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Backrooms and Obsession Are Glimpses of a Better Hollywood

Eileen Jones Jacobin
Two indie horror movies with YouTube origins, Obsession and Backrooms, crushed big-budget Star Wars and He-Man movies at the box office. But claims that these films represent a revival of cinematic creativity à la the New Hollywood era are overblown.

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The Corporate Thriller Lied to Us

Eileen Jones Jacobin
Criterion Channel is hosting a retrospective on Hollywood’s “corporate thrillers” from the 1980s through the early 2000s. If anything, their message about the capitalist rot in America’s institutions looks far too tame for how the last couple of deca

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Outcome Is Jonah Hill’s Inept Hollywood Satire

Eileen Jones Jacobin
Jonah Hill’s new Apple TV Hollywood satire, Outcome, wants to skewer celebrity culture. But even with the likable Keanu Reeves, its muddled script and self‑pitying subtext reveal more about the industry’s narcissism than the film ever intended.

Tidbits-Mar 19-Reader Comments: Iran War Quagmire; Make No Kings 3 Largest Antiwar Protest in US History; Sexual Violence Allegations by Cesar Chavez; One Battle After Another: Different Perspectives; Putin Repression of Left Opponents of Ukraine War

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Reader Comments: Iran War Quagmire; Let’s Make No Kings 3 Largest Antiwar Protest in U.S. History; Allegations of Sexual Violence by Cesar Chavez; One Battle After Another - Differing Perspectives; Putin’s repression of left opponents of Ukraine war

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Netflix’s Jay Kelly Eulogizes an Industry It’s Killing Off

Eileen Jones Jacobin
Noah Baumbach and George Clooney’s Jay Kelly is a Netflix dramedy about the death of Hollywood stardom and the theatrical experience. Ironically, with Netflix’s acquisition of Warner Bros., the call is definitely coming from inside the house.

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1960: The Year the Modern Horror Film Was Born

Eileen Jones Jacobin
A combination of the breakdown of the Hollywood studio system, the decline of censorship, and the rise of wildly — and luridly — creative filmmakers across the world looking to cash in on sex and violence made 1960 the year of the modern horror film.
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