A hard act to follow

“Generally forgotten today, Grayson Hall was an actress who worked mostly in off-Broadway plays but attracted a sizeable cult audience through television. Handsome and domineering, she possessed a stately deportment…and a deep, throaty voice tailored to hit the back rows of a theatre.” A review of R.J. Jamison’s new biography, now on Flickhead.

Winterlude, this dude thinks you’re fine

“Bob Dylan 1966-1978: After the Crash is a blast and absolutely essential for anyone who…still loves Dylan.” Nelhydrea Paupér reviews a new DVD, now on Flickhead.

In Andy Warhol’s Kitchen

Above: David McCabe (photographer), Edie Sedgwick, Roger Trudeau (seated on table), Rene Ricard (at kitchen sink), Donald Lyons (seated in forefront) and Electrah (standing)

"I think Warhol's films are historical documents. One hundred years from now they will look at Kitchen (1965) and see that incredibly cramped little set, which was indeed a kitchen; maybe it was eight feet wide, maybe it was six feet wide. It was photographed from a middle distance in a long, low medium shot, so it looked even narrower than that. You can see nothing but the kitchen table, the refrigerator, the stove, and the actors. The refrigerator hummed and droned on the sound track. Edie had the sniffles. She had a dreadful cold. She had one of those colds you get spending the long winter in a cold-water flat. The dialogue was dull and bounced off the enamel and plastic surfaces. It was a horror to watch. It captured the essence of every boring, dead day one's ever had in a city, a time when everything is imbued with the odor of damp washcloths and old drains. I suspect that a hundred years from now people will look at Kitchen and say, 'Yes, that is the way it was in the late Fifties, early Sixties in America. That's why they had the war in Vietnam. That's why the rivers were getting polluted. That's why there was typological glut. That's why the horror came down. That's why the plague was on its way.' Kitchen shows that better than any other work of that time." — Norman Mailer

How we lost it at the movies

“A journey through Phillip Lopate’s American Movie Critics reveals just how significant film criticism has been over the course of the last century…as a valid genre of writing and as a strong influence on culture and values.” Read the review now on Flickhead.

A Twist of Sanda

“Two intelligent, beautiful women pushing thirty…take a long weekend together in the south of France… Depending on one’s tolerance for such things, there are far worse ways you can spend ninety-five minutes.” A review of the new DVD of Michel Deville’s Le Voyage en douce starring Dominique Sanda and Geraldine Chaplin, now on Flickhead.

Quite a Stuhr

“An engrossing meditation on society, pressure and the stifled individual…from a screenplay adaptation by Krzysztof Kieslowski.” A review of Jerzy Stuhr’s The Big Animal, now on Flickhead.

Vanishing point

“Tall and lanky with a stately mane of salt and pepper hair, his piercing eyes stare a hole through reality, their gaze locked in some private memory or joke, or the eternal questions of being and self.” A review of Monster Road, now on Flickhead.

The waters of oblivion

James Le Gros and Steve Buscemi

“What is interesting about Living in Oblivion is [Tom] DeCillo’s ability to rove between dream and reality without drawing undue attention to himself.” Author Irene Dobson does something of the same, now on Flickhead.

Geek tragedy

Above: Tyler Gannon

“To criticize the character…in Film Geek would be as easy as shooting ducks in a barrel, but in the final analysis he’s a mirror image of what lies behind my own façade of normalcy. A funhouse mirror perhaps, but an apt reflection nonetheless.” A new review now on Flickhead.