Side Shots Film Blog

Side Shots Film Blog is a movie review blog from Identity Theory managed by Matthew Sorrento. Subscribe: RSS | Email

25 Years After: Die Hard, A Degenerative Retrospective

By David C. Ryan | Published: December 23, 2013

John McTiernan’s Die Hard opened twenty-five years ago to a mixed reception, receiving both popular praise and critical loathing.

Posted in Side Shots Film Blog | Tagged Action Films, Christmas, Die Hard | Leave a comment

DVD Review: Jiro Dreams of Sushi

By Mike Wood | Published: January 9, 2013

Jiro Dreams of Sushi is a subtle meditation on art and the price it exacts from those who would seek its peaks, in the fascinating context of the sushi world.

Posted in Side Shots Film Blog | Tagged DVD Reviews, Food, Jiro Dreams of Sushi | 1 Response

Prometheus and the Complexities of Interpretivism

By David C. Ryan | Published: January 2, 2013

The critical reception for Prometheus has stimulated an interesting and extended discussions regarding the film’s synthesis of religion, science, and society.

Posted in Side Shots Film Blog | Tagged Prometheus, Ridley Scott | 2 Responses

Film Review: Sergei Loznitsa’s My Joy

By Mike Wood | Published: July 25, 2012

This Ukrainian film set in Russia and directed by documentary filmmaker Sergei Loznitsa offers no reason or explanation for why the boring, the tragic, the senseless and the funny happen in our daily lives.

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Film Review: Square Grouper

By Mike Wood | Published: July 5, 2012

Square Grouper is pretty even-handed in its telling of the exploits of a Florida religious group who funded their faith by moving piles and piles of its main sacrament.

Posted in Side Shots Film Blog | Tagged Marijuana, religion, Square Grouper | Leave a comment

Film Book Review: Every Night the Trees Disappear: Werner Herzog and the Making of “Heart of Glass” by Alan Greenberg

By Mike Wood | Published: June 27, 2012

Every Night the Trees Disappear: Werner Herzog and the Making of “Heart of Glass” gives a portrait of an artist even more enigmatic and frantically creative than his films make him seem.

Posted in Side Shots Film Blog | Tagged Alan Greenberg, Werner Herzog | 1 Response

The Dude Abides: The Gospel According to the Coen Brothers

By Mike Wood | Published: May 22, 2012

The Dude Abides: The Gospel According to the Coen Brothers makes a mostly successful case for the brothers’ classic films as a treasure trove of teachable moments about the human condition.

Posted in Side Shots Film Blog | Tagged Barton Fink, Blood Simple, Burn After Reading, Coen Brothers, Dude Abides, No Country For Old Men, religion, The Big Lebowski | 1 Response

Fassbinder “Wired” into Speculative Fiction

By Matthew Sorrento | Published: May 20, 2012

Beneath all science fiction lies a dilemma, one solved by the best storytellers: whether the speculative devices are more interesting than the characters created to experience them.

Posted in Side Shots Film Blog | Tagged Rainer Werner Fassbinder, Simulacron-3, Speculative Fiction, World on a Wire | Leave a comment

Book Review: Plague Town: An Ashley Parker Novel

By Mike Wood | Published: April 19, 2012

Dana Fredsti, novelist and former swordswoman in charge of training on Sam Raimi’s Army of Darkness, manages to squeeze some fresh juice out of an idea that Buffy did better on the small screen.

Posted in Side Shots Film Blog | Tagged Ashley Parker, Dana Fredsti, horror, Novels, Plague Town | 1 Response

The Freestyle Art of Suzuki – Branded to Kill (1967) and Toyko Drifter (1966)

By Matthew Sorrento | Published: April 5, 2012

Suzuki’s approach adheres to Godard’s dictum that all one needs for a movie is a girl and a gun.

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Listening to The Conversation

By David C. Ryan | Published: March 10, 2012

Critics have missed some thematic points that are worth exploring to further illustrate the worthiness of Coppola’s still-undervalued character study.

Posted in Side Shots Film Blog | Tagged Francis Ford Coppola, The Conversation | Leave a comment

Further Thoughts on Howard Hawks’ Scarface (and In Praise of Robin Wood)

By Matthew Sorrento | Published: February 3, 2012

As Wood noted frequently, genre is largely based on ideology; it’s fostered through popular entertainment and in the film, directly stated by the chief.

Posted in Side Shots Film Blog | Tagged Scarface | Leave a comment

Black Death, Lost in its Own Darkness

By Matthew Sorrento | Published: December 19, 2011

As in life, some promises are hard to keep onscreen. This is true in the case of Walter Hill’s cult pic The Warriors.

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Fat, Sick and Nearly Dead…Until a Second Act Prize

By Matthew Sorrento | Published: December 4, 2011

The food science/health documentary Fat, Sick and Nearly Dead makes the filmmaker-subject motif – in which the man behind the camera spends as much time in front of it – appear to be the norm.

Posted in Side Shots Film Blog | Tagged Documentaries, Food | Leave a comment