Artwork by MR DEKS NEW YORK TIMES: Like those young men in a hurry, Edward falls under the sway of two antithetical father figures, a silky apparatchik played by Rhys Ifans, and an unbuttoned renegade played by Nicolas Cage. Drawn to intelligence work out of a sincere desire to serve his country, Edward is not immune to other attractions of the job. He likes the intrigue, the money (especially after he becomes a private contractor) and the feeling of being part of a select group of insiders who know how things really work. But he is not a figure of […]

GIZMODO: What you’re about to watch is a compilation of footage that shows what director George Miller actually shot on the set of 2015’s masterpiece Mad Max: Fury Road. And you will be amazed at how much was actually done, practically, on set. You’ve heard stories about it but actually seeing it is simply incredible. MORE

  SULLY (2016, 98 minutes, directed by Clint Eastwood, 96 minutes) BY DAN BUSKIRK FILM CRITIC The lean, squinty, man-of-few-words Clint Eastwood has had an affinity for pilots going back to one of his earliest roles, dropping the bomb on top of the giant spider in the 50s sci-fi classic, Tarantula. Those stoic figures, who hold the lives of others in the palms of their hands, fits right into mold of many of the characters Eastwood himself has played: stoic, solitary men who we can count on in dangerous times to get the job done. With the true story of […]

EMPIRE ONLINE: The product of four years’ work and more than 20 interviews with the man himself, David Lynch: The Art Life is an origin story, therapy session and celebration of the formative years of David Lynch. It’s making its bow at the Venice Film Festival this weekend, in advance of a date at the BFI London Film Festival, and has an exclusive new clip to share with Empire readers. This candid footage charts a young Lynch’s traumatic move from the serenity of Boise, Idaho to Alexandria, Virginia. He relates his sense of dislocation, charting the same edgier, unsettled mood […]

  Your childhood dies a little more every day. VARIETY: Gene Wilder, who regularly stole the show in such comedic gems as “The Producers,” “Blazing Saddles,” “Young Frankenstein,” “Willie Wonka and the Chocolate Factory” and “Stir Crazy,” died Monday at his home in Stamford, Conn. His nephew Jordan Walker-Pearlman said he died of complications from Alzheimer’s disease. He was 83. The comic actor, who was twice Oscar nominated, for his role in “The Producers” and for co-penning “Young Frankenstein” with Mel Brooks, usually portrayed a neurotic who veered between total hysteria and dewy-eyed tenderness. “My quiet exterior used to be […]

  WIRED: One great irony of the German director’s newfound interest in technology is that, while Herzog may have mixed feelings about the Internet, the Internet has long had a special place in its heart for Herzog. William Pannapacker, an English professor at Hope College in Michigan, once spent a year watching Herzog’s entire oeuvre. “I started, almost beyond my control, doing imitations of things Herzog would say, in my daily life, in the voice, out loud,” he says. “I started thinking in Herzogian ways, and I felt like I needed an outlet for that.” Pannapacker set up a Twitter […]

  DAVID EDELSTEIN: The new “Star Trek” picture, “Star Trek Beyond,” is a wild ride. It’s fast and furious, which makes sense, since director Justin Lin made the last few “Fast And Furious” movies. And he thinks in terms of whoosh and jangle. He bombards you with angles. You have to concentrate or the action will streak right by. It’s like abstract expressionism. Now, if you’re a lover of the original series, you might think, I like “Star Trek” because it wasn’t fast and furious. It was philosophical. Well, I’ve got news. That “Star Trek” is gone. Since the series […]

  VULTURE: The genius of The Lobster, the English-language debut of Greek writer-director Yorgos Lanthimos — whose 2009 wonder Dogtooth was the first Greek movie since 1977 to be nominated for an Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film — is that it does not make the assumption that fuels every rom-com and love story known to man: that we can choose how we find love. In the world of The Lobster, all single people are sent to a hotel for 45 days in order to find a mate. If they fail, they are turned into an animal of their […]

THE GUARDIAN: In the first of two videos shot when director Nicolas Winding Refn (Drive, Bronson) was making The Neon Demon in Los Angeles last summer, Danny Leigh and the director motor round town, stop for a haircut and visit a parking lot where Refn recently saw a man die. They also discuss why a self-confessed ‘wholesome Danish socialist’ still prefers success-orientated LA to any other place, as well as the point at which Hollywood iconography became forever fixed. MORE

  SLADE IN FLAME (1975, directed by Richard Loncraine, 86 minutes U.K.) OIL CITY CONFIDENTIAL (2009, directed by Julien Temple, 106 minutes, U.K.) BY DAN BUSKIRK FILM CRITIC British rock gave us plenty of adorable mop tops and fey dandies but they also have a long tradition of rough and tumble r&b, rock and blues bands whose fan base ran strong beyond the sophisticated borders of London and into the wilds of the country’s midlands. This month’s double bill joins two rather different films about two different bands, navigating the wild waters of the 70s music industry. Slade in Flame […]

  BY JAMES M. DAVIS If you wanna play art rock and be the cool guitarist guy the first thing you need is a Fender Jaguar and a bunch of pedals.  The second thing you have to do is decide which Fender Jaguar/Jazzmaster art-rock icon it is that you want to imitate.  Most people go for J. Mascis or Thurston Moore.  Who are we kidding, you’ll probably wind up doing Thurston Moore. However, I would only ask you to take a moment, look around you, and listen for a single word, breathed under one’s breath: americana.  There is a confusing […]

  LOVE & FRIENDSHIP (2016, directed by Whit Stillman, 92 minutes, U.S.) BY DAN BUSKIRK FILM CRITIC Whit Stillman’s world of arch comic verbosity has always had the stiff air of ingrained upper crust manners, so the idea of Stillman doing a period Jane Austin adaptation seemed perhaps a bit too spot-on. Instead, it’s a match made in heaven. Far livelier then your typical velvety old British romance, Love and Friendship finds Stillman snapping into great mid-career form as he propels Kate Beckinsale gliding through stately manors and defying the patriarchy by steadily willing her own destiny. Set adrift since […]