PODCAST: Oscar Nominations 2019 [Electric Shadows]

Rob Daniel & Rob Wallis touch the sore tooth that is Oscar nominations 2019.

They discuss the insanity, or at least inanity, of nominating Bohemian Rhapsody for Best Picture, and how safe the Best Picture nods are in general. They’re happy Spike Lee finally has his Best Director nomination, and acknowledge a few other things the Academy got right.…

Arrival is a Möbius strip movie that home-schools Interstellar

Oh for the days of Close Encounters when we dreamed that first contact would be as elegant as five simple notes.

Arrival, the latest film from Sicario director Denis Villeneuve1, looks at the complexities of communicating with an alien race.1 When twelve mysterious craft appear at sites around the globe, linguist Louise Banks (Amy Adams) is drafted in to help start a dialogue with their occupants before China and Russia set off an inter-species war.2 Where do you begin, though, when you know nothing about their language or customs?…

London Film Festival 2016: 10 films to get excited about

Well, it’s that time of the year again.

It’s a well-known but little commented upon phenomenon that each year Christmas comes to London roughly three months early – at least for capital-based cinema buffs – as, each October, the BFI hosts the London Film Festival.…

Batman V Superman is a flaming bag of shit left on the doorstep of cinema

SPOILERS!

Say what you want about Batman V Superman: Dawn Of Justiceand I have — it’s a film that demands critical analysis.1

A reported passion project of so-called visionary director Zack Snyder,2 the film he helped birth from development hell is in dire need of an exorcism.…

Big Eyes: kitsch & sink art drama from Tim Burton

 

As a brand name director, there are certain things with associate with Tim Burton; a certain quaint creepiness and kooky charm.

More so than these things, however, Burton is known for his coterie: Big Eyes is his first live-action film since 1996 not to feature Johnny Depp or Helena Bonham Carter, though composer Danny Elfman is still hanging on in there.…

American Hustle might be my favorite film of 2013

 

AKA The David O. Russell Reunion; Batman, Lois Lane, Rocket Raccoon, & Mystique: The Movie; or, Golden Globes For Everyone!

I don’t make a habit of using this space to gush over how much I love one film or another.

The Master is a meditation on faith, sex, and the duality of man

 

The Master is a difficult film to unreservedly love.

For one thing, it’s a far trickier beast than Paul Thomas Anderson’s previous world-beater, the relentless and aptly titled There Will Be Blood. There are no oil-rig explosions, no dairy beverage related analogies, though the film is certainly closer to it’s immediate predecessor in style, tone, and content than any other PTA’s directed.…