Hearing a Charlie Chaplin character crack a quick quip to cap off a conversation can take some getting used to.
→Tags: Charlie Chaplin, Satire, Comedy, Edward Copeland on Film
ReviewBecause Annie Hall and Manhattan, the two highly revered comedies that preceded 1980’s Stardust Memories, concerned themselves with characters whose insecurities led to the demise of their relationships, Woody Allen’s somewhat polarizing 30-year-old homage to 8 1/2 surprised me in its reversal of the old break-up stand-by, “it’s not you, it’s me.”
→Tags: Woody Allen, Comedy, Depression, Edward Copeland on Film
ReviewI’ve grown somewhat suspicious of Jean-Pierre Jeunet, wondering if my immediate excitement for his films exists because he does quality work or rather because the French filmmaker knows how to push my cinematic buttons.
→Tags: Jean-Pierre Jeunet, French, Comedy, Edward Copeland on Film
Essay“The greatest show ever” or “overrated”? “Cynical” or “postmodern”?
→Tags: Seinfeld, Curb Your Enthusiasm, Comedy, TV, Personal, Edward Copeland on Film
EssayThe less-than-stellar Elektra Luxx fails to eliminate the bad taste left from the Election Day documentary 11/4/08:
→The director of 11/4/08 states that he enlisted the help of friends around the world to film their experiences on Election Day in order to “see what history looks like,” but you know how the saying goes: History is written by the winners.
Tags: SXSW, Documentary, Comedy, Political, The House Next Door
EssayIn my first report from this year’s SXSW, I look at Michel Gondry’s family documentary The Thorn in the Heart, Ivan Reitman’s early and terrible Cannibal Girls, and Crying with Laughter:
→Joey Frisk (a very capable Stephen McCole) is a fireball on the verge of flaming out.
Tags: SXSW, Comedy, Camp, Documentary, Michel Gondry, Ivan Reitman, The House Next Door
ReviewIt’s no tall order to write a tragedy set during the Great Depression, but I imagine it takes some restraint to write one where the era’s circumstances aren’t the immediate sources of distress.
→Tags: Woody Allen, Jeff Daniels, Comedy, Edward Copeland on Film
ReviewProbably the most famous thing about Woody Allen’s 1980 film Stardust Memories is the self-referential recurring joke of fans telling a filmmaker that they prefer his “earlier, funnier movies” to his more artistic efforts.
→Tags: Woody Allen, Comedy, Slapstick, Edward Copeland on Film
ReviewIt’s tempting to believe that nostalgia fuels most of the lasting appeal of The Muppet Movie as so many people literally grew up with these characters. I, however, watched the movie for the first time a few years ago as a nearly blank slate, enabling me to objectively see that, after 30 years, the film still captivates.
→Tags: Jim Henson, Comedy, Musical, Edward Copeland on Film
Essay→Each summer, a comedy or two come along hoping to carve for themselves a place among the upper echelon of modern comedies, the ones that last, that get quoted, that become a part of popular culture. Anchorman, Zoolander, Napoleon Dynamite, Superbad—these films forcefully grabbed us by the arm, stick a needle in, and injected themselves into our bloodstream.
Tags: Comedy, The Hangover, Forces of Geek
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