Over and Overs: “WALL•E” and My Son

Team Experience occasionally sounds off on super rewatchable films that hold a special place in their lives

By Ben Miller

As a parent, I have hoped to find common interests with my two children.  While my neurotypical daughter is outgoing and gregarious, my son is on the autism spectrum and does not relate as well.  His communication skills are limited and his specific interests are topic based, like dinosaurs and planets. In an effort to find a common love, I attempted many different activities.  While my love of baseball has yet to translate towards any athletic inclinations on is part, I was able to truly bond with my son through the magic of film, and that film was WALL•E...

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Venice Diary #05 - Bad Journalists, bad-ass lapdancer and a french pearl

by Elisa Giudici

"Ridacece i soldi" (give us our money back) is a bizarre event that takes place every year at Venice Film Festival. It's a sort of award for the festivalgoers. In this picture, you can see the wooden prize awarded to the author of the funniest joke about a movie seen during the festival or a joke about a stereotypical situation that can be experienced only during Mostra. Everyone can write (or draw) an entry on a simple white piece of paper. There is a big wooden board in front of the official cafeteria. If you are early for the next screening, you can stop by and read some entries. The kind of humor most appreciated in this peculiar competition is the dry kind: you have to be biting wit to have a chance of winning.

Okay let's talk about three of the main Competition films: Lost Illusions, Mona Lisa and the Blood Moon, and L'Evenement...

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Review: "Impeachment" Doesn't Live Up to Previous "American Crime Story" Seasons

by Christopher James

Boy you know exactly what you did in that White House.Ryan Murphy’s American Crime Story is back with more facial prosthetics and famous impersonations than ever. On its face, Impeachment was billed as the story of the Monica Lewinsky scandal. However, there is definitely a lot more on the show’s plate. In fact, it feels more squarely in Linda Tripp’s perspective. This could be an interesting lens to view the Clinton scandals and it’s nice that the show has some curveballs.

Unfortunately, it appears Impeachment is more about celebrity mimicry than properly dramatizing the Clinton scandals. There are plenty of great performances, particularly from Beanie Feldstein as Monica Lewinksy and Annaleigh Ashford as fellow Clinton accuser Paula Jones. It’s enough to keep people tuning in, but we’re a far cry away from the quality of the other American Crime Story seasons...

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Nathaniel in Venice: Horrors! It's "Last Night in Soho" and "Mona Lisa and the Blood Moon"

Nathaniel reporting from the Venice Film Festival

Let’s take a wee break from the Oscar-bound and foreign arthouse offerings at Venice and talk genre. As with comedies, there’s not enough of it at festivals but it’s good to program a variety of pictures if you can. Here are two films featuring supernatural elements, one a complete misfire the other a future cult gem... 

Last Night in Soho (Edgar Wright)
I am deeply sad to report that this wasn’t (at all) for me, though I was so looking forward as I generally enjoy Wright’s work. I was worried from the start with the movie’s hyper enthusiasm about everything it’s doing even before it’s begun doing things...

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Come On Come On, C'Mon C'mon

by Jason Adams

I'm still not sure what to make of the movie year that's been 2021 -- everything still feels to me of a piece with 2020 to be honest, for reasons I am sure you can extrapolate. I have only been inside a movie theater a handful of times and those have been for press screenings or for a cannot-miss repertory screening (like when The Paris here in NYC screened Call Me By Your Name a few weeks ago); that is to say I still haven't been to see a single new movie in a theater with a crowd of normals since March of last year. Add on the fact that I saw several of this fall's big movies this past winter at Sundance (my first), while several of this fall's big movies were first meant to be last fall's big movies, and I think this has given the current moment a formlessness that I'm having trouble delineating.

Anyway my ultimate point is I was going to call Mike Mills' new film C'Mon C'Mon my most anticipated film of the fall, but I actually have no idea what that means anymore. So let's just say I really really really really really wanna see this movie. So much so that doing any "Yes No Maybe So" for this morning's just-dropped first look trailer would be a total and complete farce. I am one thousand percent down for this. I mean did you SEE 20th Century Women? 

C'Mon C'Mon will be playing NYFF in a few weeks and then will presumably be out by the end of the year but A24 hasn't set a date yet. What are your thoughts on the trailer?