Minority Report (2002) A Film by Steven Spielberg

The more I think about Steven Spielberg, the more I feel he is, at heart, a sci-fi director. As hinted at by his statement that he "dre...

The Conversation (1974) A Film by Francis Ford Coppola

For a medium that is so universally hailed as a “visual art”, the resource of sound that is employed in cinema can be routinely neglected. W...

Screening Notes #3

The Others (2001): Spiritually and structurally, Alejandro Amenábar takes pains to emulate The Shining (the displaced mansion, the final a...

Heartbeats (Les Amours Imaginaires) A Film by Xavier Dolan (2010)

Xavier Dolan's Heartbeats - the Canadian wunderkind's second feature at an astonishing 21 years of age - exists in a milieu where l...

Cyrus (2010) A Film by Mark and Jay Duplass

The Duplass brothers have a knack for first acts, that prolonged down-in-the-dumps segment where the plot is free to go wherever it pleases ...

Screening Notes #2

Secretary (2002): A work without a soul. This is clinical pathology on film, and it points to nothing greater than itself. Its characters a...

Screening Notes #1

For a while now, I've aimed to find a solution to the endless pile-up of movies I see and don't end up writing about right away. The...