My Courses

Think of a perfect punk song: Crashing drums, sonorous vocals, jaw-dropping guitar solos that leave the listener in awe, a bassline that makes the very cells of the body vibrate. The song takes neither too much nor too little time to make its point. Like Goldilocks’ chosen bed, everything about it is just right. The…

For a few gossamer years in the 2010s, movie fans ate well—perhaps a little too well. That was, of course, courtesy of a little red debit card called MoviePass, the product of an ambitious startup that promised nirvana for any red-blooded cinephile with too much time on their hands: Pay a monthly fee, then use…

Do you remember the viral ice bucket challenge in the summer of 2014? The challenge videos of people getting ice water dumped on their heads were viewed 10 billion times and raised over $100 million.   Here’s a harder question: Do you remember what the money was for? Most people do not. But, like this movie, the…

Set on the western U.S. frontier during the 1860s, “The Dead Don’t Hurt” follows the relationship that develops between independent French-Canadian woman Vivienne Le Coudy (Vicky Krieps) and Danish immigrant Holgen Olsen (Viggo Mortensen). The two meet in San Francisco, fall in love, and decide to make a new life for themselves in a small…

I’m back after 15 days in Cannes–still jetlagged, my mind still spinning from the dozens and dozens of films I screened. The sense of familiarity of wandering the streets between my apartment and the Palais, running into the shopkeepers, restauranteurs, colleagues, and others, makes the entire experience feel so much like home that returning to…