[This post began as a response to some comments made by Douglas Storm on Amber's most recent post.] The name “Viktor Shklovsky” comes up a lot at this site (I’m guilty of mentioning it in perhaps half of my posts), and one might wonder why the man and his work matters. Below, I’ll try and [...]
Posts Tagged ‘Inception’
A D & Jeremy Talk about Movies: X-Men: First Class
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged A D & Jeremy Talk about Movies, A D Jameson, Angel Salvadore, Apt Pupil, Ben Gazzara, blockbusters, Bryan Singer, Buck Henry, Christopher Nolan, Cuban Missile Crisis, Dan Green, Doom Patrol, Emma Frost, Frank Quitely, Gena Rowlands, Grant Morrison, Hollywood, Hugh Jackman, Ian McKellen, Inception, James McAvoy, Jeremy M. Davies, John Cassavetes, Magneto, Marc Silvestri, Michael Fassbender, Mister Sinister, Moira MacTaggert, New X-Men, Norman Jewison, Patrick Stewart, Peter Falk, Professor Xavier, Saint Jack, Scott Pilgrim vs. the World, Sebastian Shaw, sexiness, Seymour Cassel, short shorts, Superman Returns, The 1960s, The Holy Mountain, The Tree of Life, The Usual Suspects, Timothy Carey, Uncanny X-Men, Wolverine, X-Men, X-Men: First Class, X2 on July 11, 2011 | 11 Comments »
A D: Much like how you hated The Tree of Life, Jeremy, I hated Bryan Singer’s two X-Men films. Hated them! Jeremy: What, seriously? They made you physically ill? Yes, seriously, ill. I would have gnawed my own arm off to escape, if it hadn’t meant forfeiting my malt balls.
“Is Your Villain Appropriate?”—Examining Character Construction in Different Media
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged Alice Krige, character, Charlie Chaplin, City Lights, Darth Vader, Don Quixote, F.W. Murnau, Hamlet, Humbert Humbert, Inception, Jacques Tati, John Gielgud, Les vacances de Monsieur Hulot, Lolita, Lost, Mad Men, Magic: The Gathering, Mark Rosewater, Phyrexian, Richard Burton, Salman Rushdie, Samuel Beckett, Sancho Panza, Star Trek: First Contact, Star Wars, Sunrise: A Song of Two Humans, The Borg, The Office, The Unnamable, The Wire, Vladimir Nabokov, William Gass on March 30, 2011 | 2 Comments »
Every Monday, I read Mark Rosewater’s weekly column “Making Magic,” partly because I have a casual interest in the collectible card game Magic: The Gathering (I once played it, and some of my friends still play it), but mainly because Rosewater routinely offers great insights into aesthetics and game design. (He’s also a strong writer [...]
My Favorite New Movies of 2010
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged Around a Small Mountain, Black Swan, Dogtooth, Hausu, Inception, Iron Man 2, Le Monde Vivant, Let the Right One In, Mike Stoklasa, Moon, Runaway, Scott Pilgrim vs. the World, Sherlock Holmes, Shutter Island, The Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call – New Orleans, The Fall, The Ghost Writer, The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus, Where the Wild Things Are, White Material, Wild Grass, You Will Meet a Tall Dark Stranger on January 7, 2011 | 23 Comments »
Hello and welcome to 2011. Time to make a list of what I liked and didn’t like in 2010. A word though first: I don’t consider the following definitive; I’m not trying to pronounce some final judgment on each of the following films. In ten year’s time, I might feel very differently about these movies; [...]
Schrödinger’s Laura
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged Clifton Webb, Dana Andrews, David Lynch, Dorothy Adams, Gene Tierney, Inception, Judith Anderson, Laura, Lost, mnemonics, narrative, Otto Preminger, plot, Roger Ebert, Schrödinger's cat, Twin Peaks, Vera Caspary, Vincent Price, X-Men on December 21, 2010 | 7 Comments »
I had a stray thought recently about Otto Preminger’s classic 1944 noir Laura (1944), based on Vera Caspary’s 1943 novel of the same name. The film’s first half revolves around the murder of the title character, although of course it’s more complicated than that. And I’d like to argue that it’s slightly more complicated than [...]
