1988’s The Deceivers, playing in theaters now in a new restoration, is produced by Ismail Merchant but it’s not quite what you imagine when you think of a Merchant/Ivory production. For one thing, it’s not directed by James Ivory. Instead,...
Title: Good Time Year: 2017 Director(s): Josh and Benny Safdie Cast: Robert Pattinson, Jennifer Jason-Leigh, Benny Safdie, Buddy Duress, Barkhad Abdi, Taliah Webster, Necro, muMs Synopsis: When two brothers, Nick (Safdie) and Connie (Pattinson) Nikas, narrowly escape a botched bank...
The gangster movie has long been a Hollywood staple. As far back as the 1930s, filmmakers drew inspiration from Prohibition Era figures like Al Capone and Lucky Luciano, producing some of the most iconic movies in film history. Since then,...
Title: The Sniper Year: 1952 Director: Edward Dmytryk Cast: Arthur Franz, Marie Windsor, Adolphe Menjou, Gerald Mohr Synopsis: Eddie Miller takes to the rooftops and high-rise windows to exact compulsory killings of women with his sniper rifle. His warped sexual...
For a long time, I had very little interest in seeing Bullitt, a movie I snobbishly thought of as a Steve McQueen vanity project, something he reverse engineered from the idea for a car chase scene. I softened my stance...
1947’s T-Men is one of a flurry of propaganda movies made in the 1940s and 50s with the cooperation of various law enforcement agencies. Like 1949’s Trapped, this one’s about treasury agents tracking counterfeiters. Other examples include 1954’s Down Three...
For the second year in a row, there was no in-person TCM Classic Film Festival this spring. No drinks with old friends at the Pig ‘n Whistle, no charming anecdotes from well-seasoned celebrities, no nitrate at the Egyptian. And I...
Look, I’ll confess. I didn’t see Hillbilly Elegy. I know, I know, it was nominated for a goddamn Oscar and everything but something told me maybe I ought to skip it. If that movie is even half as patronizing toward...