Category: Reviews
Revisiting a classic: The Grand Hotel
Grand Hotel (1932) isn’t a perfect, or even great movie, but it is an interesting one. By most accounts, Grand Hotel was the first movie to have multiple headlining stars, rather than just one or two. Greta Garbo, Joan Crawford, John Barrymore, Lionel Barrymore and Wallace Beery all shared the headlines for this film. Directed…
Employee’s Entrance: Pre-Code Hollywood and the American Dream
Pre-Code Hollywood – roughly 1929-1934 – has become a popular subject in recent years. The movies made during these years, before meaningful enforcement of the Production Code, featured all manner of salacious material. You can buy collections of them on DVD and see what all the fuss was about. When we talk about them today,…
Jason Reitman’s Labor Day: A look at the directorial misstep
I began teaching film around the same time that Steven Spielberg released Hook (1991). When students asked me why the movie had failed, I told them that it was because it took way too long to get to Neverland. In screenwriting terms, the first act was far too long. Then they would ask how someone…
Reviewing “Inside Llewyn Davis”
Enter The Gaslight Poetry Café 1961, smoky and atmospheric lighting highlights a dim stage and a singer under spotlight. The surrounding audience is still except for some bar staff in the background and a few draughts of smoke barely taken in. The onstage performer is giving it his all, completely heartfelt and eerily resonate. The…
Remembering Robocop: The smouldering dystopian wreck of 80s avarice
There has never been, so far as I can recall, a period in my life during which I have not been obsessed by the cinematic form in some way or other. And while my tastes have continued to evolve or change over time, there have been a handful of films that have travelled with me…