I've got a soft spot for this film and so many I'm even grading it on a curve a bit. But I think the key to watching iconic filmmakers first films is really to get a sense of where they started from compared to where you know that they're going. When you bring the history to it it changes. Maybe that's not a fair way to critique art, but that has a lot to do with it for me.
I…

I grew up on the movies of Laurel & Hardy and so when this trailer came out I got ridiculously excited, especially by the casting. I love that they've decided to use the newer tradition of a bio-pic that doesn't try to tell a cradle-to-grave story so much as give us a glimpse into a specific moment in their lives, a turning point. But give is a sense of the whole - and this film does that very very well.
Coogan…

There was a lot of buzz about this when I was at the Toronto Int'l Film Fest in Sept before it premiered and then I didn't hear anything... I didn't get a chance to see it there, but on the strength of Moonlight I was up for whatever Barry Jenkins did next.
I have to say I'm a bit baffled by this film. I don't know how it's possible with elements of a story that are so fascinating and complex,…