Seventeen Ways of Criticizing Inception (AKA, All Knowledge Isn’t Equal)
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged "Can Negative Publicity Help?", Against Interpretation, Alain Resnais, Alain Robbe-Grillet, Alan T. Sorensen, Annette Atkins, Ari Up, Banksy, Batman, Britney Spears, David Bordwell, Down with Love, Film Art, Frank Kermode, Frank Miller, Greg Gerke, Harry Mathews, Hollis Frampton, Inception, Jack Horkheimer, James Peterson, Jean Luc Godard, Jeremy M. Davies, Jonah Berger, Kristin Thompson, Last Year at Marienbad, Mai 68, mnemonics, Peter Wyngarde, Peyton Reed, Rose Alley, Scott J. Rasmussen, Scott Pilgrim vs. the World, Steve Katz, Susan Sontag, Tao Lin, teaching history backwards, The Sense of an Ending, Zorn's Lemma on November 14, 2010 | 10 Comments »
[This can be considered a response to this post, and its comments thread.] 1. You’ve just become the fiction editor of a small journal. You open your email and see that you’ve received 1,000 unsolicited submissions. The first ten were sent by: Carlos Shirley Jeanne Goss Jack Livingston Christine Stribling Melissa Mathieu Benjamin Tatro Tao [...]
Scott Pilgrim vs. Inception for the Future of the Cinematic Imagination
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged Amélie, Art as Device, Christopher Nolan, Edgar Wright, Inception, Plumtree, Scott Pilgrim vs. the World, The Princess Bride, Viktor Shklovsky on August 26, 2010 | 19 Comments »
Since I wrote this critique of Inception, one question more than a few have asked me is: “What could Nolan have done differently?” Which is one way of asking: “What could he have done that you would have liked?” At first my response was along the lines of, “Well, not doing the things he did”—but [...]
Pop’s Beautiful Blankness
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged Dusty Springfield, I Only Want to Be With You, I've Told Ev'ry Little Star, Inception, Jerome Kern, Linda Scott, Mary Ellis, Music in the Air, Oscar Hammerstein II, Rob Reiner, The Princess Bride, Tim Jones-Yelvington, William Goldman on August 21, 2010 | 2 Comments »
I wanted to add something to Tim’s recent post “On Pop Songs,” where he wrote: Part of the magic of pop songs is their blankness as texts. How, with their generic sentiments, and accessible melodies that rapidly signal which emotion they’re meant to represent, they are easily appropriated. You know, like — ” Omigod, omigod, [...]
Art as Device, and Device (When it Works) as Miracle (or, The Princess Bride vs. Inception)
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged Art as Device, Billy Crystal, Christopher Nolan, Ellen Page, Inception, Joshua Gordon-Levitt, Mandy Patinkin, Peter Falk, Rob Reiner, The Princess Bride, Viktor Shklovsky, William Goldman on August 20, 2010 | 14 Comments »
In my recent criticism of Inception, I took Mr. Nolan to task for his inelegant use of screenwriting devices, such as his endless reliance on (often irrelevant) exposition. Some took objection to this. (See the comment thread here, also.) To clarify: the problem is not the device, but the clumsy, bare-boned way in which it’s [...]
Seventeen Ways of Criticizing Inception
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged Andrew O'Hehir, Ariadne, Bob le flambeur, Bryan Singer, Christopher Higgs, Christopher Nolan, Chuang Tzu, Cornelia Parker, Days of Heaven, Edith Piaf, George P. Cosmatos, Harold Pinter, Inception, Jean Baudrillard, Jim Emerson, Kiss Me Deadly, Lily Hoang, Paul T. Anderson, Philip K. Dick, Quentin Tarrantino, Rififi, Roman Polanski, Ron Silliman, Seinfeld, Simulacra and Simulation, The Asphalt Jungle, The Betrayal, The Dark Knight, The Gateless Gate, The Ghost, The Matrix, The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch, Zabriskie Point on August 8, 2010 | 163 Comments »
[Update 8 Sept 10: If you're reading this, you might also be interested in my related posts, "Art as Device, and Device (When it Works) as Miracle," and "Scott Pilgrim vs. Inception for the Future of the Cinematic Imagination." —Adam] [Update 4 Oct 10: As well as this post: "More on Inception: Shot Economy and [...]
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