Thursday, July 31, 2025
Tomorrow Never Knows: notes on The Last Anniversary, Black Doves and The White Lotus
Wednesday, July 30, 2025
Love to Take You Home: notes on Love You to Death, Nobody Wants This and Colin from Accounts
Tuesday, July 29, 2025
Truth and Consequences: notes on Shetland, Unforgotten and Black Snow
Thursday, November 28, 2024
Westerns of 1950
Friday, November 22, 2024
Errol Flynn Goes to War (part 2)
Monday, November 11, 2024
Dissecting William Dieterle
Is there another Classic Hollywood director whose reputation has been as tarnished by time as William Dieterle (1893-1972)? He helmed his first two Hollywood films in 1931 and, by year’s end, was already being praised as a prodigy. (The New York Times applauded his “artistry and fertile brain,” predicting he “could make a poor story interesting and a good story a masterpiece.” Variety forecast “a worthy spot in the megaphoning field.”) By the time 1932 drew to a close, he had another half-dozen titles in release, and the response from critics grew reverential. They eyed him as an original: a storyteller with a keen understanding of human nature; a jack-of-all-trades who excelled in every genre, from romantic comedy to costume drama; and an innovator whose camera roamed with impressive freedom, at a time when the technical constraints of the early sound era typically held movement to a minimum.