One of my non-obnoxious Film Studies TAs was struggling to explain to us the basics of plot. We were first year film students, dying to do avante-garde and unique things, and the idea of using standard structural elements to construct our opuses felt confining and uncomfortably like selling out. Then, she walks in one day […]
As a regular movie, Rent doesn’t exactly have classic status. With Chris Columbus’ stagey direction and lack of personal voice, Rent isn’t even a particularly good adaptation of the Broadway musical from which it’s based. The actors are all too old for their parts. The film lacks cinematic urgency. And the once-cutting-edge play about a group […]
To say that A Charlie Brown Christmas is melancholy is not exactly a news flash, but it’s nonetheless affecting. From the first chords of Vince Guaraldi, you’re 100% into the existential despair that Charlie Brown finds himself in. It’s sort of strangely appropriate that I find myself watching a movie all about finding the meaning […]
As anyone whose seen Hugo will appreciate, film is a superbly moving medium with a rich history and millions of facets. Nothing captures just how much the films of 2011 have spoken to that fact quite like this brilliant YouTube montage celebrating 143 of the best, the worst and the most diverse films of the […]
Aside from listening to the Bing Crosby tune “White Christmas,” I really knew nothing about the 1954 classic film by the same name. For example, I didn’t know it was a musical, didn’t know it starred Bing Crosby, had no idea it took place in a snow-less Vermont, and didn’t know it was in goofy […]
Now that’s more like it. From the first frames of Santa Claus Is Coming to Town (fake newsreel footage of kids trying to get ready for the arrival of Santa Claus), I was sold. It’s filled with lush claymation landscapes, witty songs, a surprisingly complicated original plot, and themes that range from trying to be […]
The second of our classic animation trifecta is Frosty. Shorter and less revolutionary than its reindeer brethren, Frosty looks less like Coraline and more like a classic Rocky and Bullwinkle cartoon. A bunch of kids get together after school on the day before Christmas to make a snowman. A magician’s magic (and very argumentative) hat […]
Ah, claymation. The most sacred purview of Christmas movies. The next few installments of the 24 Days of Christmas will be going through the Christmas classics of the claymated and classically animated variety: Rudolph, Frosty, and Santa Claus is Comin’ to Town. First, to Rudolph. Narrated by Sam, the talking Snow Man, Rudolph starts with the […]