Alfred Hitchcock’s Rope and the invention of the modern movie

When you consider that the 1948 cult-classic was one of the master director’s lesser known and less heralded works, his achievement in cinema – which I would suggest amounts to nothing less than the invention of modern cinema, from its plot and characters to how it is filmed and edited  – is all the more… Continue reading Alfred Hitchcock’s Rope and the invention of the modern movie

Fellini’s 8½ and whether or not reality matters in either art or life itself

Much like music, a great film can exist purely on an emotional level, as a stream of loosely related and structured consciousness that teases us with symbolism, impenetrable to a complete analysis, and yet filled with meaning all the same. Federico Fellini’s 1963 surrealistic fantasy about a film director struggling with his love life and… Continue reading Fellini’s 8½ and whether or not reality matters in either art or life itself

Celebrating 500 posts: Why and how I write

My writing process can best be described as vomiting on the screen and sifting through it in search of an editable morsel.  The morsel is then preserved as I throw up again and repeat the process.  Many morsels do not make it, some do as the process repeats itself into something resembling a final product. … Continue reading Celebrating 500 posts: Why and how I write