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Articles in Culture and Criticism

Another Year
February 25, 2011 – 3:28 PM | 10 Comments
<I>Another Year</I>

Sarah 49, Death Race 7; 21 of 24 categories completed
(Stay tuned through the weekend for a Documentary Shorts roundup; a predictions entry, whose prognostications you should do the opposite of in your Oscar …

The Animated Shorts 2011
February 24, 2011 – 10:16 AM | 11 Comments
The Animated Shorts 2011

Sarah 48, Death Race 8; 20 of 24 categories completed
The 2011 crop of animated shorts, like their live-action brethren, also came off less turgid than last year’s; I liked almost all of them. But I …

The Live-Action Shorts 2011
February 23, 2011 – 9:02 AM | 5 Comments
The Live-Action Shorts 2011

A more entertaining, less self-serious crop than last year’s, or at least I felt that way when the lights when up Monday. It helps that the program chose its order well, and ended with a …

Incendies
February 22, 2011 – 10:57 PM | No Comment
<I>Incendies</I>

Sarah 43, Death Race 13; 19 of 24 categories completed
…Wow. How to describe Incendies without giving away anything. How to describe it, period, really, but I will try not to tip anything here (if you’d …

Bradelor! DUN!: Everyone Else Is Dead
February 22, 2011 – 4:18 PM | 6 Comments
Bradelor! DUN!: Everyone Else Is Dead

I spent the bulk of the episode buoyed by one fact and one fact alone — the next episode is the last! YAAAAAY! — and then I realized OH NO we haven’t had key-party awkward …

Barney’s Version
February 22, 2011 – 10:22 AM | 4 Comments
<I>Barney’s Version</I>

Sarah 42, Death Race 14; 18 of 24 categories completed
“Barney’s Version” is not a movie to be loved from start to finish. I was annoyed by it, then I liked it, then it irritated me, …

Hereafter
February 21, 2011 – 12:55 PM | 6 Comments
<I>Hereafter</I>

Sarah 37, Death Race 19; 17 of 24 categories completed
I liked it more than I’d expected to, but the guiding structural principle — the three plot strands that converge at the end — felt like …

Tangled
February 21, 2011 – 9:18 AM | 22 Comments
<I>Tangled</I>

Sarah 36, Death Race 20; 16 of 24 categories completed
Super-likable and fun, especially Pascal the chameleon, Maximus the bloodhound horse, and the song in the highwaymen’s pub — until the end, where it loses its …

The Way Back
February 20, 2011 – 9:32 PM | 5 Comments
<I>The Way Back</I>

Sarah 36, Death Race 20; 16 of 24 categories completed
It’s a good yarn, in theory — a bunch of guys escape from a Siberian gulag during World War II and walk all the way to …

Inside Job
February 18, 2011 – 5:39 PM | 5 Comments
<I>Inside Job</I>

Sarah 33, Death Race 23; 15 of 24 categories completed
I got impatient with it at first. It misspells two key names in chyrons right off the bat — former Fed chairman Paul “Vocker” and IMF …