Directed by Chad Stahelski John Wick: Chapter 2 follows the same formula that made John Wick work.  We have our rock solid, violently capable but reluctantly violent protagonist who has something taken from him, forcing him back into a life of crime that he has sought to escape.  In the first movie, Wick is still haunted … Continue reading John Wick: Chapter 2 (2017)

Directed by Robert Altman In the opening shot of The Long Goodbye, detective Philip Marlowe lies asleep on his bed with the light on, blending into the muted color palette of the bedroom like he’s invisible.  The Long Goodbye is a noir detective thriller of sorts.  It’s not actually all that thrilling, but it hits … Continue reading The Long Goodbye (1973)

Directed by Sofia Coppola If you can boil this movie down to one idea, I think it would be consequence, both the importance of having consequences to your decisions and the abruptness of consequences in your life. Marie Antoinette (Kirsten Dunst) is a character whose life has no consequences.  She even pushes back against the … Continue reading Marie Antoinette (2006)

Directed by Alan J. Pakula   All The President's Men is one of the most entertaining films I've seen recently.  After watching this I wanted to live in the atmosphere of late nights, too much coffee, typewriters and secret aliases, kind of like how every Western I see makes me briefly consider relocating to a … Continue reading All The President’s Men (1976)

Directed by Hal Ashby Shampoo is a comedy set on election eve 1968, right before Richard Nixon's inauguration, but the politics are only ever seen in the background.  The story is really about the frustrations, sexuality and aspirations of a hairstylist named George (Warren Beatty) who sleeps around with several women and tries to raise … Continue reading Shampoo (1975)

Directed by Alfred Hitchcock In Strangers on a Train, two men meet and discuss plans to kill someone the other man wouldn't mind seeing dead.  It's a rich premise but also one that requires that one of those men be a little unhinged.  Guy Haines (Farley Granger) is a famous tennis player who mostly tries to … Continue reading Strangers on a Train (1951)

Directed by Hal Ashby A lot of the films from this period of time (consider the American New Wave) feel very understated.  I want to learn more about the influences and goals of those filmmakers (like Hal Ashby, Bogdanovich, Scorsese, Coppola, Altman, many others).  Of course they all had different ideas for what their movies … Continue reading The Last Detail (1973)

Directed by Matt Johnson In my last post (Kramer Vs. Kramer) I mentioned my affinity for screenplay structure, and Operation Avalanche is almost the perfect example of everything I've read about screenwriting. The who/what/where/when is introduced very quickly: young NASA filmmakers in the 60s.  Matt and Owen film everything (or their friends do, this is a found … Continue reading Operation Avalanche (2016)

Directed by Robert Benton Kramer Vs. Kramer has an incredibly long first act.  I love story structure, particularly the 3 act structure, but I often have a hard time spotting the act breaks, sequence structure, etc. of movies unless they are crystal clear.  I was reading something recently where a guy said that an act … Continue reading Kramer Vs. Kramer (1979)

Directed by Robert Altman In McCabe and Mrs. Miller, John McCabe (Warren Beatty) and Constance Miller (Julie Christie) as well as Mrs. Miller's prostitutes are effectively the first family of Bearpaw (somewhere in Washington), but I never found them all that interesting. McCabe is a businessman who builds a saloon and then tries to open a brothel, … Continue reading McCabe & Mrs. Miller (1971)