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Critic Portfolio Examples

They did it. Best Picture winner — which, despite its maximalist name, isn’t a “big” movie, like some of its fellow Best Picture nominees — won the big prize. It’s not the sort of film directors make assuming it will win them Best Picture. Weird,…

Everything Everywhere All at Once

It’s important for the purposes of this article that you know my age: I am on the verge of turning 40. Having been raised in that brief interregnum between the Cold War and the war on terror, I, like many of my peers, assumed that I would live my…

Party Down’s new season says hustle culture is a scam

What even is the point of the Oscars? Every year, I find myself asking that question, and every year I have a different answer. They’re a cultural barometer. They’re a way to spotlight movies that got lost in the mega-blockbuster vortex. They’re…

The surprising lesson from a century of Oscar scandals

It’s a familiar trope, so familiar it has been skewered over time: In Hollywood horror movies, “the Black guy” usually dies first. The token minority character in the film will be the first to go, a casualty of horror’s need to up the ante and make…

What’s the future of Black horror?

In a recent Saturday Night Live sketch, Bowen Yang hosts a cheesy game show called “The Big Hollywood Quiz.” Tonight’s contestants are a film professor (Pedro Pascal), an entertainment writer (Ego Nwodim), and a Hollywood history podcaster (Chloe…

Maybe we’ve just forgotten how to find out about movies

Sometimes a great movie gets buried, for whatever reason, in the end-of-year awards rush. But if you talk to those who experienced its magic before the rush began, you’ll get an effusive collar grab, a gentle shake, and a declaration that “you must…

The best movie you didn’t see last year is finally out

, from the directing duo known as the “Daniels” (Daniel Kwan and Daniel Scheinert), has turned out to be one of 2022’s biggest success stories. It’s a quirky, non-franchise film with a wholly original plot about a Chinese immigrant mother who owns a…

Bright and early on the morning of January 24, 2023, as Riz Ahmed and Alison Williams named the Oscar nominees for Best Actress, the results were, more or less, as expected. Cate Blanchett for Tar. Michelle Williams for The Fabelmans. Ana de Armas…

What Andrea Riseborough’s controversial nomination reveals about the Oscars

In January, while Oscars discourse roils and people are still catching up on last year’s best movies, a new crop arrives via the Sundance Film Festival. This year, after two years online, the festival returned to Park City, Utah, where stars,…

17 movies to watch out for in 2023

There’s a liminal space just adjacent to grief. It’s where you live when anticipating loss that hasn’t yet arrived — the loved one with a terminal diagnosis, the crisis looming on the horizon. It’s the space you occupy when standing beside someone…

We can’t grieve what we can’t remember

James Cameron's smash hit film "Titanic" is being re-released in theaters with a new, 25th anniversary edition. The tragic love story between Jack and Rose launched the careers of Leonardo DiCaprio and Kate Winslet into the stratosphere, and sparked…

Celebrating 'Titanic' 25 Years Later

Near the beginning of Celine Song’s brilliant debut film Past Lives, two little Korean girls are choosing their English names as part of the family preparation for immigration to Canada. Na Young, age 12, can’t quite settle on one; they all sound…

Past Lives is already one of the year’s best films

Cat Person — the movie adaptation of the New Yorker short story that took over your Twitter feed in December 2017 — starts with a now-familiar paraphrase of a Margaret Atwood quotation: “Men are afraid that women will laugh at them,” says the…

Cat Person, Brett Kavanaugh, Fair Play, and the anger of entitled men

At a recent family gathering, the conversation turned to dining, and from there to a common practice of mine: eating alone in restaurants. My grandmother, who’s in her 80s and grew up in the upstate town where they all live, said she’d never do it,…

The glories of dining out alone

Here’s something you probably didn’t know: The Golden Globes are this week. Wait, the Golden Globes are back? They sure are. The Golden Globes will air on NBC and stream on Peacock, beginning at 8 pm ET on Tuesday, January 10, live from the Beverly…

The Golden Globes, Hollywood’s most chaotic awards, have returned

Death, supermarkets, and an airborne toxic event. If you buy something from a Vox link, Vox Media may earn a commission. See our ethics statement. There’s a white noise machine in my bedroom. I got it to block the sounds of traffic from the busy…

What Noah Baumbach’s White Noise is really about

The real Babylon, the one from which Damien Chazelle’s Babylon draws its name, was the capital of an ancient, mighty empire. The Bible mentions it almost as soon as humanity arrives on the scene: “Come, let us build ourselves a city, with a tower…

