American Beauty Through a Screen Darkly - Bonus Chapter - The Whole Wide World [A consideration of Crash, Gosford Park, and Yi-Yi] - Eight-year-old Yang-Yang, in the film Yi Yi (A One and a Two) - U2, "When I Look at the World" A Crash-Course in Cultural Prejudice When writer-director Paul Haggis's film Crash won Best Picture at the 75th
On Movies & Media Intriguing letters of the week! I'm as anxious as anybody to leave the political and critical debates about Brokeback Mountain behind. But email feedback at Looking Closer has more than doubled since my Brokeback Mountain review was published, and just this week, I've received several interesting messages, and a few are
On Movies & Media Michelle Williams and "Brokeback Mountain" [REVISED, after some second thoughts...] Thanks to Peter T. Chattaway for catching this... [ ... AND thanks to Dan Buck for challenging my first post. I got a little too cocky (Can I say that in a post about Brokeback Mountain?), thinking I was responding to the SFC headmaster, when in fact
On Movies & Media Interesting letter of the day Got the daily bundle of letters in response to the Brokeback Mountain reviews, but I also received one that was quite unusual. I don't usually post the complimentary letters because I don't want to appear to be glorying in somebody's appreciation. But this one
On Movies & Media Washington Post's Stephen Hunter & Peter Chattaway on "Brokeback Mountain." (Well, no, they're not really ON Brokeback Mountain.) Two worthwhile perspectives on Brokeback Mountain: Stephen Hunter sees the film very clearly: And what do Lee's images tell us? ... It's hard to argue that the movie constitutes any kind of threat, or pro-gay propaganda. For one thing, there's too much authentic pain in
On Movies & Media Other memorable Oscar quotes of the day... "You can't pasteurize the Academy Award, you can't negotiate it. It is the top." - Felicity Huffman, Transamerica Hate to break it to you, Ms. Huffman, but, well, you're completely wrong. "I was completely surprised." - Reese Witherspoon, Walk the
On Movies & Media Letter of the Day: Response to "Brokeback Mountain" Review Today I received this letter in response to my Brokeback Mountain review. Its typical of other responses I've received, but this one was such a convenient distillation of the various contradictions and claims that I was grateful for the chance to address so many common attacks on Christian
On Movies & Media Mark Steyn is Right about "Brokeback Mountain" Thanks to Peter Chattaway for alerting me to this review of Brokeback Mountain by Mark Steyn, which sums up why this big screen emperor has no clothes. Caution: One obscenity included. I like Ms Proulx's books not because of the characters or the plots but because she'
Looking Elsewhere Specials: Sarris on where "Brokeback" is broken. Pretty woman, Gump may join Mike Nichols. CNN on religious media. Wednesday's specials: SARRIS DARES TO SHRUG OFF BROKEBACK MOUNTAINCourageously stating some of the obvious problems with Brokeback Mountain, Andrew Sarris demonstrates that he's willing to swim upstream against the tidal wave of hype: Besides, the problem of the economic disparity between lower-middle-class Ennis and upper-middle-class Jack
On Movies & Media Homosexual Heath Ledger Character: Bad. Heterosexually Promiscuous Ledger Character: Not So bad? I've had some interesting chats with the film writers and the editor of Christianity Today Movies in the wake of the publication of Lisa Cockrel's Brokeback Mountain review. Mark Moring, the CT Movies editor, says he's received over 250 e-mails about the Brokeback Mountain
On Movies & Media Rod Dreher on "Brokeback Mountain" Rod Dreher on "Brokeback Mountain" Ms. O'Connor once wrote that you don't have to have an educated mind to understand good fiction, but you do have to have "at all times the kind of mind that is willing to have its sense of
On Movies & Media After seeing it twice, I've posted my full review of "Brokeback Mountain." I finally got tired of reading the debates and the diatribes. I sat myself down and watched the film twice in one week. And I wrote a review that was ten pages long. Then, deciding that I wanted at least one person to read it, I did a severe edit.
On Movies & Media The CT Mailbag: Brokeback Mountain What's sad is how far short of grace and tact some of these messages fall... What's even sadder is how predictable it was that this would happen...
On Movies & Media Steven Greydanus Finds a Fundamental Flaw in "Brokeback Mountain" Many Christian filmgoers will condemn Brokeback Mountain because they will assume that it is evil due to its subject matter. That's the worst kind of reaction to it. It leads us to become reactionary and judgmental, and it prevents us from learning to be patient, to look closely,
On Movies & Media Brokeback Mountain - Reviewed by Christianity Today Christianity Today Movies has just published a review of Brokeback Mountain. And that's just what it is... A REVIEW. It's not a protest. It's not someone spewing bile about Hollywood's "homosexual agenda." It doesn't include any slurs like
