Arts & Culture
Young couples in movies are customarily given obstacles to overcome, but If
Young couples in movies are customarily given obstacles to overcome, but If I Stay seems unnecessarily cruel in…
Arts & Culture
Everything you always suspected about music is true. Scientists can point to
Everything you always suspected about music is true. Scientists can point to the parts of the brain that…
Arts & Culture
Is the story of The Kill Team singular? That’s the unspoken question
Is the story of The Kill Team singular? That’s the unspoken question that hangs over this award-winning documentary,…
Arts & Culture
It would be easier to enjoy the madcap, stranger-than-fiction revelations of The
It would be easier to enjoy the madcap, stranger-than-fiction revelations of The Dog if it weren’t for the…
Arts & Culture
The underlying subject of many romantic comedies is chemistry, the mysterious rapport
The underlying subject of many romantic comedies is chemistry, the mysterious rapport that draws people together despite whatever…
Arts & Culture
If you were working from a menu of “crowd-pleasing movie conventions,” you
If you were working from a menu of “crowd-pleasing movie conventions,” you could do worse than to mark…
Arts & Culture
Watching two film directors play catch is not a guarantee of interest.
Watching two film directors play catch is not a guarantee of interest. Put Brett Ratner and Jean-Luc Godard…
Arts & Culture
Michel Gondry’s capacity for imagining wacky designs and adorable contraptions is so
Michel Gondry’s capacity for imagining wacky designs and adorable contraptions is so boundless he makes Santa’s elves look…
Arts & Culture
The giant apparatus required to create a 21st-century comic-book/sci-fi/action movie is expensive
The giant apparatus required to create a 21st-century comic-book/sci-fi/action movie is expensive and unwieldy. Little wonder so many…
Arts & Culture
It begins as a science thriller: Researchers narrow in on absolute proof
It begins as a science thriller: Researchers narrow in on absolute proof that the eye evolved in nature.…
Arts & Culture
Most of the conventional horror is contained in the first 10 minutes.
Most of the conventional horror is contained in the first 10 minutes. A surgically precise evocation of a…
Arts & Culture
The title Boyhood suggests something definitive, perhaps even a statement on the
The title Boyhood suggests something definitive, perhaps even a statement on the essential nature of growing up. Which…
Arts & Culture
The movie of the summer in 1996 should have been A Summer’s
The movie of the summer in 1996 should have been A Summer’s Tale, a wise and bittersweet romance…
Arts & Culture
The new spiritual leader of a small religious sect in the American
The new spiritual leader of a small religious sect in the American South has received the word. That…
Arts & Culture
In this adaptation of the 2010 stage play by David Ives, Roman
In this adaptation of the 2010 stage play by David Ives, Roman Polanski casts his wife in the…
Arts & Culture
Paul Haggis has had such a curious career, it’s no wonder he
Paul Haggis has had such a curious career, it’s no wonder he seems to make movies with no…
Arts & Culture
The problems of squishing down a novel to fit a two-hour movie
The problems of squishing down a novel to fit a two-hour movie are familiar; when a complicated historical…
Arts & Culture
Melissa McCarthy has earned her moment, and it is now. After scaring
Melissa McCarthy has earned her moment, and it is now. After scaring up an Oscar nomination for Bridesmaids…
Arts & Culture
For the last 25 years of his life, Roger Ebert was the
For the last 25 years of his life, Roger Ebert was the most famous film critic in America.…
Arts & Culture
Alfred Hitchcock called them the “plausibilists”—those nitpickers who can’t suspend disbelief long
Alfred Hitchcock called them the “plausibilists”—those nitpickers who can’t suspend disbelief long enough to swallow a movie’s colorful…