Babylon’s debauched old Hollywood is about something much bigger

If you don’t count Minions: The Rise of Gru, and I do not, then the highest-earning comedy of 2022 is The Lost City, a genuinely funny vehicle for Sandra Bullock and Channing Tatum. (At one point it was titled The Lost City of D, and the last bit got…

What gets lost when comedies go straight to streaming

I hated the first Avatar movie — like, hated it. It came out in 2009, and I remember tearing off my 3D glasses at its conclusion, livid that I had paid around $18 to watch Dances With Wolves but with blue people. All blockbusters recycle a certain…

Avatar: The Way of Water

Lately, my social media feeds have been full of people strategizing about how to stretch a dollar when feeding their family in the face of inflation. For those who’ve lived in tough financial circumstances — or who remember recessions of the past —…

The enduring civil rights lessons in Edna Lewis’ cookbook

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It was a very badly timed email. That week I’d received a pension tax bill, been shouted at by a stranger for my views on covid, done resident consultant night shifts paid at plain rates, missed my dad’s birthday to attend a research conference, and…

Matt Morgan: Why I left the NHS—and why I’m coming home

Animal Magic

Can understanding animals help save human lives? It's a question which Dr Matt Morgan investigates in his new book, One Medicine. Animals are separated from humans by a very small degree. Do their bodies work like ours. Have they solved issues in…

How understanding animals can save human lives

The idea came about pre-Covid, when Dr Matt Morgan was treating a patient who had choked on a Hobnob. The biscuit had entered the man’s lungs and caused a cardiac arrest. When a flock of birds flew past the hospital window, Dr Morgan wondered why…

The health lessons animals can teach us

NATURE One Medicine: How Understanding Animals Can Save Your Life by Dr Matt Morgan (Simon & Schuster £16.99, 288pp) Feel this!’ said Matt Morgan’s ex-patient, offering his wrist. The doctor felt for a pulse — and there was none. The man, who Morgan…

How giraffes stop fighter pilots from blacking out - New book reveals the healing powers of animals

Breathe like a frog, sting like a midge

What if your boss asked you to work fewer hours, for 50 per cent more pay, surrounded by great coffee, great beaches and great weather? A third of UK junior doctors have answered ‘bonza!’ and are already planning their move to Australia. This comes…

How to stop the junior doctors’ strike

Alexis Conran

After two years fighting Covid in a Cardiff hospital, Matt Morgan last year flew off for a new life as an intensive care consultant in Australia. Before he left, I bought him lunch, which was the least I could do for I owed Morgan many times over:…

How to reform the NHS, the Australian way

My colleague in intensive care looked tired. Numerous patient stickers were stuck at skewed angles on the computer screen. Paperwork covered the desk like patchwork, including death certificates and transfer letters. Yet the intensive care unit (ICU)…

Matt Morgan: Hand over your invisible patients

It's time to bring doctors and vets under one oath.

Its time to bring doctors and vets under one oath.

By Matt Morgan (sort of, see Disclosures below!) Adjunct clinical professor at Curtin University, Honorary senior research fellow at Cardiff University, consultant in intensive care medicine in Western Australia and an editor of BMJ OnExamination.…

Dr ChatGPT will see you now

Health services around the world are sinking. They’re facing a storm—struggling to withstand the pressures of caring for an ageing population, of meeting higher patient expectations, and of trying to provide ever more brilliant, but expensive, new…

Matt Morgan: Aggressive transparency is a tool for change

Modern intensive care medicine has recently become a senior citizen. Happy 70th birthday. Born out of necessity, innovation and hope during the Copenhagen polio epidemic of 1952 [1], we have come a long way. Those early decades brought machines that…

Intensive care 2.0

As many healthcare workers plan industrial action for better working conditions, another revolution in working life rumbles on. Millions of office workers no longer have to commute, moving only from their bedroom to another part of their house to…

Matt Morgan: Working from work

My fellow BMJ columnist Rachel Clarke has rightly argued recently that we should judge health secretaries according to their policies, not their appearance, after widespread public criticism of a photo of England’s new health secretary, Thérèse…

Matt Morgan: We all contain multitudes

The palliative care physician and author Kathryn Mannix described the death of Queen Elizabeth II sadly and beautifully on Twitter last week.1 She wrote about how the Queen’s gradual adaptation to frailty in recent years, involving less travel and…

