Screening Room
September 2, 2010
Zen and the Art of Image Maintenance 3
by Lizzie Skurnick
Julia Roberts may star in the movie Eat, Pray, Love. But it’s Elizabeth Gilbert who’s turning in the performance of a lifetime.
August 25, 2010
Staff Pick: This is England 0
by Lydia Kiesling
At the start, the film’s world is shaped by Thatcher and the Falklands and council housing and having no money; the youth, as is their wont, are acting out and wearing silly clothes.
August 24, 2010
“Baster” and The Switch 2
by Anne Shulock
Adapting a short story is a different animal from novel-to-movie adaptations, as both stories and movies are meant to be consumed in one sitting. Jeffrey Eugenides’ “Baster” is a good opportunity for an adaptation; it’s funny, with a high-concept plot, and it’s not impressionistic or experimental.
May 21, 2010
Death in Venice? Don’t Look Now 5
by J.P. Smith
A movie possesses a literalness that a truly good piece of fiction doesn’t, or shouldn’t. Because we can’t, in the first instance, flip back to an earlier scene, and because it’s presumed that we’re seeing this movie for the first time at the cinema, we experience it as one continuous unspooling of narration.
May 13, 2010
V: Lizard Aliens as a Social Reminder 15
by Sarah McCoy
The latest TV hit: a 2010 sci-fi remake of a 1980s sci-fi hit, itself an adaptation of a 1935 novel warning against the growing threat of fascism. We live in a world where history repeats itself; where old ideas cloak themselves in various contemporary skins and pretty packages for each budding generation.
March 22, 2010
Navigating the Turbulence of “Up in the Air” 10
by Sonya Chung
If you ascribe to the notion that, more than anything, great art disturbs, Reitman has indeed crafted something lasting.
