Had I been writing this column 80 years ago, I would probably have lined up with those critics vigorously opposed to the talkies. “Who needs sound?” we might have argued. By the mid-1920’s film had developed into an incredibly sophisticated visual medium. The Russians had mastered

Two ladies of a certain age sitting behind me gasped during the opening sequence. The young hero Adam Markovski (Jason Schwartzman) first appears on screen walking toward the camera as his voice-over explains in spectacularly scabrous terms his bewilderment with the universe. Those of us who deal on

The worm turns. Last spring the religious right made such a fuss about the polychrome piosities of Mel Gibson that even card-carrying atheists had to line up to see what all the buzz was about. Every action has its reaction, so now the sanctimonious left has created an even greater fuss about Michae

Reality leaves a great deal to be desired. Reading the morning paper feels like an ongoing suicide pact with the universe, and listening to NPR without several doses of Prozac in hand can threaten one’s tenuous grasp on sanity: Iraq, terrorism, environment, fundamentalism, economy, abuse, AIDS

Why am I writing this? More to the point, why are you reading it? The answer is simple. Everybody has to say something about it, and many of you feel you have to see it. Even before seeing the film—and making it clear that I had not yet seen it—I was badgered into making statements on it

Cold Mountain adds significance to its shopworn narrative with several brilliant scenes that have only marginal relationship to the story line. That is not an altogether damning comment. Jean Renoir, the great French director, once expressed his admiration for American Westerns: “They’re

The Charles River is English tweed and cappuccino from Starbucks. It splits the twin campuses of Harvard University and hosts the Head of the Charles Regatta, a band shell for the Boston Pops and fireworks on the Fourth of July, marinas for modest but assertively picturesque sailboats and a lovely p

Woody Allen has never been in the Spielberg or Lucas class of popularity with American audiences yet the critical literature surrounding the artist and his work continues to grow beyond any correlation to his box-office numbers With the possible exception of Hitchcock Allen may be the most scruti

Given the choice between dental surgery without anesthetic and The Magdalene Sisters, call your dentist for an appointment immediately. In either case, pain may be salutary in the long run. The film raises too many important issues to be dismissed as just another skirmish in the vast anti-Catholic c

Best known in the United States for his early films ldquo Diary of a Country Priest rdquo 1951 and ldquo The Trial of Joan of Arc rdquo 1962 Robert Bresson became known to the critical establishment as a ldquo Catholic rdquo filmmaker In this brief but comprehensive survey of the comple