How Arnie ushered in the Age of Quips. (Part of my book project BEEF: SCHWARZENEGGER V STALLONE - pls subscribe if you have any interest in either man, the 80s, or longform feuding or writing.) bit.ly/4nDV16m

Couldn't help wondering what Tarantino might've done with CAUGHT STEALING. So monotonously paced that it evaporated most of the humour QT would have worked into the violence Aronofsky kept resorting to

Great to see this sensational film get a good critical shine-up

Celebrating publishing this by watching HEADS OF STATE, which apparently is quite a good streaming original

I watched more Netflix Originals than is strictly healthy to bring you this exposé www.theguardian.com/media/2025/a...

If Tarantino was working now, Reservoir Dogs would have been bought by a streamer at Sundance and put on Netflix or Disney+ with tiny fanfare then perhaps gone viral for a few weeks before disappearing into the archive with no physical release. Pulp Fiction would never have happened.

Why am I writing about Arnie and Sly? My latest post, in which a 49 y/o film writer begs his 14 y/o nerd self for an alibi. (Part of my book project BEEF: SCHWARZENEGGER V STALLONE - pls subscribe if you have any interest in either man, the 80s, or longform feuding or writing) bit.ly/4mCQGjo

Very satisfying interview in covering all nooks and crannies, eras and regimes, of Hollywood

My fourth five-star review - though it won't be news to anime fans bit.ly/4mEA2Qr

Why is there no decent biog of Stallone? My latest blogpost delving into a problem for the would-be Italian Stallion chronicler. (Part of my book project BEEF: SCHWARZENEGGER V STALLONE - pls subscribe if you have any interest in either man, the 80s, or longform feuding or writing) bit.ly/4mvW3Ri

I dug EDDINGTON. The big American canvas was a more fertile fit for Ari Aster's occultism than literal occultism, as in MIDSOMMAR. It was like a giant SOUTH PARK episode threatening to turn into SOUTHLAND TALES folly, with faint MOTHER!-type allegorical leanings

@outlawvern.bsky.social Hello, just hoping for a follow, so I can DM about something I'm working on ?

Interesting that the main (acting) players in Bollywood are a minority (Muslim), just as Jewish people originally drove Hollywood, and Igbos founded Nollywood bit.ly/4fnftWm

For this very special episode, Quentin Tarantino returns to the show to talk about his 10 favorite Michael Madsen performances (not from his own films)! A lovely tribute to a great actor! Listen: open.spotify.com/episode/5wPX...

ANDOR S2 didn't live up to S1 for me. A few magnificent moments, especially Forest Whitaker's Rhydo tirade and the Ghorman plaza massacre. But some actively poor episodes (the first three), it lacked the methodical focus on fascism's infrastucture, and Diego Luna was oddly decentered

I'm serialising my non-fiction book about a great Hollywood rivalry, BEEF: SCHWARZENEGGER v STALLONE, here: beef-schwarzenegger-v-stallone.ghost.io. A true story of biceps, bulging paychecks and insanely toxic masculinity. Please consider becoming a paid subscriber so I can get to finish it

I'm serialising my non-fiction book about a great Hollywood rivalry, BEEF: SCHWARZENEGGER v STALLONE, here: beef-schwarzenegger-v-stallone.ghost.io. A true story of biceps, bulging paychecks and insanely toxic masculinity. Please consider becoming a paid subscriber so I can get to finish it

This is great. I had no idea PHANTOM THREAD broke him. Fascinating how a lifetime's internalising finally left him marooned outside a character

I adored 28 YEARS LATER : how it turned zombie Brexit UK into a Spencer Tunick happening run amok, dotted with Piers Plowman hold-outs and eccentric nutters overinvesting in outsider art, and Danny Boyle slinging his iPhone around in sync. Probably the best, and easily the funniest, of the series

And strangely overlooked these days ...

Researching Michael Madsen I was surprised to find that SPECIES is actually a satire on LA arriviste gold-digging that only a paranoid 90s studio exec could've dreamed up

My obit of one of the last of the tough guys bit.ly/4lzgyfq

I wrote about France's unlikeliest and (in the 60s and 70s) coolest nightclub, la Churascaïa, in the deep Camargue delta www.theguardian.com/music/2025/j...

