If there’s any particular reason to hate the #OnePerfectShot mindset (and there are really quite many) one can look no further than how the proliferation of that thinking has short-changed the appreciation of small moments in cinema. Yes, film functions as an association between many different elements to create meaning through interplay, rather than … More 2015 Wrap-Up: Moments and Ephemera
For all the attention heaped upon lead performances and actors, it would seem that there is some hard distinction between those carrying the narrative and those left to fill in the edges of the film. Of course that’s ludicrous; I thought for quite a while that I would simply have one list of … More 2015 Wrap-Up: Non-Lead Performances
I hesitate to say that 2015 was a shit year because how can one generalize an entire year in such a way, so let’s compromise and call it rough. I can’t speak for everyone, and am relatively young and thus no expert on comparing years of contemporary times for aspects of upheaval or strife. But … More 2015 Wrap-Up: A Lengthy Preamble
Baltimore is a city both familiar and heavily unknown to me. My father grew up here, and much of my family still lives here, but I am only aware of the general atmosphere of the city rather than the daily texture of life. The past two days alone have been more instructive in letting me … More 2015 Maryland Film Festival Coverage, Day Three: The Great Unknown
For a festival filled mostly with unknown qualities for myself, there’s something humorous about starting the proper program with a master whose work I’m well acquainted with. But watching Tsai’s films never gets old; indeed, they only get newer and fresher upon each revisit. Blessed with hindsight, Tsai Ming-liang’s feature debut Rebels of the Neon … More 2015 Maryland Film Festival Coverage, Day Two: Old Dog and Young Pups
I call myself a cinephile, and yet I’ve never even been to a full-time film festival before. Sure, I’ve attended screenings here and there at both the Denver and Boulder International festivals; both work and school schedules have prevented me from devoting myself completely to those programs, turning me more into a sampler than a … More 2015 Maryland Film Festival Coverage, Day One: A New Beginning and Opening Night
The late Edward Yang is among the most fastidious and precise of all observers of human nature. His films are not so much character studies as they are metaphysical documents of the intersection between the social and the personal, the external and the internal. They accumulate detail and space until characters are turned emblematic of … More Knife and Camera: Modern Displacement in the Work of Edward Yang
Genre films have always faced an uphill battle in garnering intellectual respect. Although long beloved by both certain mass audiences and niche groups, aspects of the critical establishment have long carried pre-conceived notions about the worth of genre filmmaking. There is the assumption that they lack the sophistication of so-called “prestige” pictures; that they are … More No Frills: Genre Films as Groundbreaking Commentary
Letter From An Unknown Cinephile 