Tag: film
-
Media of the moment
An ongoing series Reality. Riveting recreation of the arrest of whistleblower Reality Winner, played by Sydney Sweeney. This was my first encounter of Sweeney and was thoroughly impressed. Just released on (HBO) Max. Queer Eye season 7. A quality hang as usual. Ted Lasso season 3. Hard to top season 1 but have enjoyed watching […]
-
How ‘Hairspray’ and ‘Once’ made me love musicals
To cap off Musicals Month at Cinema Sugar, I wrote about seeing Once and Hairspray in the summer of 2007 and how they transformed my rather reductive view of musicals as cheesy, frivolous entertainment: Seeing these movies individually made big dents in my stony resolve against the allure of musicals, but seeing them within about […]
-
Ratatouille
Rewatching Ratatouille recently made me think of a line from the Guardians of the Galaxy Honest Trailer, which portrays Marvel as so dominant and drunk on its own power—and its fans so eager—that a weird movie with a trash-talking raccoon and monosyllabic tree can be a smash success. Their tongue-in-cheek name for the studio: “F— […]
-
The Lion King
It’s hard for me to watch The Lion King objectively as an adult when it’s so deeply ingrained into my being, having been released when I was 7 years old and subjected to countless subsequent rewatches in our family VCR—not to mention inspiring my own adult creative endeavors. But rewatching it now—with my 4-year-old son […]
-
Jack would NOT have fit on the door in ‘Titanic’
I’m sorry, but it’s true. I say that in spite of the apparently real investigation into this internet-famous debate by National Geographic and James Cameron himself: All the evidence you need is from the scene itself: When Jack tries to get on the door, it almost capsizes. Putting two grown, soaking-wet adults on it amidst […]
-
Media of the moment
An ongoing series Priestdaddy by Patricia Lockwood. Hilarious and insightful memoir/biography of Lockwood’s Catholic priest father and her experience living with her parents. Blankets by Craig Thompson. A stunning graphic novel memoir about small-town life, religion, young love, winter, and so many more things. The Climb. An excellent indie film told through episodic, slice-of-life sequences […]
-
My ‘Back to the Future’ bonanza
Well, I finally did it: I finally revealed my decades-old collection of Back to the Future memorabilia. With it being Sci-Fi Month at Cinema Sugar, I thought the timing was right to show-and-tell such items as: I had a blast doing this, so please watch, enjoy, and share:
-
A COVID movie journal
As I’ve been going through my old journals and digitizing the entries—a tedious and time-consuming process that will eventually yield a much more accessible and searchable archive—it’s been fun and enlightening to rediscover things I was thinking about at any given time. Like this entry from March 10, 2020: I hadn’t seen Contagion at that […]
-
Those tender trenches
Wanted to spotlight something from A.O. Scott’s interview with Steven Spielberg, where he talks about collaborating with screenwriter Tony Kushner on The Fabelmans: It’s hard to hold someone’s hand over Zoom, but Tony did a good job in giving me the kind of comfort I needed when we were tapping into moments in my life, […]