It’s getting to the point where films don’t need plots, just articles about potential ones

The trickiest review I've written in a while www.theguardian.com/film/2025/ju...

As much as I love the distro work Mubi do and have many friends that work there, their response to Sequoia's investment is embarrassing & harmful. they're far from the only 'indie' studio taking Israeli artwashing $$$ (check who funds A24!) they've always positioned themselves as politically engaged

It is Chantal Akerman's birthday.

Apparently when David Lynch signed a deal in the mid-90s with French industrialist Francis Bouygues to fund his films, Bouygues asked him if there were any buildings in Paris he wanted to see, like Arche de la Défense. Lynch asked to see the Paris morgue

It maybe gets a bit twee in the road-trip phase, but Takeshi Kitano's HANA-BI is still an extraordinarily beautiful referendum on life or death (made in the aftermath of his motorcycle accident/suicide attempt)

I've been chipping away for a while now on a Guardian Long Read about how Netflix and other streamers' algorithms and data are shaping cinema. I'm looking to chat to directors, producers and screenwriters about their experiences working with these companies - on or off the record. Anyone keen ?

I've been chipping away for a while now on a Guardian Long Read about how Netflix and other streamers' algorithms and data are shaping cinema. I'm looking to chat to directors, producers and screenwriters about their experiences working with these companies - on or off the record. Anyone keen ?

My obit of James Foley, the intense-eyed Hollywood journeyman who understood the hustling life and condensed it into GLENGARRY GLEN ROSS www.theguardian.com/film/2025/ma...

@gralefrit.bsky.social Hi Joel, just hoping you could follow me, so I can DM you regarding a Guardian article I'm working on ?

No clue about what the movie's like - but THE CHRONOLOGY OF WATER feels like a parody arthouse title

@gralefrit.bsky.social Hello Joel, any chance you could follow me so I can DM you about an article I'm working on ?

Why MISSION: IMPOSSIBLE not only thrills, but also recruits the audience into its 21st-century office comedy. My piece: bit.ly/3SA9xhU

My obit of VFX genius Bruce Logan, who blew up the Death Star in STAR WARS, aligned the planets in 2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY, and lensed cyberspace in TRON bit.ly/42XrY6s

It's a bit like saying you bought Playboy for the articles, but the leg-uncrossing interrogation scene in BASIC INSTINCT is really well directed

I've been trying to contact the mercurial producer and Lynch whisperer Pierre Edelman for a thing ... and here he is.

Make America Film Again ... like when the US movie industry rose to prominence by walling out international imports, which was never because the medium of film co-originated in multiple countries at once & was always an irreducibly global art form.

Insane that Trump is fingering other film industries for "propaganda and messaging" when Hollywood's entire history has been one of aggressive expansion into other countries. All things run their course

I tell no lie when I say I was long-shortlisted (ie just missed out) in the Distinguished Reporting category of the European Press Prize for my story on the last years of Alexander Grothendieck. If you're into maths, mental health or mysticism, check it out www.theguardian.com/science/arti...

Second go round on THE MATRIX RESURRECTIONS, and I do see some new neat stuff: the Analyst's spiel about the role of fictions in manipulating human beliefs make greater sense of why the franchise staged its ideas about capitalism/liberation within a simulated world in the first place

This is a really important point for journalists. I'm using machine transcription more and more - but increasingly wondering if I'm losing something in the process

Good piece about film-makers' insatiable itch to get closer to the "reality" of war bit.ly/42X57HO

Great to interview my Montpellier homeboy, graphic novelist Guy Delisle, about his new book on photography pioneer, murderer and winner of best beard 1875-78 Eadweard Muybridge bit.ly/42StQwZ

This observation of Jen Lynch's about her dad hit a chord

The scariest moment in cinema this year is Marianne Jean Baptiste's reaction to being given flowers in Mike Leigh's HARD TRUTHS