I don't really understand the comparison to Malick. Her films have a very unique, caustic Scottish sensibility, much like Bill Forsyth and the late Charles Gormley.

I really enjoyed SEX AND DEATH 101 as well, and I even saw it in a theatre during its miniscule theatrical run. I could've done with less of Patton Oswalt's character, but it's a solid movie.

he was a pretty overrated filmmaker, but I'll give him THEY SHOOT HORSES, DON'T THEY? and ABSENCE OF MALICE. I just wish somebody else had been able to make films of his like THE YAKUZA.

Michael Polish's adaptation of Kerouac's BIG SUR is coming out soon, and it's got better word-of-mouth than ON THE ROAD did, so I'm cautiously optimistic about it.

Lynch is pretty smug and self-obsessed. I saw him at a book signing once, and when someone asked him what current films and directors he admired, he said something to the effect of "I don't watch other people's films because I'm too busy making my own", which is just ridiculous.

You nailed everything I dislike about this review. Kudos to you.

more miserable bastards: David Lynch, David Mamet, Jonathan Franzen.

I've never understood the vitriol towards the first season of PARKS (or the early episodes of 30 ROCK, for that matter).

It's the overworked and underpaid library technicians that tend to get the most grief from patrons, and unfortunately they sometimes direct their anger at the wrong parties.

the most selfish wing of the party of selfishness

She's been off the junk for years and is doing just fine, thank you very much.

seemingly the entire cast of FREAKS & GEEKS are members of the WGA now

You'd rather have a senile puppet who tried to bring the world to a nuclear showdown? Hoo boy…

Julia Phillips' YOU'LL NEVER EAT LUNCH IN THIS TOWN AGAIN is arguably a more well-written and incisive account of what it meant to be a Hollywood player in the 1970's.

so it's essentially Sakurazaka Hiroshi's ALL YOU NEED IS KILL?

MARRIED…WITH CHILDREN learned from its mistakes. I think the final season was a fairly significant improvement on the year that preceded it, too. 

THE SIMPSONS is a terrible example. It's never going to rebound from its creative slump.

FORCE OF EVIL (Abraham Polonsky, 1948). A gangster movie rife with stigmata imagery, a Cain/Abel relationship and a Judas-esque betrayal.

POD is their masterpiece. I can listen to "Lime House" on repeat for an hour. 

ISLAND IN THE SUN is even more embarrassing than HASH PIPE. The whole album has terrible production, too.