Category: review
-
Review: Lars and the Real Girl
There’s something irrevocably odd about Lars Lindstrom. He seems to be the consummate loner. Completely willing and able to see people no more than he needs to, while always being friendly to those he does see. He’s a good worker and a church-goer. He lives in a run-down garage next to his parents old house, where his brother and wife live. He seems in no hurry to find a girlfriend, but as he tells the nice lady at church, he’s not gay. […]
-
Review: Bloggingheads
I’ve been faintly aware of Bloggingheads.tv for about 18 months, and a loyal “viewer”–more on those quotation marks in a minute–for about six months. Bloggingheads is a talk show with little production value but constantly compelling guests. Most episodes are about an hour long from end-to-end and features little more than two heads presented side-by-side […]
-
Review: The Story of Stuff
Let me be clear from the outset: I think that The Story of Stuff, a web video starring Annie Leonard and aimed at raising awareness about the dangers of mindless consumption, is an admirable project with an even more admirable goal. And were I a few years younger I may have even felt it was […]
-
A Review of this Review
You could feel, almost as soon as you’d read the title, that this was one of those ideas that was going to be a little too clever for it’s own good. One of those things that at first brush sounds rather clever, but fizzles after about eight sentences when it shallowness becomes clear. Surely writing […]
-
Review: Did I Ever Tell You How Lucky You Are?
Dr. Seuss’s Did I Ever Tell You How Lucky You Are? is a book I knew by title long before I took the time to read it. I should also note that I think the question posed by the title is one that’s is critically important to ask of me and people like me. People […]
-
Review: Born Into Brothels
Born into Brothels is about children growing up in a red light district in Calcutta (now Kolkatta), India. What I wasn’t expecting is the extensive amount of outside intervention that is really the story of the film. Some would see this as an intolerable rebuke of the documentarian’s principal directive: to document. This is to […]
-
Review: Lake of Fire
Lake of Fire is filmed in black of white. It’s worth noting that like all films we term “black and white,” its actually rendered in various shades of grey. And Tony Kaye’s documentary about abortion in America is careful to show that the issue’s history and moral questions are not black and white. Lake of […]
-
Review: Raining McCain
In her 1964 essay–if one can call an enumerated list an essay–“Notes on ‘Camp,’” Susan Sontag delineated what she called the Camp style. Though nearly every example she gives is obscure to me, the essential traits of camp are clear: it’s exaggerated, it’s methods overwhelm its message, and it thereby becomes a parody of itself. […]
-
Review: For the Bible Tells Me So
For the Bible Tells Me So, a recent documentary by Daniel Karslake is an interesting beast. Through at least the last twenty minutes, my eyes were wet and my nose was running. And though that’s surely a sign of something that’s emotionally resonant, I’m not without reservation in recommending it. After the obligatory footage of […]
-
Review: Gone Baby Gone
Though I’m not in the habit of review relatively recent and well-known movies (that reason is articulated here), Ben Affleck’s directorial debut in Gone Baby Gone was so unexpected that I couldn’t ignore it. I, like the vast majority of people following along, have at times dismissed Mr. Affleck as a talentless hack who got […]