In Which We Are Still in the Desert As discussed in the article about Munich, movies made about the past are never just about the past. Especially when the contemporary world is roiling through a complicated and difficult to parse moment. Such … Continue reading Post Millennial Malaise 16: Jarhead
In Which We Met on Montauk As elucidated through the previous articles in this series the 2000’s were a boon for a certain style of indie film. The look and aesthetic of the previous decade was ebbing in favor of … Continue reading Post Millennial Malaise 15: Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind
In Which it’s Silence of the Lambs Meets Psycho In the early part of the 2000’s a certain pall cast over the culture. Cut from the brief moment between the turn of the century and the 9/11 attacks. This short … Continue reading Post Millennial Malaise 14: Adaptation
In Which There Are No Brooms on the Horizon In the mid to late 00’s there was a sudden, and honestly kind of surprising, boom of great movies. For a period over about two and a half years there was … Continue reading Post Millennial Malaise 13: Michael Clayton
In Which I Was Busy Hello. Not a full article today because of stuff with family and the fact that I lost something and spent a better part of my free time trying to find it. Anyhow here’s a schedule … Continue reading Post Millennial Malaise Presents: A Schedule
In Which Bond Begins There is an eternal truism in the world of filmmaking, Hollywood always learns the wrong lessons from success. When something strikes a chord with audiences studios frequently chase the superficial elements of what worked rather than … Continue reading Post Millennial Malaise 12: Casino Royale
In Which Home has a High Price No movies about the past are actually about the past. Yes they may recount, in varying levels of detail, events that happened in bygone days, and said accounts can indeed tell a whole … Continue reading Post Millennial Malaise 11: Munich
In Which the Camera Starts Shaking In 2002 three action espionage movies graced theaters: Die Another Day, xXx, and The Bourne Identity. While both Bond and Cage duked it out to be the coolest, hippest, and “not your daddiest” of the spies, it was … Continue reading Post Millennial Malaise 10: The Bourne Supremacy
In Which it’s Time to Enter the Xander Xone In 1995 ESPN brought the world the first X Games. An annual competition to highlight the world of so called extreme/action sports. These were trials of skill that skipped the average … Continue reading Post Millennial Malaise 09: xXx
In Which There’s Sex For Dinner and Death for Breakfast Ah, James Bond, 007. A Franchise so titanic in its cultural legacy and influence that it is practically impossible to talk about, even in the discrete sections of individual movies. … Continue reading Post Millennial Malaise 08: Die Another Day
In Which Teen Horniness is Not a Crime How much should prescience be worth in a movie, is something successful because it can call shots, even if the story falls short in a meaningful manner? It’s a question that I … Continue reading Post Millennial Malaise 07: Southland Tales
In Which The Universe is a Blanket There is a story about David O. Russell, when he was making Three Kings, that I think is pertinent to today’s article. No it’s not the one where he’s punched by George Clooney on … Continue reading Post Millennial Malaise 06: I Heart Huckabees
In Which We Explore The Infinite Abyss This week I am going to propose a hypothesis. Let’s call it the quirk equation. A way to to quantify certain cinematic entries that use cutesy affectation, or twee-ness, to attain their goals. … Continue reading Post Millennial Malaise 05: Garden State
In Which This Review Presupposes When you talk about American film in the 90’s you have to talk about the indie boom. How studios like Miramax and directors like Tarantino, Linklater, and Kevin Smith radically shifted what was seen as … Continue reading Post Millennial Malaise 04: The Royal Tenenbaums
In Which, Oh My God, It’s Jason Bourne The Bourne Identity was never supposed to rock blockbuster filmmaking. In fact while in production it had the stench of disaster. Recent indie darlings, director Doug Liman and star Matt Damon, were out of … Continue reading Post Millennial Malaise 03: The Bourne Identity
In Which He Does Whatever a Spider Can The skyline for New York City is iconic. For the whole of the 20th century its buildings, towers, and architecture served as the platonic ideal of the modern metropolis. A place of … Continue reading Post Millennial Malaise 02: Spider-Man
In Which There’s Gold in Them Hills Ah the video game movie. A now nearly thirty year tradition of filmmakers clawing through the dark and trying to crack the nut of adapting one of media’s youngest siblings. In the pantheon … Continue reading Post-Millennial Malaise 01: Lara Croft – Tomb Raider
In Which the Sequel Arrives So we’ve made it to 2021. We’re officially living in the future baby. We’ve got a sea lab and Johnny Mnemonic is out their retrieving faxes through the internet, and the world’s still a mess. … Continue reading Post-Millennial Malaise: An Introduction
In Which an End is Just a Beginning What is the legend of Korra? The legacy of a show that has always toiled in the shadow of its predecessor. Marred by a difficult production, haphazard release, and near death by a thousand … Continue reading Re-Avatar State: “Day of the Colossus” & “The Last Stand”
Operation: Beifong While writing about a long form narrative, such as a TV show, it’s easy to get wound up in big ideas. Pontificate on characters, themes, and plots that have weaved in and out of the story over the … Continue reading Re-Avatar State: “Operation: Beifong” & “Kuvira’s Gambit”
In Which, Despite Everything, It’s Still You In my opening piece about The Legend of Korra I offered a singular thematic idea that I believed served as the overarching structure of the show, even through the tumult of itss production. That if … Continue reading Re-Avatar State: “Beyond the Wilds”
