What Terrible Movies Can Teach Us

‘The Room’ Isn't Just So Bad It's Good. It's a Master Class on the Pretensions of the Film Industry

It’s film awards season, which means movie lovers and Academy/Screen Actors Guild/Nickelodeon-watching kid voters alike have been busy sorting out the best films from last year.

Many of the most hyped-up contenders of this year’s (or any) film awards season are truly worthy of the honors they seek. Whether it’s because of their unique, high-concept plot, sublime acting performances, perfectly executed action thrills, or some other form of excellence, they deliver on their promises.

And then you have the other films up “for your consideration”—and those that really, really thought they would …

by Adam Rosen | March 9, 2023

The Women Blowing Up Ethiopia’s Film Industry

Successful Female Writers, Directors, and Producers Set the Nation Apart From Hollywood, Bollywood, and the Rest of World Cinema

by Steven W. Thomas | September 11, 2020

Among the many stories about Ethiopia’s long, multifaceted past and politically complicated present, an extraordinary transformation that has received less media attention is the dramatic leap forward in its movie …

The Composer Who Saved King Kong—and Transformed Movie Music

The Masterful Max Steiner’s Career and Life Were as Dramatic as Any Hollywood Picture

by Steven C. Smith | June 15, 2020

An international crisis triggers record unemployment. Hollywood bleeds red as movie theaters shutter. And one major studio faces imminent closure, putting all its hopes on a would-be blockbuster.

The year is …

How Zombie Films Reveal the True Dangers of COVID-19

Like the Living Dead, a Virus Can Overwhelm Powerful States, Ruin Economies—and Reveal Our Best and Worst Selves

by James Der Derian and Phillip Gara | April 5, 2020

Sydney

On any given day at the University of Sydney in Australia, Chinese visitors spill out of tour buses to make their way up the hill to the main Quadrangle, an …

Hollywood Park’s Last Photo Finish

The People of a Vanished Track, As Viewed From the Clubhouse Turn

by Michele Asselin | March 11, 2020

On December 22, 2013, the world-famous Hollywood Park Race Track in Inglewood, California, shut down forever. In 2014, demolition began, closing the stable door on 75 years of history, while …

The Horrifying Hollywood Movie About Thermonuclear War That Determined U.S. | Zocalo Public Square • Arizona State University • Smithsonian

The Horrifying Hollywood Movie That Determined U.S. Nuclear Policy

Operation Ivy Provoked Such Controversy That Future Nuclear Test Films Were Kept Secret From the Public

by Kevin Hamilton and Ned O’Gorman | February 2, 2020

On a hot June day in 1953, President Dwight D. Eisenhower sat down in the cool confines of a White House screening room to watch a horrifying movie. Produced by …

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