Brigitte Berman, whose last full-length documentary was nearly twenty-five years ago, took home the Oscar for her look at the prolific Artie Shaw. Since then she has culled drama from her fingertips by creating fiction. Now, almost three decades later, the Canadian filmmaker releases a feature-length documentary that took three-years to make. A kaliedescope of [...]
Justin Bartha’s character, one of moody intrigue and gaudy affluence, is a brash menace in director Kevin Asch’s “Holy Rollers.” Playing the role of a seedy, unapologetic man named Yosef, who has veered so far from his faith that the traditional Hasidic attire he dresses in serves only a reminder of his former virtuousness. Yosef [...]
A Rockwell Piece of Americana
Starring: Sam Rockwell, Angelica Huston
By Ben Ritter
Fox Searchlight doesn’t have a clue what to do with Choke. It’s a charming little dark comedy about a man’s love for his dying mother, but they want it to be the next American Pie. How else can you explain the anal bead bookmarks handed [...]
Too weird to Live
Starring: Hunter S. Thompson
By Ben Ritter
Gonzo: The Life and Work of Dr. Hunter S. Thompson is a well-researched and engaging, if overlong and undercritical, overview of the life of America’s favorite journalist/junkie/drunk/gun nut.
Thompson’s career—like American society itself during the time period chronicled—followed a general downward trajectory, bookended by the irrational optimism of [...]
A new column written by Kyle Henke that looks and argues against a critical viewpoint shared by many. Was the movie really awful or actually great? Is the actor playing the role amazingly while being shamed for the script? Lets find out.
Bear In Heaven’s album “Beast Rest Forth Mouth” is a kaleidoscope of detached drums and ethereal vocals. The chaotic symphony pouring from your speakers sounds like a swelling of marred beauty and yellowed memories of adolescence. Jon Philpot, the lead vocalist of the Brooklyn band, channels an otherworldly voice that wafts and ducks throughout the [...]
Listening to Best Coast is almost akin to listening to the cackle of a car speaker, worn down by the effervescent saltiness of the sea air, as it sits beside a nearby boardwalk. You can hear the ethereal hum of the treble, the waves crashing like faraway mortor fire, and the detached voices of beach [...]
Sage Francis is a poet laureate, crowned with a sweaty brow and an exuberant open palm, whose movements are deliberate and without reservation. Often times unpredictable, the Rhode Island emcee, whose songs are thronged with thorned rhymes and eclectic beats, released his newest record, “Li(f)e,” earlier this year. The LP, not atypical of the artist’s [...]
“The Magician’s Private Library,” an eclectic gnashing of marred horns and spectral pianos, is a brilliant offering of jazzy-distortion and airy vocals. The perpetrator of the album, whose music is both quietly sinister and radically unchained, is Holly Miranda. The musical maven was somewhat of a wunderkind, learning piano and guitar at an early age, and [...]
Karin Dreijer Andersson isn’t homologous with her music. The cryptic and ethereal sounds of Fever Ray, clawing its way out of some uncharted land that sounds of writhing ghosts and dystopia-like themes, is brooding with ideas. The seemingly enigmatic Karin isn’t so perpetually intangible as one would think, the artist [...]
Haunting reverberations bob and slink, effortlessly bringing fourth frayed images of meandering uncertainty and fallen loves, each time The Clientele’s music is heard. This is how Alasdair MacLean utilizes his hushed, buoyant and atmospherically drenched vocal delivery as the band’s frontman.. MacLean’s voice, a ghostly pulley that lifts monochrome memories and fluttering echoes of despondency from his mind, is an abyss of mystery [...]
Effervescent echoes and spectral instrumentation waft through the air, creating, what some might call, a symphony of lo-fi harmonization and hauntingly desperate ambiance. Here We Go Magic’s self-titled debut album has, in the last few months, gained a lot of notoriety with music critics. Pitchfork named the work an honorable mention for their best album [...]
By Sam Wood
This week I am very proud to begin my series of thrilling VHS Screeners. These are not-so-sneak peeks at fine cinematic masterpieces you will not see re-released on mass-market DVD (bootlegs maybe). As a lover of knowledge, I think it is a crime that these works will be lost to the [...]
The history of film tends to be dominated by the 1920s, 30s, and 40s. We talk about the transition to talkies, the Hays code, the introduction of color, and of course the birth of future movie supergod Arnold Schwarzenegger in July of 1947 (there was thunder and lightning and candy bullets rained from [...]
Let’s talk about books. (“Oh noooo!” the voices of thousands cry in unison, “Not booooks, on my mooooovie site!”).
SIT DOWN!
That’s better. Now, I’m a major nerd, and most of the time when I know that a movie is based on a book I’m pretty stringent about reading that book. Other times, I have no idea [...]
Tonight I sat down with a couple of good friends, a big goblet of Olallieberry wine, and a DVD called “Starcrash.” I saw the film once, years ago, and at the time I sorely wished I had purchased some alcohol first. A goblet of dessert wine seemed just the thing to add a touch of [...]
Hello and welcome to Sam’s Phenomenal Cosmic Movie Column! On the following pages you will find wonders and horrors, exalting philosophical diatribes and a sublime butchery of the critic’s art. You may laugh, or cry, or pass out from the oxygen deprivation (don’t forget to breathe while reading; see disclaimer below).
The Phenomenal Cosmic Movie Column [...]
