The experience of growing up is one that has been represented on countless occasions across all forms of artistry, with many launching themselves into the past to creatively comment on some of the intricacies of our formative years. Bill Douglas was one of the many filmmakers who set forth to explore his own childhood through…
Sleuth (1972)
Milo Tindle (Michael Caine) is on his way to a manor on the outskirts of an isolated village somewhere in the English countryside. He is there to meet a man he has never encountered, Lord Andrew Wyke (Laurence Olivier), a world-renowned writer of crime novels, who beckoned for Milo to pay him a visit. The…
Cabaret (1972)
It’s always a wonderful experience to watch a well-known classic for the first time. Of the innumerable cinematic blindspots I readily admit to never having watched, Cabaret was one that was burgeoning for my attention, which was resolved recently. The danger with such a classic is that expectations will always be astronomically high, and the…
The Last House on the Left (1972)
The Last House on the Left is a dark, often offensive and generally unpleasant experience. It is also one of the most audacious films of the 1970s, and a remarkable addition to the canon of highly original constructions of terror. Occurring right at the intersection between gritty exploitation and disconcerting horror, Wes Craven makes quite…
Auggie (2019)
Felix Greystone (Richard Kind) is forced into early retirement from his job at an architectural firm, which he has devoted his life to. A housebound life proves to be something he can’t adapt to, especially considering he is left to fend for himself after his wife (Susan Blackwell) gets a promotion that requires her to…
Proof (2005)
There exist two versions of the play Proof by David Auburn – one of them is the critically-acclaimed stage production that brought out themes of identity and grief, both for the loss of a loved one, and the impending loss of your own abilities. The other is the film adaptation, directed by John Madden, who sought…
Sword of Trust (2019)
Cinema doesn’t always need to say something – there doesn’t need to be some underlying message that occurs in every frame of a scene. Sometimes, a film is just allowed to exist. No one understands this more than Lynn Shelton, whose work has been the very definition of independent cinema. Not only does she make…
Ciao! Manhattan (1972)
You’d be forgiven for thinking Ciao! Manhattan is nothing other than the pretentious avant-garde malarkey produced during the heyday of Andy Warhol’s Factory, where art films were produced on a seemingly endless conveyor belt of post-war ennui, in which the artist and his creative partners could take the opportunity to express themselves by showing off…
The Life and Times of Judge Roy Bean (1972)
One of my biggest regrets when it comes to cinema is not having explored John Huston sooner – I only made my proper introduction to his work a couple of years ago, and with every new film I see from him, I am amazed to see what he was capable of doing – whether one…
Frenzy (1972)
Dick Blaney (Jon Finch) is a former member of the Royal Air Force who fought for his country during the war. His life afterwards has hardly been fitting for a war hero, as he has struggled to earn a living through low-paying jobs that he reluctantly accepts, solely for the sake of surviving in a…
The Postmodern Pelican 