The eighties were a fruitful time for the fusion of films and pop music. Never was there a time when the pop charts and the weekly box-office complimented one another as often as they did then. It got to the point where a film’s popularity would sometimes depend on the success of its soundtrack. Eighties-era MTV was a willing participant in the crossover promotion of big Hollywood films, as a hit video from a film’s soundtrack

And  now, for the nearly-ritualistic Cannes Festival press release that announces little, leaves much to speculation and wraps up with a note of mystery while flirting with contradiction--and causes much collective eye-rolling in people, one would assume? It did in me, at least. I am rolling my eyes right now, at this strange bird of a message received in my inbox at 6 p.m. Paris time. It began thus: "Following the declaration

“The Sharks” ("Los Tiburones" in the original Spanish title) is something special. Uruguayan writer/director Lucía Garibaldi's feature-length debut is a coming of age tale that gets to the heart of its subject without judgment or forced and phony life lessons. This is a careful and organic look at a teenager on the cusp of becoming a woman.

Almost overwhelmed

What can one say when a great performance is lost on a film so enamored with itself that it becomes less and less endearing from scene to scene, finally burying any good graces it may have had?

The answer? An unfortunate negative take on the new comedy, “Lazy Susan.”

Sean Hayes is the unambitious Susan O’Connell. Susan can’t hold down a job nor do what

Confinement. Quarantine. Shut in. Whatever you wish to call it, we are all doing our part to stay safe during this tough time. For many of us, the arts are the key to keeping our minds stable through any issue, let alone being stuck in our homes for months. We have novels, music, films and television to see us through.

The world now lives in the age of bingeing

The 2020 Census is upon us, and its results will determine how much representation each district will get in the House of Representatives. But for decades there have been various attempts to cheat the system in a trick called gerrymandering, wherein voting districts are redrawn to effectively divide certain blocs and thus reduce their collective representative power in Congress.

“Slay the Dragon,”

Kioumars Derambakhsh, the Iranian director, documentary maker and still photographer, died in Paris of COVID 19, on March 31st. During his long career, his many interests and wide culture caused him to direct a number of documentaries on a range of subjects, (including a thirteen-episode series on the drawings of Eugène Flandin, famed French 19th-century traveler to Iran, or ancient Armenian churches in Ispahan) feature films