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Lucky Life: Poetry in Motion
I’ve been waiting for a chance to share this movie with you for two years. In Lucky Life, the new film by Lee Isaac Chung, three friends—a writer named Mark, his wife Karen, and their friend Alex—drive to join their friend Jason at a North Carolina beach house. They’ve been friends for years, but this vacation is unusual. Jason has an aggressive form of cancer, and he probably won’t be with them much longer. They share conversations, walks on the beach, memories. Okay, let’s face it, that’s not the....
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Strongest Impressions of 2011, Part 2
It happens every January—movie ads fill up with boasts about awards they’ve won. Soon, those boasts will include Oscar nominations. And The Artist is currently the most boastful of all. Filmmaker Michael Hazanavicius’s tribute to Hollywood’s silent film era is stirring up enthusiasm among audiences and critics alike. Me, I enjoyed it. It was playful, funny, a hoot. Hazanavicius showed guts when he committed....
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Strongest Impressions of 2011, Part 1
It’s that time again: Time to share my favorite films of 2011. Today, I’ll share twenty-one silver medal winners—movies I admired very much. Tomorrow—the gold medalists—the top ten. I was asked to share this list on a Pittsburgh radio program last week. But we got sidetracked. The show hosts asked questions about a celebrity controversy (Sean Penn’s criticism of The Tree of Life) and then asked why I hadn’t....
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War Horse: A War Story for Everyone
Was there a horse story in your childhood? My wife Anne cherished Anna Sewell’s Black Beauty, C.W. Anderson’s The Blind Connemara, and Marguerite Henry’s Stormy and White Stallion of Lipizza. When she wasn’t reading about horses, she was riding them. In the saddle by the time she was in elementary school, Anne rode both English and Western. My favorite photograph from her childhood....
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An American Starlet in Sir Laurence's Court
Alas, for all of its charm, its fashion-catalogue cinematography, and its familiar faces, My Week with Marilyn is a movie that asks big questions and then quickly dances around them in an eagerness to please rather than to challenge or explore. Don't worry: In this story about an exploited young entertainer who turned to drugs for stability and who gave herself up to the rich and powerful men panting after her like dogs, you'll never....
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Current Issue
Issue 71
Fiction by Larry Woiwode, interview with Joe Henry, art by Fabian Debora, essay by Barry Moser.
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