Reviews of the Bosch

My point of reference for A Letter to Three Wives , the 1949 drama that won Joseph L. Mankiewicz his first of two consecutive Best Director Oscars (the second was for All About Eve ), is from a late-era Simpsons  parody that struck me as way too curious a premise to have originated from that show during the 2010s. It wasn’t that bad an episode from what I recall, but I’ve been interested in seeing the movie it’s based on ever since. A plot that tackles three womens’ introspection over their marriages, their dissatisfaction and issues with their husbands during a time when the nuclear family was the immaculate model is very attractive, perhaps even courageous. So when this movie showed up on the Criterion Channel as part of a series on Mankiewicz, I knew I had to finally see it. The story, which is based off of a novella by John Klempner published in Cosmopolitan , is about three women friends, each in a fairly static marriage, who go on a riverboat cruise for a day as supervisors for a

One of the best books on movies that I own is titled Walk, Don’t Run  -it’s a study of the filmography of Richard Linklater and refers to his tendency as a filmmaker to let moments breathe, to meander and follow trains of thought almost aimlessly; and to take in atmosphere and conversation without much consideration for overarching plot. Fluid, stream-of-consciousness type stuff as in Waking Life  or Slacker . I was reminded of that book and its’ evocation while watching  Italian Studies , a thoughtful movie that is similarly free-wheeling and plotless as it drifts in and out of memory and experience, with greater regard for feeling and sensation than sensibility. It was fittingly around this time last year that I saw Pieces of a Woman , the great break-out movie for actress Vanessa Kirby that earned her an Oscar nomination. And as her follow-up, Italian Studies  makes a lot of sense; a similarly intimate indie movie that has a streak of an art film to it (much more so than Pieces of a

I really didn’t want to have to write more about how bad Disney is, but they keep giving me no choice. And hey, Disney’s been greenlighting a bunch of prolonged unnecessary sequels, they just announced a new Santa Clause , so I think I’m justified in making my own. Back in 2019 , I wrote about the encroaching dominance of Disney and why it was concerning for the film industry as a whole. I was optimistic but critical, hoping that the ceiling would be breached within a couple years. But by 2022, that dominance has come -Disney has won Hollywood ubiquity to the point even its’ largest competitor, Warner Bros., is several degrees behind. 2021 was something of a reckoning; a year when, due to holdovers from 2020, Disney had a plethora of content to drop. Between cinemas and Disney+, there were nine Marvel products, three Star Wars  shows, two Disney films allowed a chance in theatres, and a Pixar film restricted from that. Of course these were the things that Disney cared about (except per

An open on an intricate and elaborate digital reality, strange and fascinating creatures float around in an endless sea of pristine light and depth; a great megalopolis of pillars and structures seemingly built out of circuitry. It is a dazzling world, its’ figures equally so -a blue whale swims through the ether with a thousand amplifiers on its’ back and an immaculate woman with flowing pink hair sings atop it. It’s marvelous, hyper-imaginative animation, a marriage of 3D and traditional technique that rare for an anime looks good. And I was so relieved when there was a cut from this to a plainer 2D, somewhat crudely designed girl drearily awakening from bed. ‘Yes’, I thought to myself. ‘There’s the Mamoru Hosoda I love.’ It’s pretty clear now that Hosoda is the great anime filmmaker of the post-Miyazaki world -I know some might argue it’s Makoto Shinkai, though I don’t think his films have the unique touch of Hosoda, much as I do appreciate his creative voice as well. Certainly Hoso

“By the pricking of my thumbs, Something wicked this way comes.”                                                                  -Act IV, scene I, lines 44-45 In the last month, we’ve seen two movies come out written and directed by one half of an acclaimed filmmaking partnership. The first of course was Lana Wachowski’s The Matrix Resurrections , made without the input of her sister Lilly. And now similarly, a new adaptation of Macbeth has arrived courtesy of Apple TV+ by Joel Coen, for the first time without Ethan. And the Coen Brothers are so particularly established as a unit, having been one for nearly forty years now, that the idea of them working separately is jarring. What is a Joel Coen movie on his own? Well on one hand, he’s not really on his own. He’s got Shakespeare to work with. And in a sense you can maybe see why this didn’t interest Ethan. There have been a million adaptations of Macbeth , the last noteworthy version a mere six years ago –it’s not the most original i

We’ve covered eleven movies already that were pretty damn good, and yet even they weren’t the cream of the crop that came out of this last year. So let’s proceed with the final countdown. Here they are, the ten greatest films of 2021!   10. The Sparks Brothers  -directed by Edgar Wright This was a sensational year for music documentaries: Questlove’s   Summer of Soul , Peter Jackson’s The Beatles: Get Back  -both of which in releasing and remastering unseen footage, are important works of historical record in addition to exemplary films. But if raising awareness is the key function of the documentary, then none this year succeeded more than The Sparks Brothers  by Edgar Wright -a film about an obscure musical act that turned on audiences everywhere for the first time to their work, myself included. Wright’s film isn’t just a standard life story tribute to Ron and Russell Mael, the duo who have been making eclectic pop music on the margins of the mainstream since the 1970s. He plays ar