A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood had the misfortune to arrive on the heels of Morgan Neville’s underrated Won’t You Be My Neighbor? and Bryan Singer’s overrated Bohemian Rhapsody. The inevitable biopic pendulum had swung towards hagiography and appeared ready to swing back towards deconstruction. Indeed, after Neville’s Read More …
A friend once told me that in many situations, “No one wins in a divorce when kids are involved. The husband loses; the wife loses, and the children especially lose out.” I have seen first-hand the truth of that statement. As a child, I had Read More …
Lulu Wang’s The Farewell, according to its opening titles, is “based on an actual lie.” Billi’s Nai Nai (grandmother) has been diagnosed with Stage Four lung cancer, but the rest of Billi’s family has chosen to hide this diagnosis from Nai Nai. They tell Nai Nai Read More …
Greta Gerwig’s approach to retelling Alcott’s famous story is one that has earned her both praise and criticism. In my opinion, her nonlinear approach to the story of the four March sisters is a stroke of genius—heightening the bonds between each sister, while giving each Read More …
The Irishman, titled onscreen I Heard You Paint Houses from the title of the book it is based on, is a staggering portrayal of one man on the margins of twentieth century American history. The film follows Frank “The Irishman” Sheeran (Robert De Niro) in his journey Read More …
Filmmaker Terrence Malick is one of the most significant (and, of late, prolific) living Christian artists, of any medium. That alone makes any new Malick film worthy of a Christian’s attention. But his latest film, A Hidden Life—the true WWII story of Franz Jägerstätter’s stand against Read More …
When we close our eyes to suffering beyond self and are so insulated in our own world, we may fail to see the needs of others. Our self-centeredness blinds us to a world of hurt that exceeds our own sight line. When we ignore the Read More …
Amidst the wash of imagery and sound in Terrence Malick’s film is a portrayal of humanity’s search for meaning and grace. The parallels between the journey of Christian Bale’s Rick through the bacchanalia of contemporary America and John Bunyan’s The Pilgrim’s Progress are stated quite clearly, but Read More …
A quote attributed to Chesterton, although heavily paraphrased from his original words, reads: “Fairytales do not tell children that dragons exist; children already know dragons exist. Fairytales tell children that dragons can be killed.” Pan’s Labyrinth, Guillermo del Toro’s fairytale for adults, reminds us of the Read More …
If the key image of spiritual awakening in the Christian tradition is the Apostle Paul’s encounter with Christ on the road to Damascus, I would suggest that Roy Neary’s encounter on a dark country road with a UFO is cinema’s “Road to Damascus.” Close Encounters of Read More …