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Virginia Van Upp: The Successfully Unsung Woman Producer of Hollywood

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  Virginia Van Upp does not always get the respect that she deserves. It is sad to see because many cinephiles do not know her despite her being so successful in the Golden Age. She was able to break boundaries by producing so many great movies by paving the way for women producers. In addition, she worked with many legends in the industry only to enhance their careers in the process. While not as famous as other producers like David O' Selznick along with Stanley Kramer, Van Upp still remains iconic. She has developed a cult following among serious cinephiles who appreciate her setting boundaries for women. Van Upp was born in Chicago, Illinois on Jan 13, 1902, to her parents Harry and Helen Van Upp. Her mother was actually writing and editing for Thomas H. Ince. Ince was a director, screenwriter and producer in the silent era known for working with DW Griffith along with creating the Western genre. Van Upp began her film career as a silent film actress when she was a child and wo...
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Revisiting Martin Scorsese's Well-Meaning but Short-Sighted Views on Marvel and Blockbusters

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  This whole false idea of blockbusters not being cinema has always been supported by the more elitist, overtly artsy cinephiles. They absolutely believe that arthouse films are all there is to cinema. Do not get it twisted, I love and adore Martin Scorsese as a director. However, his views that Marvel movies and blockbusters are not exactly cinema still feel out of touch to this day in the grand scheme of things. We need to understand that there is no one size fits all mentality to anything in life. Variety is the spice of life due to the fact that life itself has plenty of layers. We have to embrace variety for the sake of growing in any area of our lives in the process. Martin Scorsese's views about blockbusters and Marvel movies should always be critiqued in a healthy way without any knee-jerk reactions. In other words, we should critique his views while still understanding where he is coming from at the same time.  For as long as I can remember, Martin Scorsese has always...
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The Beautifully Superlative Importance of Empathy in Cinema

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  As cinephiles, we should always be able to understand that empathy is one of the most important things in our pallets in that it instigates us to express different types of emotions in ways that allow us to be emotionally connected with cinema. No matter what the emotion is, we should constantly express it whenever we watch movies among other forms of storytelling only to really interact to any storytelling form due to empathy. Empathy means to connect to others in a relatable way by putting yourself in other people's shoes as a way to go through what someone else is going through in the process. Empathy is something that should never be taken for granted in cinema and storytelling in general considering that it makes us embrace our humanity without coming across as submissive along with overtly feel-goody whatsoever. Being a cinephile along with having empathy go hand in hand and us as cinephiles should never take it for granted at all. By the time that I began to start developi...
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Diabolique Review 5/5

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  Coming off of films like The Murderer Lives at Number 21 (1942) (his Directorial Debut), Le Corbeau (1943), Quai des Orfevres (1947), Manon (1949) along with the Wages of Fear (1953) (one of my favorite films ever), Henri-Georges Clouzot was growing in reputation only to gain critical and commercial acclaim in the process. He was considered to be one of France's greatest directors at the time due to those string of successes in France. Clouzot originally started off as a screenwriter in the 1930s and by the time he transitioned to be a director in the 1940s, he still continued to write screenplays for his films. He directed and made his first short film called La Terreur des Batignolles from a screenplay from Jacques de Baroncelli, who started off directing silent films in France from the 1910s to the 1930s and transitioned to directing films in America and Italy in the 1940s. The short film was considered by some people to be a real introduction to Clouzot's style of express...
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Examining the once big rise and staggering fall of the Motion Picture Production Code

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  The Motion Picture Production Code may be important in cinema history as a result of restoring moral history after the dominance of the scandalous Pre-Code. However, among serious cinephiles, it is considered to be well-meaning but absolutely antiquated at the same time. Cinema has come a long way from the once prevalent and ubiquitous censorship of the Code. Nowadays, Cinema is growing before our very eyes as filmmaking allows various cast and crew members to make any type of film. They make what they want to make without any type of censorship. The Code is looked at by cinephiles as an example of something outdated that was once ruling the industry with an iron fist.  It is understandable why so many cinephiles (especially younger viewers) have their issues with the Code. They take issue with the censorship that makes some of the movies of the Golden Age of Hollywood seem so dated.  The ones that were dated abided too much by the code for the worse. Dating back to the...
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How to avoid blurring the lines between fandom and criticism

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  Nowadays, in the world of film criticism, film fans tend to gravitate towards those who usually lack film knowledge. A lot of critics now hide their lack of knowledge behind a cinephile costume. The cinephile costume term means that someone pretends to be a cinephile by outwardly having knowledge by fooling people only to cause deception. This approach has made a lot of people think that they can placate to the masses by hiding their subpar knowledge. They hide behind this false image in order to get so much clout. They purposely say things like ignore the critics along with telling others that knowledge is not needed in order to be a cinephile. They think that loving movies is enough to be a cinephile. Being a causal is different than being a cinephile considering that they are two different terms in cinema. There should be one that is chosen over the other if someone wants to know who they are when it comes to experiencing cinema in the process. A causal is someone who only enj...
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The History and Lasting Impact of the New Hollywood Era

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The New Hollywood Era is truly one of the greatest movements in cinema history. It was absolutely able to break new ground in terms of truly and honestly reflecting American life in film without being artificial when it comes to tackling serious subjects. Additionally, it gave birth to filmmakers like directors, cinematographers, editors, among others who took art seriously as a way to combat studio interference. The political correctness that was ubiquitous in the studio controlled Golden Age of Hollywood was eschewed by studios to let the new crop of filmmakers do what they want to do for the sake of maintaining creative control. The New Hollywood Era will always be a watershed movement in cinema as a result of its rebellious and subversive nature on filmmaking. After years of success, the studio system era that ran from the silent era to the 1960's was collapsing because of factors like weak box office returns, the popularity of television, along with censorship. Speaking of cen...
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