Category Essays
Memo to Rex Reed, The New York Observer
Dear Rex, Do you like movies? I ask because your latest reviews suggest that you think most movies are anything but enjoyable. That except for a select few, today’s films exist solely to disgust, annoy and aggravate you personally. And that if you, Mr. Rex Reed, don’t like a film, it doesn’t deserve an […]
Television ethics in Network and The Truman Show
Be afraid of television. Be very, very afraid. Sidney Lumet’s Network and Peter Weir’s The Truman Show must use the same crystal ball, because both have looked into the future of television and both come to that very conclusion. The question is, what should we be more afraid of […]
The trouble with Glee
When promos started airing in 2008 for a new show called Glee, about the so-called misfits that made up a high school glee club, I rolled my eyes. It looked silly, a little too earnest, and “Don’t Stop Believin’” has never been one of my favorite songs. I didn’t watch and tried to ignore the growing […]
I said JUMP!
As I sat with the biggest grin I’ve ever had plastered on my face watching Johnny Depp and Peter DeLuise recreate their characters from 21 Jump Street for five precious minutes in the 2012 21 Jump Street movie, only one coherent thought went through my head: Why the hell do I love that show so much? For the uninitiated, 21 […]
Most anticipated movies of 2012
(Yeah, okay, I probably should have done this back in January. But honestly, the only movie I would have added to this list that has already opened is 21 Jump Street) Dark Shadows (May 11). Johnny Depp and Tim Burton and vampires, oh my! I’ll admit I was mildly horrified when I first heard that […]
The Red Badge of Courage: The Novel, Movie and Lillian Ross’s “Picture”
A bad film is disappointing. An average film with the potential to be great is even worse. Viewers who have never read the classic Stephen Crane novel The Red Badge of Courage (1895) or Lillian Ross’s book Picture (1952) may be spared the sinking feeling the rest of us may feel upon watching John Huston’s […]
Ode to Survivor
I can remember very clearly the night my television-watching life changed forever. June 7, 2000. I was ten years old, and probably enjoying my usual after-dinner routine of playing Barbies with my twin sister Erin, when some errand or other brought me to the foot of the stairs. At that moment, from upstairs in my […]
Miserable in Middle Earth
I’m about to reveal something I normally don’t dare to say outside the privacy of my own home. I hate The Lord of the Rings. Yes, that Lord of the Rings. The billion-dollar, Oscar-winning, superstar-filled Lord of the Rings movie franchise whose fans could fill San Diego Comic-Con about a hundred times over. The Lord […]
Robin Migdol 