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May the Fourth Be With You! 25% Opening The X-Files at McFarland Books, May4-11!
Check it out here, or give it a listen below.
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Its important not to undersell this, not to dismiss the level of craft involved in stitching together a coherent narrative from the differing lengths of cloth. There is pleasure to be had in watching the various characters come together; in watching Peter Quill get insecure around Thor, in listening to Rocket joke about stealing the Winter Soldiers arm, in the fact that Tony Stark and Stephen Strange spend the bulk of the movie attempting to out-Sherlock one another.Infinity Warsucceeds on these terms. Its easy to be dismissive of this cinematic experiment, given how easy it looks, but that does not diminish the accomplishment.
Abrams and Discovery occasionally bungle well-intentioned messages about tolerance and understanding. Voyager is ctwitter.com/i/web/status/9…around…44minutesago
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It has been described asan informative and engrossing critical history of the seriesone of the most confident, assured and enlightening reads on Chris Carters seminal show ever produced, andone of its essential texts.To quote the great Jose Chung, Im going to call those an unqualified rave!
New Podcast! Scannain Podcast (2018)15!
Musings from a Man Lost in La Mancha
Entebbeis an ambitious, and very messy, hostage drama.
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The events that took place in Entebbe Airport in Uganda during June and July 1976 are fascinating. The crisis been adapted for the screen on several occasions already. Anthony Hopkins, Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Dreyfuss starred inVictory at Entebbelater that same year. The following year, Irvin Kershner directedRaid on Entebbewith Charles Bronson and Yaphet Kotto. That same year, Israel produced its own take on the tale inOperation Thunderbolt, which earned an Academy Award nomination for Best Foreign Language Film.
However,On Chesil Beachprovides an intriguing mess of interesting ideas and solid performances. Saoirse Ronan and Billy Howle cannot hold the film together, but provide a set of interesting characters that provide the closest thing that the film has to a throughline. The film works best when it is willing to focus on these two characters together, when it moves away from its free-association aesthetic towards something more concrete.
Good for The /2018/05/the-ro…around…17minutesago
Star Trek: The Original Series (Reviews)
Screenwriter (Donald Clarke, Irish Times)
And, I mean, you can argue about the exoticism of the Klingons in the Abrams movies or Discovery. But Voyager litetwitter.com/i/web/status/9…around…51minutesago
The events leading up to the daring recovery mission are deeply fascinating, with any number of interesting angles on the larger story. It is tempting to look at the events in terms of the tenure of General Idi Amin, who made Uganda a base of operations for these terrorists, much likeLast of King of Scotlanddid. It is possible to look at the Israeli soldiers who trained to mount the rescue mission, knowing the dangers into which they were venturing. It might be reasonable to treat the events as a formative experience for the (then) young state of Israel.
You can visit the companys website hereYou can view all the books included in the offer hereYou can order my book,Opening the X-Files, here.
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A jam-packedScannainpodcast this week, featuring a wealth of insightful film people talking about a big week in film.
Star Trek: The Next Generation(Reviews)
Star Trek: Deep Space Nine (Reviews)
All of these are legitimate answers, but they dance around the truth. On its own terms, taken as a piece of popular culture projected on to a screen for two-and-a-half hours,Infinity Warisnt actuallyaboutanything. When people sit down to look atInfinity Warin the years and decades ahead, to dissect and examine it, what will they come back with? What is it actually saying? What is it actually talking about? Not even in some grandthesis statement about the universeway, but in a more basicthis is the thematic arc of the filmmanner?
WatchingInfinity War, there is a deeply uncomfortable sense thatInfinity Waris about nothing beyond itself.
Putting a lot of Sloth into it: Sloth in se7en…
I Feel Prettyhas a very bold premise for an aspirational comedy.
Star Trek: Deep Space Nine(Reviews)
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This time, Anthony Russo and Joe RussosAvengers: Infinity War.
Hosted by Andrew Quinn and Darren Mooney, and this time with Tony Black,This Just Inis a subset ofThe 250podcast, looking at notable new arrivals on the list of the 250 best movies of all-time, as voted for by Internet Movie Database Users.
On Chesil Beachnever quite coheres into a fully-formed film, often feeling more like a televison movie or a stage play than a theatrical release. Still, there is something interesting playing beneath the surface, often lost in heavy-handed writing or awkward segues.
