Pauline Kael, quoted in an Ebert essay, made a magnificent point about this scene, and how it serves to reveal new sides to characters. I'm paraphrasing, but she singles out Haven Hamilton, noting how for all his smarm and smugness as he sings "Keep a Goin," and other patriotic claptrap, when things get serious and…

When will people learn you NEVER take a "points on the backend deal." Because the studios are masters of accounting and can afford to pay lawyers to keep the litigant in limbo for years. Hell there are people suing to get their profits from the LOTR movies. It happens all the time.

Oy!

The thing is, film can be quite economical. It is just VERY demanding on the pre-pro side and you can't be like one of these digital age directors who likes to workshop on camera shoot 200 bloody hours. Film rewards on the back end when the editing goes more smoothly because of that production economy, as well as in…

He was a tunnel rat in the Binh Duong province.

Gilligan discovers a natural wellspring of methylamine, and teams up with the Professor to begin cooking blue meth which he sells to the Millionaire.

After the lousy writing of Mercy ("I saw some stuff in Iraq…."), and the nadir of Atlas Shrugged, I'm glad Taylor Schilling finally got a role worthy of her abilities.

The Professor thinks back to his illicit love affair with a male grad student, and the regrets he has over denying their love, which drives the young man to suicide.

Which raises a whole other issue…namely why an established filmmaker would use a crappy, compressed as all hell camera like the 5D. I hate how every trend must be coopted. The 5D is a useful tool if you can't afford better for your production, but for Baumbach to use it on his film? That's just slumming. He…

Next I bet you'll say you solved Myst in one sitting. Dammit I'm close, if I can't just figure out where that eighth switch is…

But will this console eliminate the need for me to blow on my cartridges before I insert and play them in my console?

Not to mention, as a documentary filmmaker myself, I found a lot of what she was saying to be disingenuous.

I'm glad "Stories We Tell" was left off in favor of "Leviathan" and "The Act of Killing." while the latter two really push the boundaries of the form, I found the former to be deeply problematic in its motives and methods. The first half of the film, I will say is magnificent, but is saddled with, in my opinion, a…

His was a tough case. I hear after the Dads premiere, he took to self medicating with season 1 episodes of "Girls." One should leave the administration of therapeutic television programming to the professionals.

Partly true. But the new wave filmmakers quickly rose to such prominence that budgets were less of a concern, and indeed many did experiment with color. Black and white also afforded more nimble camera work and blocking because it required less light than the low speed color stocks of the day.

That "Before Midnight" got tops here made my day. This film HAS to win Best Adapted Screenplay.

I think its cause is hindered by the fact that its a lock to win best VFX and Best Cinematography at the Oscars already. So the interest to award it in other ways is waning. Voters and critics love to share the wealth, and since it's a foregone conclusion the film will pick up awards in the technical categories,…

I'm late to the game here, having just watched this episode last night, but I thought I'd add my two cents.

Okay as a filmmaker and cinematographer, I gotta correct everyone one something about Frances Ha. It wasn't "filmed in black and white." That would imply it was shot on black and white negative. It was shot digitally, in color, then graded and converted to black and white in post. It makes all the difference. And…

Sonia will richly deserve her month's long stay of recuperation at the David Sims Memorial Hospital for Aggrieved Critics, where critics subjected to reviewing horrible shows and movies are treated with concentrated doses of Breaking Bad, Mad Men, the works of Altman and Hitchcock and Dawes.