finding @brightwalldarkroom.com years ago changed my life! as a reader, I found the kind of film writing I'd always been looking for. as a viewer, I've had countless opportunities to see the movies I love in a new way. and as a writer, I found my voice—something that matters more now than ever.

“I’ve often said this and I don’t think I’m exaggerating too much: America may be the only country that hates art. Money is the only thing that’s considered a healthy habit. Art is considered neurotic, or it just shows that you have problems, whereas having money is somehow seen as totally healthy.”

De Palma Does Hollywood: Fleshing Out the Split-Screened Study of Voyeurism & Illusion in BODY DOUBLE - @aheartofgould.bsky.social

the four words every girl wants to hear

“The world without fascism that Miyazaki’s POROC ROSSO envisions is both plausible and attainable; it simply has to start small, and start somewhere, like any worthwhile idea.” www.brightwalldarkroom.com/2025/12/12/p...

"The Thin Man created a truly equal romantic partnership that was neither stumbling toward matrimony nor frustrated by its restraints, a portrait of a thoroughly modern marriage so ahead of its time you can hardly believe it's nearing its centennial anniversary."

All I want is to be in a throuple with Nick and Nora Charles.

143 issue themes is…a lot! We’ve got a few more up our sleeve, but we’d love to hear some ideas from our followers—anything you’d like to see in 2026?

“OPENING NIGHT was John Cassavetes and Gena Rowlands' sixth collaboration. Two disruptors tearing down the walls of an establishment to forge a different kind of accepted entertainment, free from the bars of script, transmutable to those changed by it.”

had a blast exploring Nolan's INSOMNIA by taking a closer look at the women who shape its story for @brightwalldarkroom.com! www.brightwalldarkroom.com/2025/12/26/i...

New today on the site! Did She Have Dreams?: Christopher Nolan’s INSOMNIA in Five Women - @abigailoswald.bsky.social (🎨 by @marcaspinall.bsky.social)

“Gillian Armstrong's LITTLE WOMEN (1994) recognizes that a truly strong home stays with us even as we leave it, that the changes in life’s seasons cannot diminish the inheritance we carry with us." - Asher Gelzer-Govatos

So many Potters are George Baileys in their own mind, that’s part of the problem

Are you watching It’s A Wonderful Life right now yes or no? (And also if it’s the colorized version the answer is no)

still think this essay I wrote for @brightwalldarkroom.com a few years ago slaps

❤️💚❤️💚

“Gillian Armstrong's LITTLE WOMEN (1994) recognizes that a truly strong home stays with us even as we leave it, that the changes in life’s seasons cannot diminish the inheritance we carry with us." - Asher Gelzer-Govatos

If you still haven't gotten a gift for the movie-loving friend or family member in your life, we're here to help! You can gift them a subscription to a full year of BWDR for less than $20!

"IT'S A WONDERFUL LIFE is rich in the purest sense of the word because it is so many things: a romantic drama, a capitalist critique, an existential crisis, a chronicle of 20th century American history. But more than anything else, it’s one of the all-time great Dad movies." - Bryan Miller

Hallmark has done every plot, so it is time for the apotheosis of Christmas movies: a big city lawyer returns to her small hometown and falls in love with an actual Christmas tree. After a series of missteps, they get married and have tree/human babies. Their hybrid spawn scream in endless torment 🎄

Interesting trivia: you can legally strike anyone who disparages this movie in your presence three (3) times in their face or one (1) time in their abdomen

Not just a red flag but a deep, terrifying crimson.

If somebody tells you IT’S A WONDERFUL LIFE sucks, that’s a red flag, full stop. I hold very few truths closer.

I find it moving that David Lynch loved IT'S A WONDERFUL LIFE so much he couldn't talk about it without crying. His sincere belief in the redemptive possibilities contained in that film and what it said about people seems to me like a key element of understanding his own work.

This is why I subscribe to this outlet. For opinions that are 100% CORRECT

“it’s a wonderful life” (1946) remains the best christmas film about the importance of mutual aid during the decline of capitalism.

"I hope the skeptics have been satisfied by my 'puppets are uncanny' argument, because now I have to mount my third point and achieve the hat trick that will seal my grand yuletide theory: Kermit the Frog is the only performer to ever truly embody Bob Cratchit."

If you still haven't gotten a gift for the movie-loving friend or family member in your life, we're here to help! You can gift them a subscription to a full year of BWDR for less than $20!

WE DEMAND DRAMEDIES

This is a terrific movie. Highly recommend! It's available to stream free on Tubi. The Criterion Edition DVD/Blu-ray is the best way to see it.

“The driving force of John Sayles' LONE STAR isn’t the suspense of discovery, but the moral weight of what’s already known—and what people choose to do with it.”

And I'll take a resurgence in physical media, too, if that isn't a tall order.

theatrical release for mid-budget movies in 2026!

One of my favorite movies.

I find research just as gratifying as the writing itself - whether it's for fiction or essays. I like seeking & learning, I like it when one piece of art illuminates another. I love when the process makes me feel like a detective cracking the case. denying yourself this pleasure makes no sense to me

“Regardless, and make no mistake about it, IT’S A WONDERFUL LIFE is a tremendously dark film. It traffics in the language of tragedy, noir, even outright horror at times.”

“There’s a lot of earnest love buried underneath every moment of JACKASS, beneath the onslaught of dicks and shit that most immediately take up the frame.”

“Believing we hold all of life’s answers heralds the death of curiosity, which feels to me like the antithesis of joy. Better, then, to keep searching. Stand on the desk and say what you can see.”

None of Us Will See Heaven: On the Weight of Family & the Sacrifice for a Better Life in ROAD TO PERDITION

On STRANGE DAYS and ONE BATTLE AFTER ANOTHER

“Women aren’t the stories you think their bodies tell you.” - @kelsfjord.bsky.social on female masks in The Skin I Live In, Eyes Without a Face, and Under the Skin

You won't shoot your eye out, but you will fill your eyeballs with exceptional writing and art! $19 is a steal! Get it today!

“Like I learned early on, you don’t mess with a Midwestern winter.”

"THE SPOOK WHO SAT BY THE DOOR is a pipe bomb on the video store shelf, a gasoline-filled wine bottle in your DVD cabinet, a vicious bit of malware streamed through hijacked plutocrat satellites."

“The players in EEPHUS seek out the novel in the familiar, clinging to the sport they know and love as if it’s going to save them. The only throughline is the game itself, driven by the players’ need to keep going until it’s done, in spite of their fatigue and the failing light.”

Always Trying to Get Beyond the Veil: An Interview with Abel Ferrara

Holiday sale! $19 for an entire year of Bright Wall/Dark Room, including full access to the 1500+ essays we’ve published since 2013. Each subscription *directly* helps support independent media & the writers, editors, and artists who make each new issue possible. Coupon code: HOLIDAY2025

“Kelly Reichardt’s ninth film, THE MASTERMIND, is her most ambitious yet, exploring many of the ideas Reichardt’s been interested in since the beginning of her career: failed subterfuge, male desperation, escape.”

Ik zeg het nog maar eens. Deze website staat zo vol met prachtige essays over film en tv (inclusief schitterend origineel artwork), dat ze eigenlijk een crimineel lage prijs vragen voor een abonnement. Doe er je voordeel mee! 👇🏼