// Category Archive for: Movies

Metacritical Mass

By Less Lee Moore

Photo from Collider

It’s no secret that I’m not shy about criticizing other critics. In the last few days, however, I’m starting to feel more sympathy than annoyance.

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Cure for Pain: The Mark Sandman Story

By Chelsea Spear

Photo © Mark Ostow

Throughout the 1980s and ’90s, Mark Sandman cut a wide swath through the Boston music scene. His first band, Treat Her Right, scored a local radio hit with the deadpan, eerie single “I Think She Likes Me.” The various bands with whom Sandman played—most notably Supergroup, Candybar, and Morphine—played two sets a night at the shoebox-shaped bar Plough and Stars. Even as Morphine ascended to a renowned trio with a devoted following, Sandman could be found playing at the annual Central Square World’s Fair, talking with elementary school classes about his handmade musical instruments, converting his loft apartment into a recording studio, or just hanging out in the back booth at the Middle East nightclub. His sudden, tragic death in Italy in 1999 left a huge hole, both in the music world where he made his mark, and within the Boston arts community. (more…)

Movie Review: Red Lights

By Less Lee Moore

This review also appears on The CillianSite.com.

At its most basic level, Red Lights is about two paranormal investigators who debunk cases of alleged psychic phenomena. Yet what the movie is really about is something more: Faith, and whether or not that faith can be shaken.

Sigourney Weaver plays Dr. Margaret Matheson, a psychologist who’s built her career on not just shaking, but also shattering, the faith of those who believe in the paranormal or supernatural. Cillian Murphy is her assistant, Tom Buckley, a physicist who in Matheson’s view is brilliant enough to be doing something more with his life than helping her. Early on in the film, Matheson asks Buckley why he stays with her. He doesn’t answer. Finding out the answer is part of what makes Red Lights so engaging.

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Great Scot (regardless of the critics): Why I’m Into Brave

By Maureen

Brave silkscreen print from Dark Ink
Comic-Con 2012 Exclusive

Here’s what I know: I saw Brave on its opening night and enjoyed the hell out of it. My boyfriend and I were in a theater full to the max with a good mix of children and their parents and groups of people both our age (27 and 29, respectively) and teenagers. We had a great time. Everyone was a-buzz leaving the theater, both about the film and about other Disney/Pixar endeavors.

Here’s what I don’t know: why everyone on the Internet suddenly seems to have issues with this adorable film. (more…)

Twilight and The Problem With Modern Horror

By Paul Casey

When I saw Takashi Miike’s Audition, I did not know that the sub-genre of “torture porn” existed in horror. As such I did not approach it as an exercise in sadomasochism. (It is not, anyway). As I became aware of creators like Eli Roth, and a rather embarrassing discussion on how he had GONE TOO FAR (!!!! etc.), it was clear that there was still a burgeoning market for transgressive horror pictures. The Last House on the Left, I Spit On Your Grave, The Hitcher, the work of Lucio Fulci all caused similar bother upon their release. Some of the above were innovative, exciting examples of the independent creative spirit existent in 1970s American cinema. Others were not.

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Assemblog: July 6, 2012

Citadel still from Bloody Disgusting

New on Popshifter this week: Part two of our continuing series on THE BAND’s discography (The Band); and a review of Ernie Kovacs: The ABC Specials on DVD.

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Assemblog: June 29, 2012

Image from The Art Of The Title

New this week on Popshifter: an attempt to answer the question regarding sex, violence, and horror in movies: Are we short-charging the teens?; reviews of new releases by Jesca Hoop, DIIV, Ty Segall Band, and Neneh Cherry & The Thing; in praise of singer/songwriter Gillian Welch; and a look at a 1974 John Lee Hooker concert now on DVD.

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Sex, Violence, and Horror: Are We Short-Charging The Teens?

By Charlie M.

They say you always remember your first.

I certainly do.

Bram Stoker’s Dracula, 1992

I mean (of course) the first adult-rated film a person watches, be it at home, creeping downstairs to the TV, at a friend’s house with a DVD purloined from an older sibling, or even sneaking into a dark cinema when you’re under the age of 18. In my case, it was Bram Stoker’s Dracula, or, as the movie moguls described it, Francis Ford Coppola’s Dracula. Or, as in my underage head, Gary Oldman’s Dracula. Who knows what it is about teenage girls and their erotic fascination with vampires? It’s an equation where even the innuendos have been bled dry (apologies).
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Assemblog: June 22, 2012

Image from V/H/S, 2012

New this week on Popshifter: Thoughts On: THE BAND, Music From Big Pink; reviews of Silver Jews, Early Times and Harry Howard and The Near Death Experience; new Robyn Hitchcock song “There Goes The Ice;” Theresa Andersson in Cambridge MA; an interview with author A. Jay Lee; and that burning question: Are The Originals The Best?

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Are The Originals The Best?

By Charlie M.

There’s a rumor going around the Internet. So bad, I don’t want to believe it. I plug my fingers in my ears, but I can’t block out the “grrrrrs” of fellow horror fans across the globe in protest. Whisper it. They’re going to remake Poltergeist.

Yes.

I know.

Ghastly, unnecessary, and yet as soon as I say it you hear the ring of truth and you know it’s going to happen.
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