Film Critic at Slant Magazine.
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It's Always Fair Weather 1955
The post-war hangover to follow Donen/Kelly's night out On the Town. Where their earlier collaboration was on the cusp of the 50s, and thus still mired in the earlier decade's lingering celebration of soldiers and the WWII victory, It's Always Fair Weather is firmly entrenched in the 50s expansion of consumerism and soul-sucking "suit" jobs designed to move every man, woman and child toward the elusive pursuit of the virtually unattainable American Dream. Whether through the brilliant passage-of-time montage that…
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Bottoms 2023
"Emma Seligman’s Shiva Baby drew from the well of modern cringe comedies to tell its story of a pressure cooker of a shiva. That setting lent the film authenticity, keeping it firmly grounded in a recognizable reality. So it’s all the more surprising that Seligman’s follow-up, Bottoms, is a far more silly, over-the-top affair, but the film’s unique blend of deadpan and absurdist humor, and its tendency to occasionally push the boundaries of good taste, shows that Seligman is equally…
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It Lives Inside 2023
"American horror films featuring demons generally have a Christian bent, so a Hindu spin on this subgenre is enticing for its potential to breathe new life into well-trodden terrain. But while Bishal Dutta’s It Lives Inside follows through on its promise of representation in terms of its cast full of Indian and Indian American actors, the film’s attempts at actual cultural specificity are about as nuanced as a “very special episode” of a Disney sitcom.
It Lives Inside offers a…
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The Third Generation 1979
"The other day I had a dream that capitalists created terrorism in order to force the state to better protect the business community. Funny, isn't it?"
"Germany for the Germans. Everyone else will be sent home."
It's impossible not to relate Fassbinder's dense and challenging portrait of capital and leftist activists to today's political climate. The Third Generation, virtually unavailable for over 25 years, presents a confounding, chaotic world view where capitalism, anarchy and terrorism constantly overlap and the political…
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One Way Passage 1932
A pair of broken champagne glasses, two discarded cigarettes. Love is fleeting and dreams can last as long as a boat ride from Hong Kong to San Francisco, but like life, all will come to a bitter end. A powerfully bittersweet, unsentimental romantic comedy with a serious bite. Powell and Francis are smooth as silk as passion slides ever-so-elegantly towards its demise, while Frank McHugh's drunken hijinks and Warren Hymer and Aline McMahon's atypical romance keep things light and bubbly. It got me choked up a few times, but at 68 minutes, it chugs along at quite the pace with none-too-long between laughs.
