Drama

Vigil

By Adam Lippe

If Vincent Ward had been allowed to make his version of Alien 3, that film might have been thought of in a positive manner, as opposed to just, “the first of many forgettable follow-ups to Alien and Aliens.” Ward’s conception* was that there was a monastery where all the monks acted as though they were […]

In a Glass Cage

By Adam Lippe

How do you keep an audience in a state of shock for an entire film? It’s probably a delicate balance and part of that balance is making sure you don’t push it too far. There are many extreme gore or rape/revenge movies that try so hard to offend and alienate that they just become laughable. […]

Bullet in the Head

By Adam Lippe

A filmmaker like Larry Clark puts a viewer in a tough spot. When watching a movie like Kids, Bully, or Wassup Rockers, are we to believe that Clark has perfectly portrayed the aimlessness and idiocy of bored, wayward teenagers in search of a good time? Or is Clark just lazy himself, and he simply hasn’t […]

Submarine

By Adam Lippe

Did you know that kids, especially teenagers, use profanity on a fairly regular basis? One wouldn’t know that by watching films aimed at that demographic, considering the limitations of the PG-13 rating (where you can only say the F word once). The most accurate presentations of high school tend to be films that garner an […]

The Tree of Life

By Adam Lippe

Is there a significant difference between getting your money’s worth and getting too much? In terms of moviegoing, there’s two ways of dealing with that thought; Since you’ve paid, you have to get as much as you can out of the experience. Or, since you’ve paid, it’s your time and your money, and torturing yourself […]

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 […]

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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.