Attribution: Photo by Sandra Gabriel on Unsplash Pink is the New Black: Review of Barbie By Geoff Carter It used to be that movies were pretty much based on a straight narrative template. You know, boy meets girl, boy loses girl, yada yada yada… Then movie storylines started expanding and incorporating graphic novels, comic books, television series, and …
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Category:Movies
The Pen in Hand Guide to the Movies: Creative Differences
Attribution: Eden, Janine and Jim from New York City, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons By Geoff Carter The summer movie blockbuster season is underway. Ads and promotions for Warner Brother’s Barbie, Disney’s Indiana Jones: The Dial of Destiny, and Universal’s Oppenheimer have been saturating television, the internet, and all other social media. These traditional studio films boast all-star casts, …
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The Pen in Hand Guide to the Movies: Review of “Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny”
Attribution: Gary Stewart Gary2880, CC BY 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons Living in the Past: Review of Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny By Geoff Carter He is a movie hero of epic proportions, an icon, an institution, and an intellectual—a true renaissance man. He is, of course, Indiana Jones, the most unlikely sort of archeologist/action …
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The Same Old Story
By Geoff Carter Chris Favero from USA, CC BY-SA 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons A segment of the film industry has been stuck in a self-induced rut for the past twenty years or so—which is not atypical. Once they find a successful formula, the big studios hang onto it, producing film after film after film based on …
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The Pen in Hand Guide to the Movies: Review of “Asteroid City”
NASA, ESA, CSA, and STScI, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons “Living in Another World”: Film Review of Asteroid City By Geoff Carter There are only a few filmmakers working today whose style can be recognized within the first few frames of a film. This was possible with past artists like Stanley Kubrick, Jacques Tati, or …
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The Pen in Hand Guide to the Movies: Magic Under the Stars
RoyBuchanan, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:112_Drive-In.jpg By Geoff Carter Whenever I’m near my hometown, I go past the site of the old Starlite Drive-in, which they torn down a while ago. I still miss the sight of the titanic blue structure towering on the horizon, and always remember the place where I spent a …
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The Pen in Hand Guide to the Movies: The Films of Samuel L. Jackson
Attribution: pinguino k, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons Mr. Cool on Cool: The Films of Samuel L. Jackson Aside from Morgan Freeman, his voice is probably as distinctive as any in cinema. From the angry braying or insistent arrogance of Stephen Warren in Django Rising to the wheedling persistence or petulant whining of Gator in Jungle Fever, nobody …
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The Pen in Hand Guide to the Movies: A Tribute to Father’s Day
Photo by Sabine van Straaten on Unsplash A Tribute to Father’s Day: Ten Unforgettable Celluloid Dads By Geoff Carter It’s that time of year when we’re once again celebrating the patriarch, the pater familia, the big man, the king daddy, and the head of the family. It’s Father’s Day. Master of the grill, wearer of the toolbelt, and …
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The Pen in Hand Guide to the Movies: The Perverse Appeal of “Succession”
Maklay62, CC0, via Wikimedia Commons Absolutely Corrupt: The Perverse Appeal of “Succession” At first glance, HBO’s Succession is a series that seems to have it all. It features a hideously wealthy family whose grown children are struggling for control of a multi-national media conglomerate after the upcoming retirement—or demise—of their father, corporate patriarch Logan Roy (Brian Cox), …
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The Pen in Hand’s Guide to Going Above and Beyond the Call of Duty
Capt. Saska Ball, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons (Originally published in June, 2019) By Geoff Carter “…that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion — that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain… –Abraham Lincoln, …
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The Pen in Hand Guide to the Movies: The Cultural Work of Documentary Film
Photo by Jovaughn Stephens on Unsplash Truth Be Told: The Cultural Work of Documentary Film By Geoff Carter Elements of photojournalism, creative non-fiction, cinematic prose poetry, muckraking, and biography have all been crowded—by those who love categorization—under the vast umbrella of what is known as documentary film. Features like Bowling for Columbine, Harvest of Shame, Icarus, and Thirteen. are films that, …
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The Pen in Hand Guide to the Movies: Review of “Lucky Hank”
Photo by Oscar Nord on Unsplash https://unsplash.com/photos/Sd87V72cJEU Stuck in The Middle: Review of AMC Streaming Series Lucky Hank By Geoff Carter Hank Devereaux, Jr., (Bob Odenkirk), the protagonist—he can hardly be said to be a hero, except perhaps in an accidental sense—is a man mired in the mixed blessings of the life of an academic. He is an …
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