This is probably the Terrence Malick movie for people who hate Terrence Malick. I do not hate Terrence Malick; I find his work fascinating (with one exception, The Thin Red Line, which I have now …

I don’t entirely disagree with Roger Ebert’s assessment, in his review of The Debt, that “the film jumps the rails towards the end.” The last sequence is highly unbelievable on several levels — the timing; …

Words are a fucking nightmare when it comes to closeness, often. … Words became the enemy. — Stephanie LaFarge
Project Nim tells the frustrating story of Nim Chimpsky, a chimpanzee taken from his mother as an …

Hi Sars — I’ve enjoyed your site for years and hope to tap into the book knowledge that you and your readers have. I have a 7-year-old son who is a voracious reader. I love …

The story in question is that of Daniel McGowan, a former ELF agitator (and arsonist, by his own admission) who got pinched by federal agents in 2005. He’s not a terribly likely-looking “domestic terrorist,” certainly …

Everything. K, great: on to Film #2!
…Fine, it doesn’t get everything wrong. It’s not necessarily objectively terrible. The writing does a handful of things I can’t stand, though, and starts doing them immediately, so I …

The holiday season is looming and I’m trying to figure out how to deal with a situation before it becomes a Situation. (Could be worse. Could be The Situation…) Brief background: we’re thirtysomethings who live …

…Because we’re stupid, that’s why.
Okay, seriously: Couch Baron and I decided each to write up one film for every day in December. For him, it’s a way to get a jump on Oscar season; for …

The pre-Nixon-era mental hospital is a preoccupying terror of U.S. popular culture to this day. This isn’t without basis; madness, and its attendant visions and rants, is a preoccupation of narratives throughout the world and …

I searched the Vine archives but didn’t find an answer to this gift etiquette question, so here goes: my in-laws’ best friends sent us a large gift for my kiddos (an art easel) that I …