It’s been said that the era of the movie star is dead. I’m not sure I’d say it’s dead, per se, but it’s definitely in a medically induced coma. For example, take a look at the highest grossing films of 2022 thus far. A few of them are: Top Gun: Maverick Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness Jurassic World: Dominion The Batman Minions: The Rise of Gru All of those films are intellectual property. All of them are part of a franchise, to some degree. With one exception, their success isn’t based on who the star is. Rather, their success is based on a filmgoer’s comfort level... Read More

We can all agree that Stephen Hawking was a pretty bright guy. He took a look at what humanity had been up to and was quoted as saying, “I don’t think the human race will survive the next thousand years unless we spread into space. There are too many accidents that can befall life on a single planet.” If you’re in a pessimistic frame of mind, Hawking’s quote is easy to get behind. Due to pollution, environmental mismanagement, and climate change, bird populations in North America are plummeting. That’s only a single example of how our arrogance, selfishness, and ignorance damages the... Read More

When Quentin Tarantino’s debut feature Reservoir Dogs was released in 1992, the American film industry was in crisis. Cracks were appearing in the star system. Mainstream films were flopping at the box office. Audiences wanted something, anything new, and Hollywood didn’t know what to give them. For a moment, there was a window for Tarantino to pass through. Along with independent filmmakers like Steven Soderbergh, Paul Thomas Anderson and others, he irrevocably changed movies and culture. But 1992 was a long time ago. Sure, Tarantino was a big swinging dick—still is to a degree. He’s one... Read More

There’s a line in Adam McKay’s new film, The Big Short, that perfectly encapsulates what the film means and how its characters relate to it. “The truth is like poetry. And everyone f**king hates poetry.” When we’re children, we’re taught to share, to be nice, to behave in a fundamentally decent way. Theoretically, anyway. As we get older, and it’s different for everyone, things change. We’re told that success is measured monetarily, that our self-worth is directly proportional to our net worth. We display a lack of empathy that’s staggering,... Read More