Split Decision: "The Color Purple"

No two people feel the exact same way about any film. Thus, Team Experience is pairing up to debate the merits of this year’s Oscar movies. Here's Ben Miller and Eric Blume on The Color Purple…

BEN:  When it comes to Blitz Bazuwale's The Color Purple, I am supremely positive on the film. It's nice to have a film filled with unbridled energy and verve. I don't necessarily see it as a big loser when it comes to Oscar, but I think it deserves much more than it got.

What are your generalized thoughts on the film's quality?

ERIC:  Ah Ben we're going to have a good time with this one!  I watched The Color Purple with my jaw dropped, finding it almost unfathomable how terrible it was.  Like, I couldn't quite believe it... 

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Review: “Broadway” is a Tragicomic Crime Wonder

by Juan Carlos Ojano

There is a sequence in the romantic crime dramedy BROADWAY where a lot of things clicked with me. Street performer Nelly (Elsa Lekakou) is dragged by policeme. Suddenly, a mob of queer queens swarm in to snatch them from the police. A few moments later, Nelly is reunited with fellow performer Jonas/Barbara (Foivos Papadopoulos). They kiss and rejoice to the orchestral version of Irene Cara’s “Fame”, that they were performing before this arrest.  

This scene, which paves way for the film's midpoint, negotiates a variety of tones in a circular structure demonstrating Broadway's sophisticated storytelling. Christos Massalas' surprisingly thoughtful feature film mixes complex imagery, delicate writing, and sensitively portrayed romance with rhythmic movement and striking craft...

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For "The Humans" to Err is Human and to Forget Divine

by Jason Adams

Erik (Richard Jenkins), the patriarch of the Blake family, stands staring out a dingy window into the gray light of the alleyway -- excuse me, the "interior courtyard" -- behind his daughter's unfurnished and water-logged Chinatown apartment. His thoughts are clearly elsewhere, new worries freshly lining his already lined face, as something catches his eye, and then another -- is that snow? It's lovely, in its way, but distressing all the same -- having traveled into the big city for this Housewarming slash Thanksgiving dinner from the wilds of distant Scranton he's got to think about getting everybody home at a decent hour, and a snow-storm would have them trapped here, nary a bed in sight. (Having lugged a Mary figure there as their Housewarming gift the soft Biblical allusions to "no room at the Inn" seem let's say non-accidental.) He brings up this his most recent distress to Richard (Steven Yeun), his daughter's boyfriend, who doesn't see snow at all, instead offering the thesis that someone on an upper floor has just emptied their ashtray.

Snow to ash, and just like that beauty to death, a recurring happening in Stephen Karam's Tony-winning play turned A24's darkly funny and emotionally cataclysmic awards-season contender The Humans, out this week...

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Doc Corner: 'On Broadway'

By Glenn Dunks

They say the neon lights are bright,
on Broadway.
They say there’s always magic in the air…

Let's be thankful that On Broadway doesn’t open with those famous lyrics from the song of the same name. Bob Fosse already did that, using George Benson’s funk-inspired 1978 rendition to launch All That Jazz over images of a throng of auditioning theatre wannabes. It’s showtime, folks, and that song is a hell of an introduction, but it's been done.

The release of Oren Jacoby’s doc feels perfectly timed, having been completed and screened at the Hamptons International Film Festival back in 2019 but delayed for general release until now as the city is on the verge of re-opening to crowds...

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Soundtracking: Connie and Carla

by Chris Feil

These days, the act and art of fandom is self-reverentially chasing its own tail. But tell that to quietly minted cult classic Connie and Carla, one of our few musicals ABOUT musicals. Or at least about the love of the art form. In this jukebox musical repurposing other musicals, Broadway fandom shines because of its capacity for endless streams of references and ouroboros devotion.

It’s flop status ensured that the film got buried fast but it is primed for a revival to a new generation of musical lovers...

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