Film History
Clarence Brown: Hollywood’s Forgotten Master
Director Clarence Brown was considered first class in Hollywood’s golden years. Young tells his story well. Read more
Encountering Challenging Cinema
Veteran film critic Jonathan Rosenbaum collects interviews with Jim Jarmusch, John Carpenter and others in his latest book. Read more
Michael Caine Blows (the Bloody) Doors Off
The veteran British actor recalls his working class background, his emergence in the 1960s and the long career has has enjoyed. Read more
Hollywood in San Francisco
The story of filmmaking in the Bay Area is told in a new book, Hollywood in San Francisco. But the author also has other topics in mind. Read more
Finding Steampunk on Screen (and Elsewhere)
The look and the meaning of steampunk is explored in a new book. Read more
The Sound of Things to Come
Long before Star Wars, science-fiction films were on the cutting edge of sonic technology. Read more
Hollywood Goes to Mexico
For more than a century U.S. directors have shot films, including many classics, across the border in Mexico. Read more
'The Real Lolita' and 'The Darkness of Real Life'
In The Real Lolita, Sarah Weinman uncovers the real crime and tragedy behind the film and novel Lolita. Read more
Home Movies/Out on Digital: July 6, 2017
The award-winning indie psycho-drama Wichita, the ’70s cop movie Brannigan and the 1970 production of Anton Chekhov’s Three Sisters have been released on DVD or Blu-ray. Read more
Home Movies/Out on Digital: June 22, 2017
In Gauguin: Maker of Myth, canvas after canvas fills the frames of this documentary on one of the great visionaries of modern art, Paul Gauguin. Read more
'Hollywood Presents Jules Verne'
Morethan a century after his death Jules Verne remains one of the world’s mostfamous authors, recognized even by people who have never read a single wordfrom his stories. The reason, as Brian Taves explains in Hollywood PresentsJules Verne: Th.. Read more
'Hitchcock Lost & Found'
Asthe authors concede on page 1 of Hitchcock Lost & Found: The ForgottenFilms , there has been a lot of hype over the “rediscovery” of missing piecesfrom Alfred Hitchcock’s filmography. Alain Kerzoncuf and Charles Barr complainof “excessive.. Read more
What’s a War Movie Anyway?
The question most asked about my latest book, War on the Silver Screen : is that really a war movie? I included Casablanca as a war movie though few shots are fired and battle scenes are entirely absent, and The Manchurian Candidate , which mostly.. Read more
Francis Ford Coppola, Boss Man
Jeff Meene has found a new angle on one of the most remarkable filmmakers of his era. In Francis Ford Coppola (published by University of Illinois Press), Meene identifies Coppola as an especially prominent manifestation of the post-industrial, ne.. Read more
‘War on the Silver Screen’
Milwaukee authors Glen Jeansonne and David Luhrssen’s War on the Silver Screen: Shaping America’s Perception of History is an objective, sometimes coolly detached chronicle of many of the war films that have played a part in cinematic histo... Read more
The Real Orson Welles?
OrsonWelles was 11 when he enrolled in the Todd Seminary for Boys, a progressiveprep school in Woodstock, Illinois. The influence of its alternative pedagogy,which encouraged creative thinking based on the maxim that doing is t.. Read more
From Big Screen to Small
DavidThomson is among the preeminent film critics of our time. The Britishexpatriate, living in San Francisco, has written several big doorstopper bookson movie history. His latest, The Big Screen: The Story of the Movies (Farrar,.. Read more
The Faint w/ Zola Jesus
Even before the indie-dance boom of a half-decade ago, The Faint were playing glamorous, danceable synth-rock, marked by retro New Order arrangements and big, catchy choruses—their libidinous signature single, “Worked Up So Sexual,” stil Read more
Dr. Manhattan w/ Two Star, Chris Slone, Tadashi and Taken the Coast
The Illinois band Dr. Manhattan delivers the healthy dose of indie quirk and post-teenage angst you’d expect from a band whose name is lifted from a character in Alan Moore’s “Watchmen” comics. As students at Wauconda High School, Read more