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The Definitive ‘What the F**k?’ Movies: 10-1

10. Altered States (1980) Directed by: Ken Russell Is it a horror film? Many of Ken Russell’s films could be argued as such, but there’s enough in Altered States that makes it less horror and more science fiction/psychological thriller. Based on the novel by Paddy Chayefsky, Altered States introduced the world to William Hurt (and …

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Ranking the Films of Stanley Kubrick

There are few auteurs as instantly recognizable and divisive as Stanley Kubrick, few filmmakers as idiosyncratic or groundbreaking. His work spans the entirety of life itself–sometimes in the same film–and has inspired almost as much derision as hosannas. There is no easy consensus on Kubrick’s films–though you may not be terribly surprised by our writers’ …

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Kubrick’s Films and Their Relationship to Violence in Society

Over the course of his career, legendary filmmaker Stanley Kubrick made movies in various genres tackling a number of ideas. Entirely separate films have been made simply to document the various interpretations of just one of his films, and his attention to detail has been well-documented. Thus, a look at the themes Kubrick presents in …

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Strange Interpretation: Why ‘The Shining’ is Subliminal Genius, Not Cryptic Confession

Films have been made, thousands of hours have been spent pouring over every detail, and lives have been changed by the pursuit of a holy grail within the subtext of Kubrick’s horror masterpiece. In short there is clearly ‘something’ going on within The Shining…

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‘Gravity’ a visual stunner that lacks character complexity

By now, Alfonso Cuarón has pretty much earned the crown of being one of the best, if not the best, technicians in modern cinema. His last three films—Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban, Children of Men, and now Gravity—all demonstrate a playful and intelligent command of space, his camera always roving in, around, and out of locations whenever possible. Gravity raises the bar for technical prowess in mainstream filmmaking, and Cuarón doesn’t shy away from the challenge of a film set entirely in space. This is nothing short of a flawless technical exercise, a frequently intense and relentless theme-park ride of a movie. The real downside is that Cuarón could’ve made more than just a ride.

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Here Be Dragons: ‘Ghost in the Shell’

The animated companion to Blade Runner, Ghost in the Shell seeks to delve even deeper into the nature of identity than its predecessor, distinguishing itself with a more political story and its backdrop as the advent of the information age. An animated art film is a nigh-singular achievement. It’s a cross-section of two genres you almost never get, and a great one to boot.

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Star Trek, Star Wars & Avatar; Putting Sci-Fi Into Darkness

In almost everything, there is subtext, intentional or not. In the ‘not’ category is the significant black cloud coming with the silver lining of three massive developments in movieland this year. Firstly, after months of feverish speculation, J.J. Abrams was chosen as the man to helm the return of Star Wars to the big screen; he confirmed his worthiness for the role with the release of Star Trek Into Darkness, a mega-hit blockbuster action adventure putting the highly rated Star Trek 2009 into the shadows; almost in an attempt to draw attention away from Disney and Spielberg’s protégé, James Cameron announced that the most successful film of all time, his film Avatar, would indeed have the three sequels he had long discussed, thankfully with different screen writers covering the wordy bits. Cue much jubilation from fandom; the silver lining. The malignant black cloud, the subtext, was the continued throes of the science-fiction genre as it is starved to death.

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Maybe It’s Not Just Me; Maybe They Really Did Make Them Better In The Old Days

So I’d gone over to my cousin’s house to see his new puppy and, as he and I are often wont to do, we got to talking about movies and TV and the like. The conversation drifted around to movies we liked but our kids didn’t. “I have Blazing Saddles (1974),” he said, nodding at …

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2001: A Space Odyssey a dark visual essay on the failings of mankind

When it comes to film interpretation and finding madness in the method, it’s only a matter of time before an overly philosophical troll decides to take an almighty stab at the man whose portfolio is stuffed with the mystery, symbolism and deeper meaning usually reserved for Michele de Nostradame and biblical verse. But while Stanley …

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The Great Showdowns in Film: An Interview w/ Artist Scott C.

David and Goliath. Hamilton and Burr. Spinal Tap and mini Stonehenge? The first two exist among the greatest showdowns in history. The latter is but a sampling of the greatest in film history as depicted in artist Scott Campbell’s collection; The Great Showdowns. Campbell, or Scott C. as he signs his work, has quickly risen …

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“Hey You Geeks!!” – For All Geek-Kind; An Intro

In 1902 Georges Melies took audiences on their first trip to the Moon in his H.G. Wells inspired Le Voyage dans la lune. Sixty-seven years later, Neil Armstrong became the first man to walk on the moon. Twenty years after that, Apollo Associates released an 80 minute documentary entirely composed of NASA and astronaut shot …

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No Statute of Limitations For Spoilers

*Exclaimer: Please don’t read this if you haven’t seen Inception, The Empire Strikes Back, Planet of the Apes, The Wizard of Oz, Saw, Gone With the Wind, Casablanca, The Usual Suspects or The Sixth Sense – As a probable testament to my poor academic acumen, I cannot, in good memory, recall the particulars of the situation …

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10 (Kind Of) Great Classic Sci-Fi Flicks You May Have Never Heard Of

We know the greats; movies like Metropolis (1927), Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956), 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968), Star Wars (1977). And there are those films which maybe didn’t achieve cinematic greatness, but through their inexhaustible watchability became genre touchstones, lesser classics but classics nonetheless, like The War of the Worlds (1953), Godzilla (1954), …

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CGI and the Banality of the Incredible, Part 1

“If it can be written, or thought,” said Stanley Kubrick, “it can be filmed.”  Kubrick could very well have been articulating the credo for every cinematic explorer of the fantastic since Georges Melies. Ironically, Kubrick – who was second to none in pushing the limits of filmmaking technology – several times found himself in the position of …

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