Ziad Shihab

Showing all posts tagged "1973"

Hit Man - All the Famous Killer Easter Eggs

This article contains spoilers for Hit Man."People are disappointed when they learn that hit men don’t really exist," explains Gary Johnson. That might be a surprising statement given that it occurs early on in a movie called Hit Man. Throughout the film, Gary (Glen Powell) dons different disguises to meet with people who want to pay him money (or video games or boats) to kill people. But then again, it’s all a ruse, a police sting operation that mild-mannered teacher Gary does as a side gig....

On an Island

This article appeared in the March 30, 2023 edition of The Film Comment Letter, our free weekly newsletter featuring original film criticism and writing. Sign up for the Letter here. Enys Men (Mark Jenkin, 2022)A solitary island off the coast of Cornwall proves the perfect place for a mind to unravel in Enys Men, Mark Jenkin’s ambitious, slippery follow-up to his 2019 breakthrough, Bait. While both films probe the historical and cultural specificities of this unique region of the U.K., this n...

The creepy Pennywise reference in Stephen King’s ‘The Dark Tower’

Since the 1970s, Hollywood has looked to Stephen King’s work as a go-to source of adaptation material. As a writer of horrors, thrillers, supernatural fiction, crime and sci-fi, King’s work has proved to be the perfect fit for the big screen, with over 50 of his stories receiving cinematic treatment. Some of the most successful adaptations of King’s work include Carrie, The Shining, The Shawshank Redemption, Stand By Me, and The Green Mile. However, none are as belove...

Winchester ’73

Take Seven: Object Lessons The Myth Maker Justin Stewart on Winchester ’73 Firearms—and the violence they both enable and wreak—are as fundamental to American cinema as they are to the history of a land stolen and colonized at gunpoint and a nation whose independence (and later, union) was purchased with oceans of shed blood. When moral superintendents throughout American film history have seen fit to protect delicate sensitivities through censorship, government review, and ratings b...

Beelzebub’s Blockbuster: Why ‘The Exorcist’ Terrified Audiences in 1973 - Film School Rejects

Warner Bros. By  Meg Shields  · Published on November 17th, 2021 Welcome to The Queue — your daily distraction of curated video content sourced from across the web. Today, we’re watching a video essay about why William Friedkin’s 1973 horror film The Exorcist was so scary to audiences in 1973. There are certain films with a reputation that proceeds them; infamous offerings of pop culture of history that radiate a certain ominous energy...

Deconstructing Woody - Self-reflexivity in the Films of Woody Allen

Deconstructing Woody: Self-reflexivity in the Films of Woody Allen Home Deconstructing Woody: Self-reflexivity in the Films of Woody Allen Ronan Doyle (N.U.I. Galway) Woody Allen Among the most prolific directors in American cinema since his debut with What’s Up, Tiger Lily? (1966), Woody Allen’s work has spanned the eras, his style evolving from the broad comic leanings of films such as Bananas (1971) and Sleeper (1973) to elegiac rom-coms the like of Annie Hall (1977...