“Already long ago, from when we sold our vote to no man, the People have abdicated our duties; for the People who once upon a time handed out military command, high civil office, legions — everything, now restrains itself and anxiously hopes for just two things: bread and circuses.” —Juvenal (100-200 A.D.) There’s a meta […]
Film
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What’s the Early Buzz
“Anora,” “Bird” and “We Live in Time” for your consideration
Look, I went into this weekend fully intending to go see “Red One,” that new movie where The Rock, Chris Evans and a polar bear have to rescue a kidnapped (and completely jacked) Santa Claus, but then I realized that, ultimately, that movie is probably as critic proof as it possibly gets. You don’t need […]
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Robots, Smiles, Heretics and Last Dances
A November theatrical roundup
This weekend I caught four movies in a row at the theater and now my entire brain feels funny. Here’s what I saw: The Wild Robot: At the bookstore I work at, we’re constantly selling copies of the 2016 novel by Peter Brown to kids so excited to read it that they’re bursting to get […]
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May the Source Be With You: November Edition
Fighting SAD with cozy vibes
For one such as me, who doesn’t partake in any winter activities other than drinking hot toddies and making the occasional snow angel, I mostly spend the cold months binging podcasts, movies and shows I missed in the summer. I know, I’m boring as hell, but ending up headfirst in a tree well is a […]
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Creepshows
Ten underrated horror flicks for the spooky season
A majority of the movies that get made are horror movies for two main reasons: 1) With some imagination and a solid team you can make one on a very limited budget and 2) There’s such a large built-in fanbase starving for new horror that even hot garbage usually makes a little money. They’re the safest […]
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No Matter Where You Go
Saoirse Ronan stuns in “The Outrun”
I think most of us know the feeling of either loving an alcoholic or being one. I’ve been in a relationship with someone struggling with alcoholism and will never forget the gut-churning fear of watching the person that put fire to my blood, subtly shift into an unrecognizable other that made being in public a nerve-wracking […]
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The Joke’s On Us
"Joker: Folie à Deux" is a half-formed idea in search of a movie
Look, from the jump I’m going to say that “Joker: Folie à Deux” is both a little better than most people say, while somehow being worse in a lot of ways I wasn’t prepared for. But, and this might be a hot take, so I guess you can take my opinion with a bucket of […]
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The Bend Film Festival Primer
How to build a schedule, one movie at a time
The hardest thing about attending a film festival is building the schedule. It’s a terrible feeling spending all that time and money to catch a bunch of films across three or four days of a fest and then find out that you missed all the ones garnering the most buzz. FOMO hits hard when everyone […]
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A World-Class Weekend
The 21st annual Bend Film Festival is almost here
Here we go, ladies, gentlemen and everyone across the spectrum! On Oct. 10 the 21st Annual Bend Film Festival arrives, and I’ve seen an astonishing number of movies, not just in my duties as Lead Shorts Programmer for the fest, but in preparation to recommend some non-shorts related cinema to all of you. From the […]
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The Gorgeous and the Grotesque
"The Substance" provides a singular cinematic experience
I‘m going to lead with this so no one gets mad at me later: of the thousands of you who read this article, maybe 20 will like this movie. This is one of those films critics fawn all over, saying that it’s an audacious and strikingly original piece of work of the kind that comes […]