Reading Time: 6 minutes Mujer Lobo (She Wolf, 2013) A shape-shifting killer prowls the Buenos Aires subways in Tamae Garateguy’s inventive, trippy Mujer Lobo. Played by three actresses (Mónica Lairana, Luján Ariza, Guadalupe Docampo), the killer’s identity fluctuates as she navigates the constellation of dangers posed by the men in her orbit. Valeria Villegas Lindvall’s essay points out the […]
Film/TV
Exploring the world of film and television from a secular perspective.
‘Pig’ is a much needed post-Oscars palate cleanser
Reading Time: 2 minutes It’s depressingly apt that Michael Sarnoski’s feature debut Pig went overlooked at this year’s Academy Awards (and perhaps just as well—any hypothetical recognition would have been overshadowed by Will Smith physically assaulting a comedian). Pig is about the overlooked, the unnoticed, the forgotten. A doomed journey through the underbelly of a glittering, rotten industry, Portland’s […]
‘The Case for Heaven’ is the stuff of dreams for believers in near-death experiences
Reading Time: 5 minutes The moment I began reading that Lee Strobel, an atheist-turned-evangelist, has released a documentary called A Case for Heaven about his own near-death experience, as well as the NDEs of others, my mind went back to the Malarkey saga dating back 18 years. Alex Malarkey, then six, was badly injured in a car crash that […]
BREAKING: Will Smith resigned from all royal titles
Reading Time: 2 minutes Actor Will Smith resigned from all royal titles earlier today. No longer will the man who starred in such epic movies as King Richard, Independence Day, and Bad Boys be official Hollywood royalty. William Carroll Smith was born to commoners on September 25, 1968, in Philadelphia. His mother was a school administrator. His father was […]
It’s a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad God
Reading Time: 4 minutes Warning: this film is quite violent and disturbing. Vaya con Dios. Well, I hope y’all like unrelenting visions of suffering suspended within visceral and bleak hellscapes beyond your wildest nightmares. I knew you would. You little sicky. Much hay has been made about Phil Tippett’s 30-years-in-the-making, excessively alienating passion project, Mad God (2021). Tippett is […]
Slapschtick: God Squad members pile in over Will Smith’s loss of control at Oscars
Reading Time: 3 minutes The wacky White-Cain reacted to the slap that reverberated across the world with these words on Twitter: “I declare tonight by faith, God is restoring everything the enemy stole from you seven fold! In the name of Jesus!!” And Greg Laurie, Harvest Church leader and evangelist, quoted Hollywood star Denzel Washington: “At your highest moment, […]
Florida passes ‘Don’t Say Power of the Dog’ law
Reading Time: 2 minutes Tallahassee, Florida – Governor Ron DeSantis signed the Don’t Say Power of the Dog bill into law today. The statute places restrictions on teachers, bus drivers, and other public servants from discussing the award-winning movie due to its gay themes. “If you’re on the public payroll and at work, then you should be talking about […]
‘Everything Everywhere All At Once’: Kung-Fu, raccoons, and the immigrant experience
Reading Time: 3 minutes In Everything Everywhere All At Once, Michelle Yeoh’s character Evelyn is repeatedly called stubborn. She hurriedly rushes from one task to another, trying to keep her family’s laundromat open even with a looming tax audit, not listening to those around her. She doesn’t connect with her daughter and does not understand the America she now […]
The Oscars slap, or life in a fishbowl
Reading Time: 4 minutes By now you’ve heard about Will Smith slapping Chris Rock in the face after Rock made a joke about Smith’s wife’s hair loss during the Oscars. There is a social media uproar over what was going to be a fairly bland Oscars ceremony. After two years, a coronavirus-fatigued industry has not had its best year […]
Will Smith’s ‘apology’ at the Oscars was a faith-based defense of bad behavior
Reading Time: 4 minutes The most talked-about moment at last night’s Academy Awards involved an act of violence and a defense of that act that invoked God’s name… two things that seem to go together all too often. I made the mistake of putting my kids to bed—and stepping away from the Oscars broadcast—just as all hell broke loose […]