Matt Morgan: An ordinary death

The most dangerous procedure in medicine doesn’t involve scalpels, or lasers, or even touching the patient. It involves words, sounds, and pieces of paper: it is the medical handover. Teams huddle together with folded lists or custom PowerPoint…

Matt Morgan: The medical handover is broken

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Nobody wants to make a bad film. Even the all-time greats slip up now and then. Sometimes, a project comes along with seemingly limitless potential and an ensemble of talents that promises an absolute slam dunk. But nothing is guaranteed. This brings…

Review: ‘Marlowe’ is One of the Biggest Disappointments of 2023 So Far

Sometimes, all your troubled romantic hero needs is someone who can mend their heart as well as change the diapers. That’s where the nanny comes in and turns his life upside-down, in the best way. Here are nine nanny romances where the professional…

9 Heartwarming Nanny Romance Books

TikTok has been widely condemned for the ways it allows the rapid spread of unchecked and often-dangerous conspiracy theories. Among the memes and dances, it’s home to all manner of cruelties and bigotry, all of which reaches its young audience at…

Bella Hadid Exposes the Dangers of Blind Gossip Conspiracies on TikTok

The Oscar season is finally over, which means we’re back to normal. Well, ‘normal’, whatever that means in the post-COVID era of the film industry. What we expected was for the blockbusters to return and suck up all the money. That didn’t work out as…

Box Office Report: Sha-damn?

Thanks to the success of the Netflix series Wednesday, actress Jenna Ortega has been catapulted into stardom. She’s a SAG Award nominee, an SNL guest host, and is reportedly in talks to join the cast of the long-awaited sequel to Beetlejuice. It’s a…

Jenna Ortega and the Perils of Being Called Ungrateful

To celebrate David Cronenberg's 80th birthday, check out his underrated adaptation of the controversial novel "Naked Lunch." David Cronenberg, the undisputed king of cinematic body horror, turns 80 this month, and he shows no signs of slowing down.…

Why You Should Watch Naked Lunch, David Cronenberg's Most Baffling Film

Things have gotten weird in the UK, even by our standards. Not content with being the capital city of worldwide transphobia, chopping and changing our prime ministers like they’re Henry VIII’s wives, and sinking further into a murderous cost of…

Gary Lineker, the BBC, and the Lie of Impartiality

HOMEBOOKS Explore new desires in romantic destinations. Get away from it all and spend the night in a new place. Whether you’re on a work trip or a long-deserved holiday, there’s something about staying in a hotel that can feel like a refreshing new…

9 Hot and Heavy Hotel Romance Books

Every year, the Academy Awards includes an In Memoriam segment during the ceremony to pay homage to those who passed over the prior 12 months. This year, John Travolta tearfully introduced a performance by Lenny Kravitz, who accompanied a montage of…

Why Were So Many Big Names Missing From the Oscars In Memoriam Segment?

Another year, another Oscars ceremony. After a prolonged season that dragged well into mid-March and ceaseless Discourse, the 95th Academy Awards came to a fitting end. For the first time in a while, things didn’t feel 100% safe in terms of the…

The 95th Academy Awards Were, Dare We Say It, Good?

Reviews may have been mixed and Neve Campbell’s absence keenly felt, but that didn’t stop Scream VI from topping the box office this weekend. The competition wasn’t tough but it was there, and horror is typically a safe bet in such circumstances. It…

Box Office Report: Shriek!

Yup, it’s that time of the year, yet again. The 95th Academy Awards will take place this Sunday and, for once, hopes are high that it won’t be a total sh*tshow. Yeah, we’re going to have to put up with way too many jokes about The Slap and nothing is…

The Obligatory 2023 Oscars Predictions Post

Every year, in the lead-up to the Oscars, the Academy hosts a flashy luncheon where all of the nominees are invited to hang out, take photographs, and general revel in the mighty star power of Hollywood. 2022 offered a wide slew of A-List clout among…

Tom Cruise Didn’t Save Hollywood but ‘Top Gun: Maverick’ May Have Saved His Reputation

Jennifer Lawrence has long been prized for her charm and humor, but her roles don’t always offer the best opportunities for her to showcase that charisma. After taking a backseat from the A-List for a couple of years to unwind and have a baby,…

Trailer: 'No Hard Feelings,' the New Raunchy Jennifer Lawrence Comedy Looks Quite Bad

