There was actually a time when we didn’t need social media to drum up mass hysteria, and the new HBO documentary Time Bomb Y2K is ready and raring to take us back there. This superbly edited dash through pre-millennial anxieties is a time capsule of archive footage — no narrator, …
Read More »'Hell Camp': Paris Hilton and the Troubled Teen Industry's Abuse Epidemic
As a victim of the “troubled teen industry,” Paris Hilton spoke on Capitol Hill in 2021 to advocate on behalf of survivors of the controversial child-rehabilitation system. The opening moments of Netflix’s Hell Camp: Teen Nightmare features a clip of Hilton’s speech in front of Congress detailing her experience as …
Read More »'All of Us Strangers': Paul Mescal and Andrew Scott's Ghostly Love Story Will Break Your Heart
Andrew Haigh‘s All of Us Strangers has its share of mysteries and dreamscapes and detours into the mystical, but it drops a breadcrumb morsel of a clue to viewers early on. You don’t know it on a first viewing — and this is the sort of rich, layered, remarkable work …
Read More »'Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom': The DCEU Goes Out With a Whimper
You’ve read the stories. You’ve debated the casting announcements. You’ve watched a handful of artists try to do justice to a legacy of iconic characters that’s now just short of a century old. Maybe you even demanded that Warners release the Snyder Cut. (If so: Um, thanks?) By now, we …
Read More »'The Iron Claw' Is a Heartbreaking Tragedy and Zac Efron's Finest Hour
The Von Erichs were the first family of Lone Star professional wrestling in the late 1970s and 1980s, a dynasty of Dallas-based all-stars who took on all comers throughout the North Texas circuit. First there was Fritz Von Erich, the patriarch who’d begun his career in the 1950s and eventually …
Read More »'Gwyneth Goes Skiing': Gwyneth Paltrow's Ski Trial as a Gonzo Musical
“You know what you’re getting into when you come to one of our shows,” offers Joseph Martin, one half of queer British theater duo Awkward Productions. “But you’re still going to leave thinking: ‘I’ve never seen anything like that. What the hell was that?!’” We’re talking about Gwyneth Goes Skiing, …
Read More »'Rebel Moon' Is the Snyder Cut of 'Star Wars'
Do you like the Star Wars franchise? How about the new version of Dune? And what about Avatar, The Matrix, Starship Troopers, Lord of the Rings, and Game of Thrones? And also: Westerns, samurai movies, Inglourious Basterds, ancient mythology (Greek, Roman, and a smattering of Eastern), the Dungeons & Dragons …
Read More »Gwyneth Paltrow's Ski Trial Doc Is No Fun
An Oscar-winning actress and lifestyle entrepreneur collides with a retired optometrist on a Utah ski slope. The optometrist sues, claiming a life-altering brain injury. Not so fast, says the starlet; it was his fault, and she countersues, seeking damages of… one dollar. The media, not surprisingly, laps it up, covering …
Read More »'American Fiction' Is a Scathing Satire, a Family Drama, and an Absolute Triumph
Thelonious “Monk” Ellison has hit his breaking point. The students in his Southern-lit class at the prestigious university he teaches at are oversensitive snowflakes. His superiors think he needs a break from academia. Monk’s novels may still be in print, but you wouldn’t know it; they’ve all been relegated to …
Read More »'The Crown' Ends With Too Much Prince William and Kate Middleton
An unexpected thing happens in the series finale of The Crown, which Netflix released today: Queen Elizabeth is the main character. This would seem to be the most predictable thing in the world, right? The Crown began with Elizabeth’s unexpected ascension to the British throne at the age of 25, …
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