Casablanca is my first foray into the world of classic Hollywood cinema. As the black and white title card flickered onscreen, I felt extraodinarily self-righteous - is this how film buffs feel all the time? At first, I felt as if I didn't have a whole lot to say about this 1942 romantic drama; ' It was good,' I thought, 'not mindblowing, just good.' Yet, as I began to write this review, I realised this wasn't exactly the case. The story is set in the Vichy-controlled ci

Now this one was a doozy. I feel like I have truly entered the territory of the film buff with Stanley Kubrick's 1968 sci-fi thriller, and it is a territory in which I am not at home. As I was pummeled with lengthy exposition from the right, celestial time travel from the left, and philosophical perplexities from practically everywhere, I found myself befuddled and thrilled, but mostly befuddled. First off, I feel mildly embarrassed. The opening sequence of 2001 has been re

This film is one of the main reasons I started this blog, as I have lied about seeing it SEVERAL times. It took a surprising amount of courage to finally sit down and watch it: I had a vague sense that Saving Private Ryan was going to emotionally wreck me, and it did. Just not in the way I expected. Set on the war-torn frontlines of 1944 France, the film follows the perilous journey of a small American platoon ordered to locate and retrieve Private James Ryan, the last survi