This past Sunday, a small but crucial barrier was broken in Hollywood. At the American Society of Cinematographers Awards, Mandy Walker took home the feature competition title for her work on Baz Luhrmann’s Elvis. This made her the first woman ever…

How 'Elvis' Cinematographer Mandy Walker Could Make History at This Year's Oscars

The Rocky/Creed franchise has long proven itself to be one of immense financial clout, and Michael B. Jordan is continuing that proud trend with Creed III. The film marks his directorial debut as well as his third time in the title role, and…

Box Office Report: Creed Crushes Ants

Legendary and Warner Bros. Discovery have a lot of hopes riding on the success of the Dune saga. The long-awaited big-screen adaptation of Frank Herbert’s beloved novel became a critically adored and multi-Oscar winning blockbuster, and the sequel is…

Looks Like Things Aren't Going Well for the 'Dune' Prequel Series

The publishing house Puffin caused a furore when they recently announced plans to ‘update’ the books of Roald Dahl for modern audiences. The changes to his work included changing words like ‘fat’ to ‘enormous’, removing gendered pronouns for the…

It Was Never About Cancel Culture: It Was Always About Capitalism

Books time! You know the drill. It’s February, there are plenty of titles to talk about, but here are four that proved to be especially interesting to me this past month. The Summer Prince by Alaya Dawn Johnson What is everyone reading this weekend?…

The Pajiba February 2023 Book Recommendations Superpost!

Romance novels have been the subject of mockery for decades, derided as silly or artistically unworthy or, that dreaded word, trash. Well, guess what? We love trash! There’s absolutely nothing wrong with something that’s over-the-top, lascivious, and…

9 Trashy Romance Novels Everyone Should Read

Rent Kayaks from Bayou City Adventures at Discovery Green to North Lake Conroe Paddling Co. in Lake Conroe—our city has no shortage of paddle-worthy waterways. IF YOU LEFT THE LAST BUFFALO BAYOU REGATTA feeling inspired to do some paddling of your…

Paddle On: Here’s Where to Kayak and Paddle in Houston

Rice undergraduates presented alongside historians and experts on the intra-American slave trade at the “Bound Away” conference held at the Moody Center for the Arts Dec. 3 and 4. Lovett College senior Victoria Zabarte, a history major with a minor…

Undergrads share research on Texas slave trade

Baker College associate and director of the Principles of Economics program James DeNicco grilled links upon links of venison sausage Oct. 2 for Baker’s annual Deers and Beers bash. (Photos by Aidan Gerber)

How the sausage is made

National Voter Registration Day block party signed up students across campus to vote
A line of newly registered voters snaked across the Grand Hall Sept. 28 at the Rice Memorial Center as students who came out for the National Voter Registration Day…

Harris County Elections’ Ben Chou ’13 hails increased civic engagement at Rice

The annual Discover Research Fair returned in person this year, held Sept. 29 in the Grand Hall at the Rice Memorial Center. A popular one-stop shop for undergraduates interested in learning about Rice’s many opportunities in research, service and…

Inquiry-based learning

Hugh “Hughy” Davis III, an access services assistant at Fondren Library, died Sept. 23. He was 30 years old.
Davis was a well-known, friendly face to Fondren patrons, where he’d worked since 2017. From his perch at the front desk, Davis greeted…

Rice remembers Hugh Davis, access services assistant at Fondren Library

The annual fall plant sale is back at the Rice Holistic Garden. If the recent cool snap inspired you to get outside again, the garden has the perfect plants to put in the ground right now for the cooler months ahead.
Starting Oct. 4, all manner of…

Fall plant sale starts Oct. 4 at Rice Holistic Garden

Following a scavenger hunt across campus, a big batch of brand-new Rice grad students refueled with gigantic slices of pizza and ice pops at the Sept. 23 orientation picnic hosted by the
The following night, Sept. 24, the party moved to the Ray…

Party masters

It isn’t September without a Baker College Christmas, a . This year’s festivities included gingerbread house-building in the commons and pizza al fresco to the strains of “Feliz Navidad.” (Photos by Aidan Gerber)

Feliz navidad

‘The Sand Recalls the Moon’s Shadow’ runs through Dec. 19
One gallery at Rice’s Moody Center for the Arts has been converted into a desert landscape made from approximately 50 tons of fine silica sand, while another is centered around a giant…

Minimal gestures, grand scale: Kapwani Kiwanga fall exhibition now open at the Moody

Grad student Nina Cook found out firsthand during this fall’s Rice Theatre production
When a script is as densely packed with wordplay, cultural references and allusion as Eric Overmyer’s play “On the Verge,” a dramaturg really comes in handy.
What’s…

Behind the scenes: What does a dramaturg do?

