After the sudden death of their close friend, three middle-aged New Yorkers spend a lost weekend in London, drinking, gambling, womanizing, and struggling to make sense of their places in the world. “I am a moralist,” writer-director Jon Cassavetes once said, “in that I believe Read More …
In The Holy Mountain, Alejandro Jodorowsky adapted Ascent of Mount Carmel (St. John of the Cross) and Mount Analogue (Rene Daumal) to film by combining them with attributes of various religions in a whirlwind eclecticism of the esoteric. An alchemist takes under his tutelage the Read More …
The title character of Fitzcarraldo is an opera fan with a dream bringing an opera house to the Peruvian jungle, but first, he has to transport a three-story, 300-ton steamer ship over a mountain. Director Werner Herzog filmed this story without computerized special effects, and Read More …
The opening shot of Aguirre: The Wrath of God tracks the descent of a group of conquistadors into an Amazon river valley as they search for El Dorado, the fabled city of gold. That shot becomes a metaphor for Aguirre’s descent into madness as he Read More …
“Open the pod bay doors, HAL,” Commander Dave Bowman requests. But the HAL 9000 computer is perfect; too perfect to allow humanity’s imperfections to interrupt this important mission to Jupiter. An epic of awe-inspiring visuals and a thundering symphonic soundtrack, 2001 is a pilgrimage into Read More …
Andrei Tarkovsky’s film about the great Medieval Russian Orthodox icon painter is a fractured journey, showing disparate episodes from Rublev’s life instead of following a traditional narrative arc. These include Rublev’s conversation with Theophanes, a cynical artist; a sequence in which he stumbles upon a Read More …
Stalker follows three men—a professor, an author, and their guide, a “Stalker”—on a journey from the muted and run-down city in which they live to The Zone, a vibrant and mysterious space created by an alien crash-landing. The journey becomes metaphysical as well as geographical Read More …
Alvin Straight (Richard Farnsworth) is a 73 year-old veteran who has not spoken with his brother in ten years, but he won’t let his physical limitations stop him from a cross-country trek on a riding lawn mower in search of reconciliation. Along the road, he Read More …
A “minor character” steps off a movie screen and into Depression-era New Jersey, stranding his fellow characters while offering perfect (but imaginary) love to an abused housewife. Woody Allen’s best film (even he regards it as the most successful of his efforts) is a delightfully Read More …
There are two things that can be unarguably claimed about the films of Wes Anderson. First, he is preoccupied with the idea of family—both that which one is born into and that which one chooses. And second, he has an unmistakable visual style. Fantastic Mr. Fox, Read More …