unkind to lock the door and leave no key
Once I started writing music reviews for Spectrum Culture, one of my goals was to eventually branch out and try to cover material that’s somewhat outside of my normal range. So for my last album review of the year, I made a point of grabbing a hip hop release. Lucky for me, it just so happens to be one of the best records of the year. I did the best I could, but I wish I’d had a little more concentrated time with the album before I wrote on it. I have a feeling this one is going to age … Continue reading Spectrum Check
#3 — Raiders of the Lost Ark (Steven Spielberg, 1981) Just for fun, consider where Steven Spielberg was professionally when Raiders of the Lost Ark was released in the summer of 1981. He had directed four previous feature films, the … Continue reading Top Fifty Films of the 80s — Number Three
I absolutely love the first and last shots of Alexander Payne’s The Descendants. Each of them encompasses everything I like about his work in their straightforwardness, their simplicity, their understatement and their quiet, careful wit. These shots don’t push an … Continue reading Almost ready, almost there, or is it already over?
The first thing of mine that went up on Spectrum Culture this week was an attempt to write on a new music release that was outside of my normal wheelhouse. Punk music speaks to the inner part of me that still craves the opportunity to descend into a basement somewhere and turn the stereo playing the angriest music I can find with the volume turned up as loud as it will go. Another challenge: the whole EP is less than ten minutes long. Writing a full-length review about something like that is a challenge. I think I did all right. … Continue reading Spectrum Check
#4 — Hannah and Her Sisters (Woody Allen, 1986) It’s perhaps foolhardy to make any sort of definitive statements about a favorite film in a directorial career as lengthy, prolific and studded with great works as that of Woody Allen. … Continue reading Top Fifty Films of the 80s — Number Four
#5 — Ran (Akira Kurosawa, 1985) Sadly, it will happen no more, but everyone should have an Akira Kurosawa masterwork show up new in theaters at precisely the time when they’re crossing over from seeing movies as entertainment to viewing … Continue reading Top Fifty Films of the 80s — Number Five
One of the regular features at Spectrum Culture is called “Film Dunce,” in which a writer makes a point of viewing and considering a film they haven’t previously watched that they feel everyone else has seen. I’ve used my past entries to review significant works that I considered blind spots in my broader knowledge of hefty, important cinema. This time out, I was challenged to instead watch something more broadly popular that I hadn’t seen. The editor was pushing a particular comedy, but I have my limits. In general, I’m enough of a completist about these things that most widely … Continue reading Spectrum Check
It’s be hard to find another film as awash in enthusiasm for its subject as The Muppets. Written by Jason Segel and Nicholas Stoller, who directed Segel’s previously produced screenplay Forgetting Sarah Marshall, the movie is really just Segel’s extended … Continue reading Footloose and fancy-free, getting there is half the fun, come share it with me
Though I’ve had plenty of time to get used to it, I still find it very odd to think of the director Taxi Driver, Raging Bull, Goodfellas and The Departed presiding over a movie largely targeted at children, or at … Continue reading Hugo’s not afraid to cry, Hugo is an okay guy
