Review| The Lighthouse (2019)
For a while now I have been contemplating how filmmaking changed with the introduction of sound in film. The dawn of the “talkies” is an innovation that I am not at all sure we have fully come to terms with…
Hell Is Behind That Door: Suspiria (1977 & 2018) and the Curse of Knowledge
How does one go about remaking Dario Argento’s blood-splattered hallucination Suspiria? One doesn’t. Were one to try they would wreck upon the shoals of its bewildering non-plot and nightmarish visual logic. The most a writer or director can do is…
#207 – Stranger Things 3 and Commoditized Community
On this episode of the Reel World Theology Podcast: The most popular show on NETFLIX is back and brings with it all the nostalgia and mystery that we have come to expect. Stranger Things enters its third season and there…
The Beloved Bombs of Paul Williams: Phantom of the Paradise (1974) Meets Bugsy Malone (1976)
Paul Williams was on quite a roll in the early 1970s. He’d written monster hits for groups like The Carpenters (“We’ve Only Just Begun”) and Three Dog Night (“An Old Fashioned Love Song”) and become a near-regular on The Tonight…
#204 – Godzilla: King of the Monsters and Mixed Messaging
On this episode of the Reel World Theology Podcast: Another special PATRON sponsored episode. Another of our esteemed Patreon sponsors, Hunter and Stephie Van Wagenen, have selected one monster of a film, Godzilla: King of the Monsters. The 2014 Godzilla…
How Culture Has Killed the Zombie: The Dead Don’t Die and the Death of Meaning
“[George Romero] turns the whole concept into something completely different. You can’t control the zombies. They are out of control. Generally, monsters — vampires, Frankenstein, Godzilla, whatever — they are outside the social structure. They are a danger to it, they are…
Reel World: Rewind #038 – The Dark Crystal
On this episode of Reel World: Rewind… Journey into “The Age of Wonder” with co-host Josh Crabb and returning co-host Blaine Grimes as they discuss Jim Henson’s 1982 visionary classic, The Dark Crystal. Using the bookends of the forthcoming Netflix series…
Good Omens’ Ineffable Apocalypse
It’s difficult, bordering on impossible, to talk about Amazon & BBC’s Good Omens miniseries from a Christian perspective without talking about the Biblical setting it inhabits and the Christian trappings it wears. Many are obvious, like the angelic and demonic…
It’s Not About You: Godzilla: King of the Monsters and the Legacy of Toho
However, Godzilla: King of the Monsters maintains the legacy of the franchise in a way that the 1998 or 2014 do not because of their overtly Western narrative frameworks. It concentrates on the kaiju, first and foremost, while obscuring the human stories in order to broaden the thematic world beyond the human perspective, and it maintains the environmental critique that has been present since the first film. Within the legacy of Toho, the film is everything one could expect.
4 Reasons Not to Be Disappointed with Game of Thrones
We have endless choices with our entertainment today. That’s no exaggeration. We can pretty much watch whatever we want, whenever we want, if we pay the right subscription fee. So, when we choose to spend our time on a show,…