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Fair Game (2010)
Wife. Mother. Spy.
Filmmaker(s): Doug Liman

A devoted wife and mother leads a secret life as a CIA agent until her husband’s article exposes a scandal, putting her identity and loved ones at risk. As her world crumbles, she must navigate the fallout of her double life.

Choices big parts of life are about choosing. That is why, I believe, that we are so drawn to fiction. When we enter a work of fiction, we are entering an entire world where every single element is chosen. Characters may seem to grab control but...


Published March 22, 2025
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Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone (2001)
Let the magic begin.
Filmmaker(s): Chris Columbus

Harry Potter has lived under the stairs at his aunt and uncle's house his whole life. But on his 11th birthday, he learns he's a powerful wizard—with a place waiting for him at the Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. As he learns to harness his newfound powers with the help of the school's kindly headmaster, Harry uncovers the truth about his parents' deaths—and about the villain who's to blame.

Hermione's Mouth a long time, we have been warned about what will happen when a couple large companies own all the news, publicity, publishing and film channels. Now, we have the results, a film product that is as moribund as Microsoft software. In both the...


Published March 12, 2025
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Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix (2007)
The rebellion begins.
Filmmaker(s): David Yates

Returning for his fifth year of study at Hogwarts, Harry is stunned to find that his warnings about the return of Lord Voldemort have been ignored. Left with no choice, Harry takes matters into his own hands, training a small group of students to defend themselves against the dark arts.

Nothing Up My Sleeve were previous editions of the franchise that I liked. One had a real rhythm; another leveraged architecture in a truly competent way. I suppose if you are invested in the books, this one advances the story a bit: some few revelations; another...


Published March 11, 2025
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Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire (2005)
Dark and difficult times lie ahead.
Filmmaker(s): Mike Newell

When Harry Potter's name emerges from the Goblet of Fire, he becomes a competitor in a grueling battle for glory among three wizarding schools—the Triwizard Tournament. But since Harry never submitted his name for the Tournament, who did? Now Harry must confront a deadly dragon, fierce water demons and an enchanted maze only to find himself in the cruel grasp of He Who Must Not Be Named.

Unmagical bottom line is that the first two films engaged us on the sheer visual invention of the magical world. The third film was a good film as a film, architectural, Sculpted rhythm that matched the physical spaces shown. This one fails on both accounts. Oh,...


Published March 11, 2025
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In the Realm of the Senses (1976)
Never before had a man and a woman loved each other so intensely.
Filmmaker(s): Nagisa Ōshima

A passionate telling of the story of Sada Abe, a woman whose affair with her master led to an obsessive and ultimately destructive sexual relationship.

Pudendal Space Japanese notion of space is highly developed: abstract but visceral, refined but applicable to a daily, graceful life. That notion, and the philosophy of beauty through balance ('katachi') is what makes the Japanese sense of architecture worth incorporating into one's life. Many good...


Published March 8, 2025
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Taboo (1999)
How am I insane?
Filmmaker(s): Nagisa Ōshima

Set during Japan's Shogun era, this film looks at life in a samurai compound where young warriors are trained in swordfighting. A number of interpersonal conflicts are brewing in the training room, all centering around a handsome young samurai named Sozaburo Kano. The school's stern master can choose to intervene, or to let Kano decide his own path.

Beautiful Face of the Senses" was an insidiously effective film: it tricked us into an obsession over sex with its frank and open explicitness. Thus, we became part of the story about sexual obsession. This does something similar, in a masterpiece of sorts in audience manipulation....


Published March 8, 2025
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Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets (2002)
Something evil has returned to Hogwarts!
Filmmaker(s): Chris Columbus

Cars fly, trees fight back, and a mysterious house-elf comes to warn Harry Potter at the start of his second year at Hogwarts. Adventure and danger await when bloody writing on a wall announces: The Chamber Of Secrets Has Been Opened. To save Hogwarts will require all of Harry, Ron and Hermione’s magical abilities and courage.

Shakespearian Architecture did not like the first Potter film. Indeed, I've been generally unimpressed by all the manufactured Hollywood spectacles that have been moving through the promotional pipeline. So this one caught me unawares. One element of its craft was done so very well, that...


Published March 7, 2025
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Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban (2004)
Something wicked this way comes.
Filmmaker(s): Alfonso Cuarón

Year three at Hogwarts means new fun and challenges as Harry learns the delicate art of approaching a Hippogriff, transforming shape-shifting Boggarts into hilarity and even turning back time. But the term also brings danger: soul-sucking Dementors hover over the school, an ally of the accursed He-Who-Cannot-Be-Named lurks within the castle walls, and fearsome wizard Sirius Black escapes Azkaban. And Harry will confront them all.

Spaniard in the Works franchise is being managed extremely well, better than any other. The `Lord of the Rings' films were all of a single whole, while these Harry Potter movies are each cognisant of what went before, changing and maturing just as would an...


Published March 7, 2025
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Miss Julie (1999)
Worlds apart... bound by desire.
Filmmaker(s): Mike Figgis

A footman seduces a count's daughter. Adaptation of August Strindberg's famous play.

A Man and his Mistress what love does, when yearning crosses boundaries and makes someone see another as better than they really are. Here, it ends in suicide. I'm talking about Mike Figgis' view of girlfriend Saffron. A reliably trenchant play: a competent footman; a very...


Published February 26, 2025
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Tampopo (1985)
The first Japanese Noodle Western.
Filmmaker(s): Jūzō Itami

In this humorous paean to the joys of food, a pair of truck drivers happen onto a decrepit roadside shop selling ramen noodles. The widowed owner, Tampopo, begs them to help her turn her establishment into a paragon of the "art of noodle-soup making". Interspersed are satirical vignettes about the importance of food to different aspects of human life.

New New Wave about other movies both fascinate and challenge me. The French "new wave" consisted of three types of ideas. They had notions about explicitly acknowledging the camera. That's such an ordinary notion these days that it is impossible to appreciate. And in any...


Published February 20, 2025
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