Released two months after actress Carole Lombard was tragically killed in an airplane crash selling war bonds, To Be or Not To Be was initially not well received by the public or critics, many of whom just couldn’t understand the…
Based on the novel by Rick Moody, Ang Lee’s The Ice Storm is a film about the things we think we know. New Canaan, Connecticut is the picture of affluence and prosperity. On the outside, the Hood and Carver families…
A faithful re-telling of William Golding’s classic novel, Peter Brook’s 1963 film Lord of the Flies subtly conveys the psychological turmoil and violence that overtakes children who are forced to exist in a world devoid of consequences. Brook makes these…
World War II is the most visually documented event in world history; there are countless hours of ships on patrol, planes in combat, and squadrons on the battlefield. However, the one thing that’s nowhere to be found is a visual…
It’s one of the most iconic images in film comedy: Harold Lloyd, with his round owl glasses and straw hat, dangling perilously from the hands of a clock on the side of a lofty building in downtown Los Angeles. Even…
Ingmar Bergman is one of the most revered filmmakers in the world. His work, both complex and deeply thoughtful, some see his work as too incomprehensible to really understand. Nothing is further from the truth. Largely autobiographical, Wild Strawberries reflects…
Filmed at a time when director Delmer Daves was delivering some of the best work of his career—his other mid-fifties films include Jubal (1956) (which he also scripted), Cowboy (1958), and The Hanging Tree (1959)—3:10 to Yuma, based on a…
A psychological western with Shakespearean tensions, Jubal is a nearly forgotten film that despite obvious differences deserves comparison to the simultaneous works of Howard Hawks and John Ford when considering mastery of the western genre. The film’s director, Delmer Daves,…
Made at the pinnacle of the French New Wave, Band of Outsiders (1964) is director Jean-Luc Godard’s take on the crime film. More to the point, Band of Outsiders is Godard’s reinvention of the crime film. In an interview included…
A true loner, writer/director Alex Cox has zealously avoided participating in mainstream Hollywood films throughout his career. One look at Cox’s best known film, 1984’s Repo Man, makes it clear that he is not a filmmaker concerned with being conventional….