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Pickup on South Street: Extra! Pickpocket Foils Doom Plot!
By Lucy Sante
The Criterion Collection
By the time Sam Fuller directed his first film at the age of thirty-six, he’d already lived three lives: as a journalist, a novelist, and an infantryman. By spinning his newsroom and frontline experiences into his movies, Fuller developed a unique cinematic voice that was complex and sophisticated, at times brutish and raw, though always truthful and personal. Fuller himself was a character only he could script—a magnanimous storyteller who spoke with brutal clarity and urgency (usually with a cigar clenched tightly in his teeth), relating to those around him as if they were comrades in a foxhole fighting deadlines, Nazi Germany, or studios unwilling to cooperate with his vision. What he once said about the writer he most admired, Balzac, Fuller could have said about himself: “He lived his stories.”
Perhaps the most hard-to-categorize of the great Hollywood studios came into its own with a string of critically acclaimed films based on popular books and plays, including Born Yesterday, A Raisin in the Sun, and From Here to Eternity.
From After Hours to Mikey and Nicky to Collateral, movies centered on the twists and turns of a single night give filmmakers the chance to boldly experiment with cinematic time and space.
In this early-career gem from one of the most beloved Japanese animation directors of all time, an extravagant sci-fi narrative is anchored by the transcendent power of young love and poignant observations of modern life.
What makes a “bad” movie anyway? By surveying the bombs, disasters, and secret masterpieces (dis)honored at the Golden Raspberry Awards, we can learn much about American cinema’s prevailing standards of taste.