Movie

One of the many ways in which I’m a fortunate person is that every year starting in 2015, the estimable scholar and critic Peter Cowie has invited me to participate in the Biennalle College panel. This...

Heaven can wait for Victoria Justice in “Afterlife of the Party,” a shrill and derivative Netflix comedy. The former Nickelodeon star brings all the incessant perkiness of her sit-com roots to the role of Cassie, a...

It often seems like Netflix sets out to have their own versions of hits from other networks. Watching their latest adult animated offering, it’s not difficult to picture a boardroom meeting in which someone yelled, “We...

This Unloved was made about eight seconds before I learned that David Prior’s next project fell outside of my ideological comfort zone. But I hope this stands as a testament to the strength of his ideological...

Now that “Gene and Roger,” the new podcast by Brian Raftery for The Ringer (Spotify), has aired its eighth and final episode, I want to acquaint you with the entire series. It is a superb tribute to the legacy...

Watching Ryan Murphy’s latest chapter in his “American Crime Story” anthology series, I was struck by his use of that first word. It’s become trendy to tack the word “American” onto dramatic titles to signify importance—this...

In celebration of the fortieth anniversary of Robert Redford’s Sundance Institute,  they have asked us to share some of our own memories about the Institute and the Festival. We are presenting a special edition of Thumbnails...

Although the notion of a werewolf had been utilized for its cinematic potential as far back as the now-feared-lost silent film “The Werewolf” (1913) and reached the pinnacle of its popularity in the 1940s thanks to...

I have long admired Ethan Hawke but I was suddenly aware of the fact that he wasn’t in a lot of comedies, and that he as an actor didn’t have a long history of making me laugh....

Ed Asner, who died this week at age 91, might not be the grumpiest celebrity I’ve ever interviewed, but I’m pretty sure he was the one who most enjoyed being grumpy. We were talking on the...