6 Reasons Why “Holy Motors” is a Surreal Masterpiece

Holy Motors

Surrealist Luis Buñuel once stated, “Film seems to be the involuntary imitation of the dream.” This of course is of particular interest when it comes to Leos Carax’s 2012 French-German film Holy Motors, in which the French film director uses a metaphysical dreamscape to channel life as it is experienced while deliberately calling attention to […]

6 Reasons Why “The Fountain” is an Underrated Masterpiece

Hugh Jackman in The Fountain

American filmmaker Darren Aronofsky has never been the kind of writer-director who shies away from controversial qualities in his films, or to sidestep surreal flourishes as well as story elements that may confound or confuse audience expectations, and his third and arguably most ambitious feature, The Fountain (2006), exemplifies such considerations. A psychedelic science-fiction fantasy […]

7 Reasons Why “L.A. Confidential” is a Modern Masterpiece of American Cinema

In recent years, those who have an avid interest in vintage Hollywood films are inevitably drawn to two movements or periods in the history of American pictures. One is now tagged the “pre-code” era, the roughly five years of relaxed censorship at the dawn of sound in the very late 1920s and early 1930s. The […]

15 One-Time Director-Actor Collaborations We’d Like to See More of

django unchained (2012)

Looking at some of the best pairs of frequently collaborating actors and directors, i.e. Akira Kurosawa and Toshiro Mifune, Paul Thomas Anderson and Philip Seymour Hoffman, Werner Herzog and Klaus Kinski or Federico Fellini and Giulietta Masina, there’s a clear chemistry that extents from the front to the back of the camera. The relationships we […]

The 10 Best Movie Couples of The 21st Century

Crazy, Stupid, Love (2011)

It all started with a superhero in search of a paramour. During the preproduction phase of 2002’s “Spider-Man,” director Sam Raimi was looking for someone to play Mary Jane Watson, the copper-haired aspiring actress whose toughness and compassion make her the love of her knight in shining spandex’s life. It wasn’t going well, co-producer Grant […]