The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari and the audacity of the earliest filmmakers

Somehow, a silent film managed to include a false framing device that serves to mislead the viewer and set up a twist ending straight out of a modern movie, a love triangle, a flashback within a flashback, multiple murders, a murder investigation with a falsely accused suspect, an abduction, and more. Over a century after… Continue reading The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari and the audacity of the earliest filmmakers

Nosferatu and how Hollywood has become miners instead of creators

Perhaps if it had come out in 1970, it would have been a revelation, but I can’t stop myself from asking why Robert Eggers, a relatively young, supposedly talented director, chose to make this film, retreading more than a century old ground, mining rather than creating. Nosferatu isn’t a bad film.  From a technical perspective,… Continue reading Nosferatu and how Hollywood has become miners instead of creators

David Lynch and a life lived outside the frame

Mr. Lynch was a director’s director, an artist who operated well outside the mainstream, sometimes far outside of it, but whose appeal occasionally crossed over in both classic films such as The Elephant Man and the birth of prestige TV with Twin Peaks.  David Lynch as had a career perhaps as strange as the film’s… Continue reading David Lynch and a life lived outside the frame

Hamlet, The Northman, and Shakespeare’s genius through the looking glass

Robert Egger’s The Northman is based on the same source material as Shakespeare’s Hamlet, a Viking legend circa 1,000 AD, but takes a completely different path, crafting an almost anti-Hamlet.  This “Shakespherean” mode of adaptation presents unique opportunity to return to Shakespeare’s original roots and illuminate both works. Despite attempts to cancel the world’s greatest… Continue reading Hamlet, The Northman, and Shakespeare’s genius through the looking glass