In 1984, Michael Heizer’s massive triptych of pink granite monoliths, “45°, 90°, 180°

Playing the angles

It’s a mitzvah to . Beginning five days after Yom Kippur, Sukkot is named after the huts (“sukkot” in Hebrew) in which Jews are supposed to dwell during this weeklong celebration. (Photos by Jeff Fitlow)

The four species

When your identity is constructed by those around you, what does it mean to create one for yourself?
“Sex, Sea and Self,” Jacqueline Couti’s second book, continues her research examining the construction of self and identity through what she terms…

Couti examines ‘Sex, Sea and Self’ through French Caribbean literature in new book

A casual game of Friday evening soccer became a pickup match when medical school students from across Main Street at the Texas Medical Center asked to join a group of Sid Richardson College students who’d been passing the ball around the pitch.…

Main Street derby

Fifty tons of silica sand were carefully transported into the Moody Center for the Arts for its new fall exhibition, “Kapwani Kiwanga: The Sand Recalls the Moon’s Shadow,” which debuted Sept. 17 with an opening party that spilled out onto the patio…

Sandbox environment

Renowned novelist explored the global legacy of colonial attitudes and aggression during the two-night Campbell Lecture Series
Award-winning novelist Amitav Ghosh delivered a duo of lectures describing the ways in which climate change and the…

Amitav Ghosh on the dangerous delusions that created our climate crisis

The staff of the Gibbs Recreation Center handed out hundreds of snow cones and bags of popcorn Sept. 15 to welcome back students at its big fall bash, which included a range of free, fun activities from rock wall climbing to photo booths to…

Getting rec’d

NEWS RELEASE
Katharine Shilcutt
kshilcutt@rice.edu
713-348-6765
Texas abortion law to be discussed in webinar
Leah Litman, Melaney Linton, Wendy Davis and other reproductive rights supporters to speak
HOUSTON – (Sept. 17, 2021) – The nation turned…

Texas abortion law to be discussed in webinar

After a year spent studying remotely, Rice’s Graduate Student Association (GSA) knows the importance of reestablishing connections on campus — and creating a community for those first-year students just arriving.
That’s why the GSA is hosting three…

GSA welcomes grad students new and returning with fall festivities

In the realm of cinema, we would like to see more Black joy. Directed by Raine Allen-Miller with lead actors Vivian Oparah and David Jonsson, we find that joy in “Rye Lane.” When it opened at Sundance, the film was a welcomed breath of fresh air in a…

David Jonsson and Vivian Oparah bring Black joy to life in 'Rye Lane'

Shadow and Bone is an American fantasy streaming television series developed by Eric Heisserer for Netflix. It is based on two series of books in the Grishaverse by Leigh Bardugo, the Shadow and Bone trilogy and the Six of Crows duology. All eight…

Freddy Carter/Amita Suman,/Kit Young/Danielle Galligan/Calahn Skogman/ & Jack Wolfe  Shadow & Bone 2

Interview with Lewis Tan, Anna Leong Brophy, and Patrick Gibson for season 2 of Shadow and  Bone

Harlem is an American comedy television series created and executive produced by Tracy Oliver. It premiered on Amazon Prime Video on December 3, 2021. In February 2022, the series was renewed for a second season, which premiered on February 3,…

Interview with Meagan Good and Jerrie Johnson for Harlem season 3 out now on amazon

The second season of “Shadow and Bone” continues the events of “Storm and Siege,” the second book in Leigh Bardugo’s trilogy, with the Six of Crows characters tagging along on their own crime-filled expedition. On a recent press tour, the actors…

The cast of 'Shadow and Bone' on what to expect from the newest season

Jimmy Kimmel opened the 95th Academy Awards with a traditional monologue. As he whimsically went through a barrage of jokes, he quickly acknowledged that women were missing from the directing category once again. Kimmel made several jokes about “the…

The Academy still lacks representation of Black and brown voices

John Luther is a walking contradiction. His personal life is chaotic and his work life is always held on by life support, however it’s those things that make him a top-tier detective. It’s the holes in his life that allow him to spot the same…

Idris Elba leaves viewers captivated in 'Luther: The Fallen Sun'

