Quantcast
   
Tuesday - March 19, 2024

Articles Written By TimBrennan

 

Infernal Technical Difficulties

March 18th, 2024

We still have talk shows, and we still have late night talk shows, but not the way they used to be. Bill Maher still trots out his weaponized snark to gab about politics and get mad at the youths. Jimmy Kimmel trots out his weaponized snark to trigger Donald Trump, as does Stephen Colbert.  But perhaps the strangest of all is Jimmy Fallon. If you’re not of a prehistoric age like I am, you might be wondering why that is. Fallon has popular celebrities on his show, plays games with them, never asks awkward questions or makes things weird. His show is literally a safe space, so what’s weird about... Read More

The Worm Has Turned

March 11th, 2024

A combination of a journalism assignment at the Oregon Dunes and the recreational usage of psilocybin mushrooms led Frank Herbert to write “Dune,” a sprawling, five book saga. Beloved by many, they featured intergalactic warfare, giant worm-related destruction, and trenchant criticism of politics and religion. On the one hand, you’d expect that as a lifelong genre dweeb and sci-fi nerd, I would have been into these books. On the other hand, those are some seriously long-ass books. I put off reading them, and if you know anything about me, I have some god tier procrastination skills. Years... Read More

Jacked Up

March 4th, 2024

There are two kinds of crime movies that I’m an absolute sucker for. The first are the ones about professionals. With movies like The Town, Thief, and The Driver, we’re introduced to crooks who live and work by a code. They consider the situations they’re walking into, the kinds of people they’re likely to deal with, and frequently have plans within plans. More importantly, they operate on a base level of competency. If you need someone to successfully rob a bank, crack a safe, or successfully evade the police, they can do it. The second kind of movie hews closer to reality. Most criminals... Read More

The Passion of the Props

February 26th, 2024

Years ago, I had the opportunity to buy an Alien. By that I mean a xenomorph, one of the double jawed critters that have joyfully romped with Sigourney Weaver through multiple movies. In those movies, we’re led to believe there are a metric ton of them, so many that if you were to throw an M41A pulse rifle, you’d hit one. But next time you watch Aliens and marvel at Weaver, Michael Biehn, Bill Paxton and others being terrorized by hordes of fiendish thingies, bear in mind that there were only twelve of them. Those twelve were cunningly shot by James Cameron to create the illusion of an unstoppable... Read More

Reality’s Mess

February 19th, 2024

These days, it’s hard to be nuanced. The United States is profoundly polarized, and we’re constantly encouraged to to self-sort, to live, work, and socialize with other like minded people. Why? It’s easier. We say we want unity, but that really means we just want people to think and agree with our positions. It’s still the early days of 2024, but we are in an election year, which means the polarization will only get worse. So how are you supposed to get past polarization? First, I think you don’t automatically assume the worst motives of others. It’s true there are people out there... Read More

Resurrection Nation

February 12th, 2024

American film is in sad shape. It’s true that Barbie and Oppenheimer made crazy amounts of money. It’s true that Top Gun: Maverick did the same, as well as Avengers: Endgame and Anyone But You.* I promise you that every year that movies are released, there will be a few American films that make all the money. American film is still in sad shape, because major studios don’t know what audiences want. For the most part, their decisions are reactive as opposed to proactive. I think we’ll see the rom-com come back in a big way because a) when times are stressful, audiences like pretty people... Read More

Socks Maketh Man

February 5th, 2024

You probably shouldn’t listen to me in general, and you really shouldn’t when it comes to movies. Consider the fact that I’m no expert. I’m not a director. I don’t have a degree in film studies. I’m just some guy who’s done some screenwriting and is extremely into movies. And bear in mind that this isn’t an impromptu pity party I’m throwing on my behalf. There’s something more to it. I used to think that some movies, and some tiers of filmmakers, were objectively good. Akira Kurosawa is a genius, and if you feel otherwise, that’s a you problem, not a Kurosawa problem. But... Read More

Avian Philosophy

January 29th, 2024

The movie industry is generally an unforgiving one for filmmakers, and it demands that each film made either be profitable or critically acclaimed.* As a result, incompetents, nepotists, and erratic people are usually weeded out sooner or later. The ones left standing decades later are the modern masters of the art form, and it’s important to check out their work. It’s also important to be honest with yourself on how you feel about those modern masters. Maybe Scorsese’s Raging Bull is too brutal for you. Totally cool! Maybe Kubrick leaves you cold. A valid perspective! The way you feel is... Read More

Schrodinger’s Deity

January 22nd, 2024

Is there a God? What’s more likely, that an omnipotent being has created us in His/Her/Its image, and subtly guides the universe like a puppeteer, or that it’s all chaos, that we’re on a puny world in some jerkwater part of the universe, and when our dust mote existence terminates, it’ll happen with the same fanfare we give to a dust mote? We can’t say, though we like to think we can with something approaching certainty. The question is too big and we’re too limited. I’ve had my own brushes with the divine. My grandmother, a devout Christian, was diagnosed with inoperable cancer,... Read More

The Wall of Life and Death

January 15th, 2024

It would have been easier if the Nazis were monsters. If we consider the atrocities committed in service of the Final Solution, if we peel back each layer of cruelty to expose another layer even worse, the enormity of it all is nearly too much to bear.  Monsters would do those things. Would human beings do those things to other human beings? The question is staggering, and it makes it easier for us to call them monsters. To be sure, there were psychopaths and sadists in the ranks of the Reich. Dehumanizing language from authoritarian leaders has always attracted those types. But the majority of... Read More