Aliens, Atomics Bombs, and Artificial Intelligence

Three nuclear explosions blasted across my screen when I went to see Wes Anderson’s Asteroid City several weeks ago. One of them was in Asteroid City itself. Another was in the trailer for Oppenheimer—a movie about the man who invented the atomic bomb, so, it figures. Yet another was in the final shot of the trailer for Dune: Part Two, just as Paul Atreides says, “He who can destroy a thing has the real control of it.”

Reading The Bible Is Like Watching Foreign Cinema

I saw a tweet recently that said “contrary to what people on twitter will tell you, watching 1960s latvian arthouse films or whatever doesn’t make u a better, smarter or more interesting person. in fact, it usually just means you’re extra annoying]. watch whatever u like. the fast and the furious is perfectly fine.”

The Broken Brotherhoods of Post-Pandemic Cinema

Back in April, I saw two movies in theaters: CREED III and the theatrical re-release of the Indian blockbuster RRR at the magnificent Belcourt Theatre in Nashville. If you’ve never heard of RRR, it’s an overwhelming and rollicking piece of epic historical fiction that quickly became the highest-grossing movie of all time in India last year–and you can watch it on Netflix. The story follows two real-life Indian revolutionaries who fought against colonialism, imagining the two of them as near-mythic heroes who go from the worst of enemies to the best of friends.

The Healing Sacrament of The Cinema

It’s a recent storytelling trend, but the concept might be relevant to reality right now: sometimes, it can feel like we’re all living in alternate universes.

Love, Niceness, and The Banshees of Inisherin

“I don’t want to be your friend anymore.”

Everyone has probably heard some variation of these words at least once in their life – and they feel particularly common between kids on the playground. That’s probably why, when full-grown ColmSonnyLarry offers more or less the same words to his buddy Pádraic Súilleabháin, some folks in the village say, “What is he, twelve?”

The Subversive Ordinariness of ‘Andor’ and ‘The Chosen’

Sometime recently, I was bubbling over with praise once again for the new Star Wars series, Andor, and my wife said something that struck me. “It sounds like you like this show for the same reasons we’ve liked The Chosen.”