Soundtracking: Southland Tales

by Chris Feil

Recently resurfacing with repertory runs of its original catastrophic Cannes cut, Richard Kelly’s notorious Donnie Darko follow-up Southland Tales plays like the most bizarre time capsule. It captures not only a specific ideological moment in the timeline of post-9/11 anti-Bush anxieties, but it also captures the aura of MTV in its dying days as a culturally dominant force. For the uninitiated: imagine a Nashville porn parody peppered with internet conspiracy theories and set to the Pixies, then edited for television. It doesn’t all work by a long shot but it’s kind of awe-inspiringly out there, and at its best when it realized that it’s really meant to be an opera.

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The Ophir Nominations. Which film will be Israel's Oscar Submission?

by Nathaniel R

The Ophir Awards, honoring the best in Israeli cinema, were created in 1990. The winner of Best Film always becomes Israel's Oscar submission. Well, almost always. There have been a few exceptions due to eligibility issues --  the most famous example being The Band's Visit (2008) which was hugely successful in US arthouses (and eventually became a Tony-winning Broadway musical) but which could not be submitted because the Israeli and Egyptian characters spoke in English too often due to their language barriers.

After the jump, the nominations for this year's Ophirs  NOW UPDATED WITH THE WINNERS (thank you to longtime reader Yonatan for the hat tip!) and more about Israel's Oscar history...

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"Kathy Griffin: One Hell of a Story" and "The Great Hack"

by Eurocheese

Kathy Griffin: A Hell of a Story’s one night only theatrical event (Wednesday, July 31st) and Netflix’s disturbing expose on digital exploitation The Great Hack couldn’t be more different in tone, but they would make an interesting double feature. I couldn’t have imagined either film would exist just a few years ago. In a decade, I wonder what we’ll be saying about both of them...

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The New Classics: Master and Commander

Michael Cusumano here to explore what keeps fans returning for repeat voyages on Peter Weir's 2003 nautical adventure.

Scene: Exploring the Galapagos
Right before the climactic naval battle in Peter Weir’s Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World, the story pauses to watch a scientist leisurely wander the Galapagos Islands, collecting lizards and measuring giant tortoises. How many modern adventure films would halt the action dead in its tracks like that? Hell, how many films from any era would resist relegating such a detour to the cutting room floor? I can imagine David Lean including the sequence, but then his version of Master and Commander would probably push the four hour mark.

This adaptation of Patrick O’Brien’s series of novels is less about narrative urgency and more about creating a world to get lost in. Sure, when the time comes to pay-off the naval duel at the center of the plot, Master and Commander delivers in spectacular fashion. But that’s not what keeps the devotees of the film returning over and over again...

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Lunchtime Poll: Which scene in a movie made you imagine a whole other movie?

by Nathaniel R

Once Upon a Time ... in Hollywood was difficult to write about. That's what happens with dense movies. Naturally, then, my review left out something major. It was only after publishing it that I realized I hadn't even mentioned the extended scene that is the movie's most impressive on a filmmaking level. I'm talking about the significant detour when Cliff Booth (Brad Pitt) visits Spahn's Movie Ranch. He used to shoot a TV show there a decade earlier but it's now Manson Family territory, thanks to the retired and now blind George Spahn (Bruce Dern)...

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