Ragtime
When it was announced in 1975 that Robert Altman, then riding high on the success of his groundbreaking epic Nashville, had been hired to direct the film version of E.L. Doctorow’s sprawling novel Ragtime, it almost seemed too good to be true. After all, not only was he one of the most inventive American filmmakers of the era, he seemed uniquely qualified to bring the book to the screen. Additionally, with its sprawling cast of characters, multiple storylines, and cheeky mixture of fact and fiction, Nashville now seems like an experiment to test out potential approaches for tackling that book. Continue Reading →
American Rust
NetworkShowtime,
SimilarCigarette Girl, Dark Winds,
Roswell Soul Land 2: The Peerless Tang Clan,
StudioShowtime Networks,
For many, present company included, tales of alternate realities contain an undeniable hook to them. As people, after all, we start with so many choices to make, so many avenues to pursue. Sometimes, no matter how happy you might be, one can’t help but ponder how things could be different. What if you attended that other school? What if you went on that one blind date? Those questions sit at the center of NBC’s newest offering, Ordinary Joe. Continue Reading →
Hemingway
There isn’t a lot of revelation to be found in Ken Burns & Lynn Novick’s extensive 3-part documentary on Ernest Hemingway. Those dads and grandpas tuning in will already be well-versed in his adventurous life, his tumultuous relationships, his legacy of violence, and self-aggrandizement. But Burns & Novick manage to put together a narrative that suits the author’s legendary machismo. If there’s one person who’d love Hemingway, it’s Hemingway. Continue Reading →
Something Wild
Every month, we at The Spool select a filmmaker to explore in greater depth — their themes, their deeper concerns, how their works chart the history of cinema and the filmmaker’s own biography. For February, we’re celebrating acclaimed genre-bender Jonathan Demme. Read the rest of our coverage here.
Jonathan Demme's most acclaimed works are often his darkest: the grim serial killer nihilism of Silence of the Lambs, the tearjerking tragedies of Philadelphia and Beloved. But it's important to remember the late director for his moments of mirth, his celebration of music and Americana, and the little ways we allow ourselves to break out from the pack. 1986's Something Wild is more of a curio in Demme's back catalog, a manic pixie road romance that flits between goofy renditions of "Wild Thing" and blood-soaked confrontations in a suburban bathroom. It flirts with serious issues of late-capitalist malaise, but is first and foremost here to show you a good time.
The opening minutes of Something Wild feel like something out of a Dear Penthouse letter: I never thought it'd happen to me, but.... It starts with gormless, straight-laced Manhattan finance guy Charlie Driggs (Jeff Daniels, paradoxically at his most Minnesotan) trying to skip out on a check at a diner, only to be intercepted by a mysterious, enticing woman named Lulu (an entrancing Melanie Griffith). In his transgression, she sees the glimmer of a fellow 'wild thing' trying to escape, someone flaunting social norms because he just needs to feel alive. Lulu, with her European bob (reminiscent of Louise Brooks' Lulu in Pabst's Pandora's Box, perhaps deliberately) and array of African jewelry, steals him away from his day job on a sojourn to a New Jersey motel, enticing him to skip work and come with her on a long weekend of sex and discovery. Continue Reading →