Actually I think I was complaining more about traditional Hollywood plots, using cliched characters and stories more than anything else. Wonder Woman has more of a storied history than I gave it credit for. And yes I added that Hollywood makes these films to sell tickets more than to do any kind of gendering.

See my parenthesis. I was just thinking out loud, probably because it's too hot today and I don't want to leave the house.

I can't decide if the header is stupid or attractive. We're in a dumb age where putting more women in films means they have to act like stereotypical men. Not that women don't like to party and be dissolute, but film and character-wise, the formula, (also in Wonder Women, though I haven't seen it yet) is for male…

During the campaign, I found it baffling that progressive voters picked the election where Donald Trump was the opponent to have purity qualms about liberals not being liberal enough. You picked the election with the most unqualified and dangerous candidate? Where was this progressive outcry in past elections? Sure,…

So the Tories are actually becoming more like American Republicans? I thought they were still a ways away.

A Christianity from the Left needs to be politically built. So far, the easy association when you think of Christians is Republicans, just because the evangelical movement has been greatly successful infiltrating and influencing politics. Democratic politicians could talk more about faith, if they don't already; the…

Now beloved actors always have that story: they toiled for a long time, in obscurity, not getting work, until one big break. Think of yourself as an actor.

If you feel this way after one person's opinion, you may not be looking at it objectively. Get more opinions.

I think society still has the pernicious myth that artists somehow have special talent or see the world more perceptively than anyone else, when a lot of good art is just working your ass off. The work feeds the imagination and perception, and hones the ability.

Not to pile on, but, ahem, AI was a masterpiece. A masterpiece! Ladykillers may be the least good Coen, but it's still pretty entertaining.

You're being too hard on yourself. Making art is tough, brutal. It's breaking a butterfly on the wheel. By definition, the artist will have failures and self-doubts. Don't let that discourage you. After reading your first paragraph, I thought, "Maybe that guy's wrong!" But if you've dispassionately looked at your…

The food I would use for that analogy would be KFC, which I thankfully stopped eating. But when I would, I liked it during but asked myself why did I eat that, after.

This is true, he can ignore the intent of the movie for trivial objections. His Munich review completely missed the point for some dumb griping about how inauthentic and cliched the city scapes looked. But for the movies he loves, he can convey his fandom in infectious language. I also like him because he doesn't…

I thought that analogy would go you couldn't wait to watch it again.

I've been dipping into Anthony Lane's collection of New Yorker movie reviews from the 90s. This is how he begins the Speed review:

Robert Harris' Conclave, which I burned through in one sitting. Very entertaining thriller. A few years from now, a pope (fictional but like the current Francis) dies and all the cardinals have to sequester themselves until they elect a new one. Harris writes this as any political candidate/party making backroom deals…

This went from horror to drama to thriller. I was excited Chris O'Donnell was back in the movies, until that's not him playing the husband. With the screenwriter's experience working with Sec. of Defense, the commander in Afghanistan, and the Homeland Security chief, it'd a waste if this movie weren't an allegory for…

How now brown cow? Where is thy chocolate nectar?

Not that weird of a dissonance. Olympic athletes need a lot of calories to burn, thus the greasy fat burgers of McDonalds. They also go to Fatburgers, probably.

It's a great day for America, everybody! Dammit, Ferguson was the best. I said on this site after it aired that his cold open to his last show was the best thing—by which I mean most joyous and wise—TV I saw that year.