Babylon
SimilarLucky Number Slevin (2006), Maria Full of Grace (2004), My Own Private Idaho (1991),
Watch afterAnt-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania (2023), The Whale (2022),
Babylon is a frenetic crash course in Hollywood history that plays fast and loose with most of its facts. However, it still paints a vivid portrait of Tinseltown from its birth to the behemoth it is today. You won’t find the meticulous and mind-boggling commitment to detail of Mank (most of Margot Robbie’s costuming looks more 2010s than 1920s). Still, director and screenwriter Damien Chazelle is less interested in getting everything right than translating that history into something an audience can feel in their bones. Continue Reading →
Searching
No recent film has understood the Internet quite like Searching. Aneesh Chaganty’s 2018 thriller follows John Cho as David, a father desperately searching for his missing daughter. The film is formatted entirely on screens, a new form of visual storytelling called Screenlife. We see David’s investigation through video calls, websites, and digital files. But at the heart of the story is a deep understanding of the way people, especially young people, can take on new lives through technology. Continue Reading →