Northern Exposure Season One (CBS) Written by Joshua Brand, John Falsey, Stuart Stevens, Karen Hall, Jerry Stahl, Sean Clark, David Assael, Steve Wasserman, Jessica Klein, and Charles Rosin Directed by Joshua Brand, Peter O’Fallon, Steve Cragg, Dan Lerner, David Carson, Sandy Smolan, Max Tash I was a weird kid, if you haven’t picked up on it. I read TV Guide every week when I had access to it. It was through reading that magazine that I came to learn about the show Northern Exposure and the comparisons to Twin Peaks. I watched that program as a kid, and on rare occasions, I caught an episode ..read more

Mulholland Drive (2001) Written and directed by David Lynch I’ve mentioned on the blog before how I discovered David Lynch as an eight-year-old who was somehow allowed to watch Twin Peaks. For a long time, I knew him as “the guy who made Twin Peaks.” Even in college, as I began to explore his greater body of work, I was like most people; I just didn’t understand the abstractness of it all. What shifted my understanding was reading Lynch on Lynch, a book of interviews with the director focusing on his work in chronological order up to Mulholland Drive. Through this text, I came to underst ..read more

Jackie Brown (1997) Written and directed by Quentin Tarantino Saying a lot has been written about Quentin Tarantino’s films would be an understatement. I think it would be safe to say that Jackie Brown is the film the least written about or regarded with the least awe. It was the filmmaker’s follow-up to Pulp Fiction, and such “next movies” can fail to live up to eager fans’ expectations. Brown is a far more muted picture than we have come to expect from Tarantino. There are a few loud stylistic flourishes, but for the most part, the picture is entirely character-driven. The result is somethi ..read more

This special reward is available to Patreon patrons who pledge at the $10 or $20 monthly levels. Each month, those patrons will pick a film for me to review. If they choose, they also get to include some of their thoughts about the movie. This Pick comes from Bekah Lindstrom. Betty Blue (1986) Written and directed by Jean-Jacques Beineix Certain movies don’t take long to reveal that they were written by a man who has difficulty seeing women as anything other than to make a man feel good about himself. Betty Blue is such a movie, rife with all the cliches of French cinema. That doesn ..read more

Chungking Express (1994) Written and directed by Wong Kar-wai The Chungking Mansions is a building located in Kowloon, Hong Kong. It was intended as a residential building but ended up being partitioned into many independent low-budget hotels, shops, and other services. There’s a mix of selling directly to the public and wholesalers from these businesses. Because it has become so unlike its original intent, the Chungking Mansions are often compared to the now-demolished Kowloon Walled City. Wong Kar-wai grew up in the Mansions, and their densely packed environment shaped his sensibilities as ..read more

This is a wildly divergent A24 double feature. One film is a comedy about the immigrant experience in NYC. The second follow journalists through a war on American soil. Ariana and Seth watched Problemista and Civil War. They are ready to share their thoughts ..read more

Heinrich’s Call of Cthulhu Guide to Character Creation Written & Designed by Heinrich D. Moore You can purchase it here Heinrich’s Call of Cthulhu Guide to Carcosa Written & Designed by Heinrich D. Moore You can purchase it here Read our previous adventure into Carcosa starting here Today we introduce a new character to enter Carcosa. Once again, I used Heinrich’s Guide to Character Creation which made an even more fascinating person than my last run. I cannot get over what a great tool this is for making complex, layered characters with backstories just as interesting as any adventur ..read more

Starman Omnibus Volume Two (2022) Reprints All-Star Comics 80-Page Giant #1, Batman/Hellboy/Starman #1-2, JSA: All-Stars #4, Starman #44-81, Starman #1,000,000, Starman: The Mist #1, Starman/Congorilla #1, Stars and STRIPE #0, and The Shade #1-12 Written by James Robinson with David Goyer & Geoff Johns Art by Tony Harris, Peter Snejbjerg, Mike Mayhew, Dave Ross, Mike Mignola, Mike Mckone, John Lucas, Brett Booth, Lee Moder, Cully Hamner The second half of James Robinson’s Starman is mainly comprised of two storylines: Stars My Destination and Grand Guignol. Intermixed within are Times Pas ..read more

Who Framed Roger Rabbit? (1988) Written by Jeffrey Price and Peter S. Seaman Directed by Robert Zemeckis There will never be a film like this one again. Warner Bros. and Disney allowing their characters on screen together makes it a rare event. Who Framed Roger Rabbit? was a celebration of classic American animation, both in the characters featured but also in animation legend Richard Williams overseeing that part of the production. Watching it now as an adult, it is surprisingly straightforward. It follows the noir genre closely with its plot while letting the tone be set by the zany premise ..read more

The French Connection (1971) Written by Ernest Tidyman Directed by William Friedkin It’s not the story that compels you to keep watching. It’s the lead performance by Gene Hackman. It’s the bleak atmosphere of a decaying New York City. It’s the sense that no matter how this turns out, no one really wins. The rot will just keep spreading. Reactionary cinema had its Golden Age in the 1970s. Most of those depicted the rogue cop or the street vigilante as a bastion of “real justice,” pushing aside those pesky civil rights laws to “get the job done.” You might lump The French Connection in with so ..read more