After a year of planning, the South by Southwest festival, better known as SXSW, is back bigger and better than ever. More new movies and parties have returned to Austin, Texas, March 10-18. The festival that gave birth to this year’s Oscar…

SXSW returns with an impressive lineup of Black creatives

Creed III, the third installment in one of the most entertaining boxing film franchises, will be hitting theaters soon. The Rocky spinoff maintains the themes of the original, with our champion Adonis Creed (Michael B. Jordan) now a seasoned veteran…

Michael B. Jordan and Tessa Thomspon discuss the complexities of Creed III

Nikole Hannah-Jones is using her platform to inform at a time when states are actively fighting to remove the retelling of history. The Pulitzer Prize-winning investigative journalist, who is currently the inaugural Knight Chair in Race and…

Nikole Hannah-Jones discusses why 'The 1619 Project' is so controversial

Nothing says summer like the Roots Picnic. Diddy with the Roots, along with Ms. Lauryn Hill performing her album “The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill,” and Philadelphia rapper Lil Uzi Vert will all be headlining the Roots Picnic on June 3 and 4. The…

The lineup for the Roots Picnic features hip hop, R&B classics

Democrats and Republicans have both used gerrymandering, a method of drawing voting districts to effect electoral outcomes to favor themselves in an election. However, Republicans have been more aggressive in ignoring court orders, as seen in…

Gerrymandering, merely one of many threats to progressive political gains

A. V. Rockwell’s “A Thousand and One” was among the many outstanding films made by Black women at the Sundance Film Festival this year. Rockwell, who attended Sundance for the first time in 2018 with her short film “Feathers,” is no stranger to the…

A.V. Rockwell's 'A Thousand and One' deals with real-life issues for Black women

Harlem is an American comedy television series created and executive produced by Tracy Oliver. It premiered on Amazon Prime Video on December 3, 2021. In February 2022, the series was renewed for a second season, premiered on February 3, 2023.The…

Interview with Tyler Lepley for Harlem season 2 out now on Prime Video

Interview with Tracy Oliver for season 2 of Harlem currently streaming on Prime Video

Dave Franco co-wrote and directed the American rom-com film “Somebody I Used to Know” with his wife Alison Brie. She stars in the film along with Jay Ellis, and Kiersey Clemons. The premise of the film is workaholic Ally reunites with ex-boyfriend…

New rom-com delves into complexity of relationships and lost love

On a trip to her hometown, workaholic Ally reunites with her ex-boyfriend Sean, which makes her question her life choices. This feeling is exacerbated when she meets Cassidy, a younger woman who reminds her of the person she used to…

Interview with Alison Brie, Jay Ellis and Kiersay Clemons

Interview with Dave Franco for the new prime video film Somebody I used to know out 2/10/23

In 1920, Mallie Robinson and her five children – Edgar, Frank, Mack, Willa Mae and babe-in-arms Jackie Robinson – arrived at the train station in Cairo, Georgia, headed to Pasadena, California. Most know that Jackie went on to become No. 42, the…

For early 20th century Blacks, resistance meant moving out

The second season of “Harlem” has returned, and our favorite Harlem four — Camille, Tye, Quinn, and Angie — are back for another round of friendships, sex, and simply figuring out life. Last season, creator Tracy Oliver threw us some curveballs,…

The cast of 'Harlem' talks the ups and downs of season 2

AUSTIN, TX: I’ve said before that SXSW is my favorite film festival, but if we’re being honest, that has more to do with the food and drink and camaraderie than the movies themselves. I took in over a dozen during my week or so on the ground, and…

Crooked Marquee’s SXSW 2023 Diary

April Wright is our favorite kind of documentary filmmaker, because she makes movies about movies. Her latest, “Back to the Drive-In” (out now!) looks at drive-in exhibition in the COVID era - and she picked 1980, a year of great drive-in movies (and…

1980 with April Wright

Rachel Sennott is ideally cast in the leading role of Ally Pankiw’s “I Used to Be Funny” because this is a character who sort of can’t help but make you laugh, even without trying, even in tremendously difficult situations. Her name is Sam, and she’s…

‘I Used To Be Funny’ Review: Rachel Sennott Shines In A Narratively Tricky Seriocomic Drama [SXSW]

Every Tuesday, discriminating viewers are confronted with a flurry of choices: new releases on disc and on demand, vintage and original movies on any number of streaming platforms, catalogue titles making a splash on Blu-ray or 4K. This twice-monthly…