Coming back to this, I realize that I glossed over your discussion of "essentialist views about loyalty." That's exactly right, and what makes The Shield a drama, not a novel. Novels are about what people think and feel, films are about what people see, and dramas are about what people do. (This statement comes in…

Thanks man. Keep going, there's more; season seven was recapped at the-solute.com.

They also can't disguise that this already looks like no other movie, shot on digital, film, or any other medium. Fucker is 71 and still brings the ownage.

Despite my not fully getting into Public Enemies or Miami Vice, they are both stunning works. Lower-grade Mann is still stuff other directors can't even imagine.

Nope, I read it! (I opened up another account with the same name and avatar when The Dissolve went live, but I still check this one.) That's a really good point about the music, and about Breaking Bad too. The music never felt like it was making a point, it was what Shawn Ryan or the writers happened to be…

"Armond White reviewing a film about slavery" pretty much sounds like a recipe for unpleasant.

See, I would watch that. If we could be promised an episode of James Purefoy cooking clam AND corn chowder and Bacon tasting and saying "classic Melville," that would be cool.

'Fraid so. They're also ripping off the Face/Off teaser http://www.youtube.com/watc… , another thing that's way above their credit limit.

Just saw the commercial for the return of The Following. Classic Baudelaire, which this show has no goddamn right to use.

All through late January and February 2001 FOX was advertising that Mulder would come back at the end of the (sweeps!) month, with scenes from "This Is Not Happening." I remember one ad with the utterly stupid voiceover "we can't tell you HOW Mulder comes back. . .but we can tell you WHEN." By the time of the actual…

Gillian Anderson hit it so far out of the park all the way through "This Is Not Happening"—her screaming at the end takes something that would have been cliche (and stupid, stupid cliche) with anyone else and makes it PT Anderson-level devastating. Good call on the screenshot, Todd (and great review. I hope I say…

The writers (and Karnes) made an effective decision to make Dutch the sympathetic, nice-guy detective in a room full of macho assholes; instead, they made him as flawed a character as anyone else in the Barn. I think it works, because Karnes is up to the richness of that portrayal, and because (without spoiling…

RIP sir, you were good. His music definitely had its own style to it; it wasn't like a pale copy of Part or anything. There always seemed to be this strong English tradition of folksong and plainchant to it; like if Ralph Vaughan Williams had been born 50 years later.

Yup, it's horrible. It's not believable that Mulder wouldn't let Scully know, or (come to think of it, this is way more likely) that Scully wouldn't find out on her own. It's apparently one of those brain-cloud-type diseases, where you're getting sicker and sicker but there are no apparent symptoms.

It's my favorite standalone (or near-standalone); the image of the monster vomiting up personstuff is both gross and genuinely disturbing.

Also, Sorkin has his characters talk in complete (often elaborate) sentences. Mamet doesn't. George C. Scott's "well, I think you're vastly overstating—" line, in Mametspeak, is "No. (pause) You're overstating this." (If he's less confident, it's "No, he wouldn't— You're overstating—")

It's the second; that also has several examples (including this) of Sorkin's characters giving resumes instead of dialogue.

"…and they hypnotized Orson Welles into covering it up."

Me too! And yes, that's what has to be played today.

"OH MY FUCK" was my first reaction. Second reaction: well, he made it about 40 years longer than anyone thought he would. He was one of the greats, though, and could use language like no one else.