Tag: cinephile
The Fabulous Forties: 5 Short Films That Can’t Be Missed
Who decreed that feature films run two hours? Though there may be some organic rationale based on how two hours fits into an evening’s entertainment, there’s no rule that I know of that requires 120 minutes. The very first movies ran about 60 seconds, depending on how fast the camera was cranked, because that’s how…
Flight of Fancy: ‘Birdman’ Worth Taking Off With, Despite Flaws
Virtuoso filmmaking by Alejandro González Iñárritu. A bravura, Oscar-worthy performance by Michael Keaton. Innovative, feels-like-one-take cinematography by Emmanuel Lubezki. You’d think that with all those ingredients, Birdman, or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance) would be an instant masterpiece, pushing director Iñárritu into a very select group of celluloid heroes. Indeed, there are moments in the…
Damien Chazelle’s Whiplash: The Darkness of Artistic Ambition
2014 still has a couple more months to go and some big, well-regarded movies are soon to be released. They will have to go a long way to surpass Damien Chazelle’s Whiplash, which is head and shoulders above anything that has been widely released thus far. Of all its outstanding qualities, this is what makes…
Cartoon Swoon: Our 10 Favourite Animated Feature Films
Animation. It’s not just for kids, but it never really was, was it? Adult humour and situations have been prevalent in the genre since day one, yet for some reason, it’s still associated with children and the whims of fantasy. Perhaps that’s because it has been the domain of fantasists for so long – through…
Four Great Boxing Movies You Haven’t Seen
Sports movies present a challenge. Especially American sports movies. For even though we Yanks talk a lot about democracy and the people, we really, at heart, reserve our highest accolades for exhibitions of individualism. Our art reflects that. The Western is our greatest film creation and no other genre elevates the value of the individual…