Comedy

Lisztomania

By Adam Lippe

There’s a famous story about how Paddy Chayefsky, screenwriter of Network, who had it in his contract that none of the dialogue that he wrote for Altered States could be changed. That presented a problem for any director brave enough to tackle the speech and science heavy material and still assert themselves on the set, […]

I’m a Cyborg, but That’s OK

By Adam Lippe

Onion AV Club writer Nathan Rabin coined the term manic pixie dream girl to describe that irritating sprite of a character that’s always adorable, energetic, impulsive, and bound to bring a down-on-his-luck, brooding, scruffy, yet good-looking outsider back to the surface so he can discover how wonderful life can be. He was describing Kirsten Dunst’s […]

The Day of the Beast

By Adam Lippe

If filmmaking is an act of myth-making, than what is a filmmaker who spends his time busting up long held myths? He’s not Penn and Teller, who specialize in creating magic and then explaining to you what a dope you are for falling for it. He’s not a meta-filmmaker who likes to break the fourth […]

A podcast with Josh Shelov, the writer/director of The Best and the Brightest

By Adam Lippe

Here’s a podcast with Josh Shelov, the writer/director of The Best and the Brightest. While the film is screening in Philadelphia as you read this (that is, if you’re reading this as soon as I post it, so, that would just be me), it will open in a more traditional fashion in the next few […]

Scre4m [sensibly known as Scream 4]

By Adam Lippe

Charlie Kaufman’s screenplay for Confessions of a Dangerous Mind — his adaptation of Chuck Barris’ book about his dual professions of hosting The Gong Show and being an assassin for the CIA — is a lot different from the movie that the director, George Clooney, put together. Apparently, Kaufman was upset by the fact that […]

What?

By Adam Lippe

My theory has always been that Robert Altman fully developed his never-to-be-broken misanthropy while filming the conclusion of California Split. It was a spur of the moment decision on set, but who knows what Altman was going through personally at the time (he had a major problem with cocaine and alcohol)? George Segal and pal […]

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Roadracers

By Adam Lippe

Whenever there’s a genre parody or ode to a specific era of films, such as Black Dynamite’s mocking of Blaxploitation films or Quentin Tarantino’s Death Proof, the second half of Grindhouse, the danger is that the film might fall into the trap of either being condescending without any particular insight, or so faithful that it becomes the very flawed thing it is emulating.

Black Dynamite has nothing new to say about Blaxploitation films, it just does a decent job of copying what an inept [...]

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Featured Quote (written by me)

On Cold Fish:

Though the 16 year old me described the 1994 weepie Angie, starring Geena Davis as a Brooklyn mother raising her new baby alone, as “maudlin and melodramatic,” Roger Ebert, during his TV review, referring to the multitude of soap-operaish problems piling up on the titular character, suggested that it was only in Hollywood where Angie would get a happy ending. “If they made this movie in France, Angie would have shot herself.”

Well Cold Fish was made in Japan, where Angie would have shot herself and that would have been the happy ending.