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I have a bit of a vested interest in the sale, given thatMcFarlandpublished my book.Opening the X-Filesoffers a critical history of the original run ofThe X-Files, all the way fromThe Pilotthrough toI Want to Believe. Im very proud of the book, and very grateful of the opportunity thatMcFarlandgave me. And the reviews have been quite kind.
Quick post to announce that my publisherMcFarland Booksare having amassivesale on their pop culture books to mark the week of May 4th. Using the couponPopCulture25, readers can get a discount of one quarter off the retail price of a wide range of books covering film, television and pop culture. If youve been waiting for an excuse to pick up a book, this is a good one.
All you need to need to do is just enter the codePopCulture25when you reach the check-out. No muss, no fuss.
77. Avengers: Infinity War This Just In(10)
Unfortunately,I Feel Prettylacks that sense of cohesion, resulting in a mismatched tonal disaster, a film never entirely sure whether it is laughingwithits protagonist orather.
And this is just the stuff that is boring. Theres plenty of stuff that is bad. How want to know how someone can wtwitter.com/i/web/status/9…around…54minutesago
However, theres also something gnawing away in the background ofInfinity War, an awkward question that the film never actually answers.What is this actually about?somebody might legitimately ask, and there are any number of possible answers.Infinity Waris a film about a big purple dude with a magic glove.Infinity Waris about paying off ten years of continuity.Infinity Waris about proving that it is possible to make a movie likeInfinity War.Infinity Waris about ensuring that the next Disney shareholders meeting is a blowout party.
Renee is a young woman wrestling with her insecurities, who dreams of being more beautiful. Inspired by a late-night viewing ofBig, she is inspired to transform that dream into a wish, and pleads with some external power to physically transform her. Following an awkward accident (and a brain injury) at herSoul Cycleclass, Renee wakes up and does not recognise her own body. The only catch is that the transformation is strictlyinternal. Renee is delusional. Her physical appearance has not changed, but the way that she sees herself has.
Star Trek: The Original Series(Reviews)
That is an ambitious premise, but also a loaded one. There are any number of potential misfires and miscalculations that could sabotage that premise, the skillful execution of the movie relying upon a pitch-perfect management of tone, a key understanding what the movie is trying to say at any given moment, and the sense that all of the production team are working from the same template towards the same goal.
Entebbeattempts to tell the story through all these different prisms at the same time, to offer a holistic perspective on the events that captures the surreal nature of events and the absurd stakes for all of the players caught up in this perilous game.Entebbebites off a lot more than it can chew, never quite managing to balance the competing demands of the objects of its focus.Entebbeis an intriguing film, but one that feels fractured and unfocused.
McEwans source material might be better described as anovellathan as anovel, with the writer describing it as such and the book generating some small controversy when shortlisted for the Booker Prize. Indeed, the film strains when it tries to extend the novellas core idea out into a feature-length film, often struggling to find focus and to hold its attention. The result is a very uneven piece of work.
This weeks episode features an impressive panel, includingJason CoyleRonan DoyleGrace DuffyNicola TimminsandDaniel Anderson. Theres a host of material to discuss, including the end of theAudi Dublin International Film FestivalwithThe Delinquent Season. As usual, we also talk about what we watched, what is being released next week and what is currently in the top ten.
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Voyager is effectively Star Trek for Trump voters. A bunch of wanderers who just want to find their way back to m/i/web/status/9…around…40minutesago
On Chesil Beachis a messy and awkward adaptation of Ian McEwans story, adapted by the writer from his own work.
Star Trek: Deep Space Nine – One Little Ship (Review)
The film features approximately fifty major characters drawn from ten years of cinematic storytelling, all drawn together to face a major existential threat in a story that spans from a fictional African kingdom to the depths of outer space, all told within two-and-a-half hours, and all packaged in a neat and easy-to-follow delivery mechanism. Marvel Studios and the Russo brothers might make itlookeasy, but theres no denying the level of skill and technique involved in shepherding a story like this to the big screen and making it work in a fundamentalthis is entertainingkind of way.
Avengers: Infinity Waris a staggering accomplishment, from a purely logistical standpoint.