The opening of The Doll sets the fantastical tone for the uniquely cinematic fairy tale to come. The storyteller, director Ernst Lubitsch himself, is seen constructing the miniature set of the story we’re about to see. Carefully, he places each little wooden tree, stumbling a bit as he struggles to set the background in place before shuffling away and allowing the camera to peer into the doorway of imagination set atop a luscious green hill.
The Doll is an absolute…
It’s always a special experience to watch a great movie on the big screen with an excited crowd, but today was extra special. I’m on vacation for New Year’s in London, and although it may be ignorant to assume the experience would differ within the company of a wholly different culture, it’s nice to see that indeed, the appeals of Billy Wilder’s masterful writing transcend borders and generations alike. The Apartment remains such a particular masterpiece due to how finely…
An unwieldy and farcical madcap from Ernst Lubitsch, leaning into the raucous “wild woman” conceit with Pola Negri as a woman of the woods paired against a womanizing aristocrat in an unlikely romance, The Wildcat has energy and enthusiasm, sadly at the sacrifice of more elegant coherence and wit. Lubitsch’s penchant for social satire remains in the juxtaposition of the unruly mountain gang against the gentry elite, but the more chaotic disposition inherent to his German comedies leads to a…
It’s been a significant amount of time since I was 16, watching this film in the theaters for the first time, and identifying so hard with so much. There’s still a lot of personal reflection I see in young Scott’s journey to discovering self respect, navigating the often confusing and emotionally tumultuous world of relationships and communication, but as an Adult™️ much of the central conflict within Scott Pilgrim vs. the World feels naive and contrived now — and even…
A film of severe ups and severe downs, blessed with a terrific establishing act and then destroyed by its contrived conclusion, Last Night in Soho brims with style and panache only to unravel itself completely in a nest of narrative clichés and hollow messaging. Edgar Wright does right by setting the subject of his horror early, depicting a sympathetic portrait of the world through a young woman’s eyes, and the inherent danger she feels every day simply existing in a world…
Did I just go out to see Chicken Run at eleven in the morning despite not only having seen the film countless times but even just as recently as earlier this year? I did, and you would too if you know what’s good for you. We need to normalize early matinee screenings, I’d go see a film at six am if they’d show them. Roll out of bed, order a coffee at the counter, suffice on a breakfast of buttered popcorn and twizzlers while soaking in a nostalgia-fueled screening of a childhood classic? I can think of few better ways to start the day.
