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How Do You Know

By Adam Lippe

A visual motif is supposed to be used to express a feeling that is never overtly expressed by the characters, revealing something about them that they’re unaware of or trying to hide. A perfect example is Tammy Metzler in the movie Election, and the use of garbage that she either hides behind or hangs out […]

A review and podcast on The Cove

By Adam Lippe

Below you’ll find a review of Louie Psihoyos’ documentary, The Cove. I’m also including a podcast about the film which I conducted with famed dictator Pol Pot, the former Prime Minister of Cambodia. Click the play icon to listen to the podcast. Or you can download the podcast here. (Right-click, Save Link As…) The use […]

Skeleton Crew

By Adam Lippe

The easiest way for filmmakers to get themselves out of being painted into the corner is with a deus ex machina. Sometimes that deus ex machina is a lapse of logic, like Samuel L. Jackson driving on the highway and looking out his window at the exact moment Bruce Willis flies out of a water […]

Drag Me to Hell

By Adam Lippe

Any actor willing to look foolish on camera should be cherished for their surprising lack of shame. Since acting is almost entirely about insecurity, ego, and validation, someone willing to forgo all of that “for the good of the project” is a rare find. The king of this fearlessness is undoubtedly Kurt Russell, who enthusiastically […]

Vicky Christina Barcelona

By Adam Lippe

B-movie legend Bruce Campbell said in his autobiography If Chins Could Kill, that he was more than happy to take a role in the expensive, dreadful, Michael Crichton adaptation Congo, because it meant he’d get a free [and well paid] trip to Africa. Watching Woody Allen’s new film Vicky Christina Barcelona, one might easily assume […]

Running Time

By Adam Lippe

An attempt by producer/star Bruce Campbell and director Josh Becker to outdo Rope, this sparse but tense action film, is striking not just because it appears to be all in one shot, but because the movie manages to entertain apart from the gimmick. All of the cuts are hidden, unlike Rope, and Hitchcock did it […]

Now on DVD and Blu-Ray

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.