Mr. Sorkin Goes Back to Silicon Valley: Why The Social Reckoning Falls Short
It’s 2026. The AI arms race is fully underway, and all the major tech players are rolling out new and better generative products. You hear that Aaron Sorkin, the Academy-trophied Tiresias who wrote The Social Network, has penned (and directed) a sequel of sorts that continues the Facebook story.
Then you find out it’s about The Facebook Files, what turned out to be an explosive but less-than-apocalyptic episode in the company’s history, and something within you deflates.
No one reading this has to imagine that scenario, because it is, of course, what happened.The Social Reckoninghas just hit theaters—and it’s a colossal misfire.
Unraveling the Fascist Illusion in The Conformist
Bernardo Bertolucci’s Il Conformista tells the story of fascist spy named Marcello on an assassination mission, as memories from his past haunt him in the present. One of the film’s central ideas is Marcello’s faith in the image of fascist Rome. Bertolucci weakens this image through a distortion of time and space and powerful imagery
Richard Linklater’s Big Year: Nouvelle Vague and Blue Moon
This year, Linklater opened and closed the festival season with two films: Blue Moon, which hit stateside cinemas this past weekend, and Nouvelle Vague (to be released theatrically on Halloween and then streaming on Netflix, the film’s US distributor, by the middle of next month). Though radically different formally and thematically, both films freeze exquisite moments in time—evoking more than just texture and sound, but a feeling of living in a time and place divorced very much from our own.
Why Luca Guadagnino Got Snubbed at the 2025 Oscars
Luca Guadagnino is no stranger to critical acclaim - or Oscar snubs. In 2024, the Italian director delivered two strikingly different but equally lauded films: Challengers, a steamy, slow-burn tennis romance, and Queer, a moody adaptation of the William S. Burroughs novella. Both films were praised by critics, yet neither received a single Oscar nomination.
In The Shadow of The Brutalist
Yes, The Brutalist is long. It’s pretentious. It’s ambitious and unapologetically grand. But this is what makes it interesting. It’s a film that forces you to bear witness to an unchecked ego and sit with that discomfort. Far from being a stock tale of genius, the film is a complex (and flawed) meditation on the forces that can elevate and destroy a man.
A Face in the Crowd: Prescience at What Cost?
There is one film, though, that I believe deserves the modern parallels it often invokes: A Face in the Crowd. Released in 1957 to moderate acclaim, the film is the work of Hollywood envelope-pusher Elia Kazan and screenwriter and novelist Budd Schulberg, whose eponymous collection of short stories the film is based on. A Face in the Crowd focuses on the meteoric rise of a jailbird from Arkansas.
A Beginner's Guide to the French New Wave
The French New Wave was a radical departure from conventional filmmaking. Utilizing jump cuts and location shooting on a yet-unseen scale, the movement prioritized low-budget, singular films that allowed creatives to break out of the confines of the studio system. New Wave films were further proof for domestic and international audiences that film was more than mere entertainment.
The Sage is not Humane: Sam Peckinpah’s Five Best Films
Sam Peckinpah occupies a unique station in the canon of American film directors because he found success just before the creative floodgates of New Hollywood. He then went on to push the boundaries of what could and couldn’t be shown on film—crafting works more transgressive than many of his younger peers. This made him the target of studio meddling and censorship, but his legacy is nonetheless founded on grit, ingenuity, and daring.
House of the Dragon Season 1: A Worthy Successor to the Game of Thrones Legacy
Succeeding Game of Thrones (GoT), one of the most widely discussed and watched shows in television history, is no easy job. The shows will be compared, and previous baggage always remembered. House of the Dragon, a show about the rise and fall of a ruling house in the GoT universe, stares down that daunting prospect with aplomb and more.
