The Crop Duster has two goals. One is to organize links to my critical work: reviews written for The Herald (Everett, Washington) and Seattle Weekly; and public appearances and TV jobs. Selected past work for Film Comment and elsewhere is also linkified. You may also link to my website of 1980s reviews and learn more about my book on Frankenstein and my graphic novel, ROTTEN.
The second goal is to keep a daily record of films watched, annotated with brisk, brief comments. It's a slightly more advanced version of the movie list I kept, in Flair pen, thumbtacked next to my bed when I was twelve.
You do the translation: "Robert Horton en un infatigable crítico residente en Seattle y colaborador habitual de Film Comment. Su espacio en la red está en The Crop Duster acaso el mejor blog de un cinecrítico profesional americano después del de Roger Ebert." --Ernesto DiezMartinez Guzmán, editor of Vértigo
Mr. Smith Goes to Washington (Frank Capra, 1939). We kick off our sixth year of Scarecrow Academy on March 2nd with this classic, the curtain-raiser for our “Election Year: Politics in Film” semester. The Academy meets online on Saturday afternoons at 2 pm Pacific Time via Zoom, where I lead a consideration of the movie in question. It’s free, and there’s information about how to sign up at the Scarecrow website. Check the website or the poster below for the entire roster. See you there?
Coming up: Scarecrow Academy returns for its sixth year! Our free online “semester” kicks off on Saturday, March 2, with a nine-week series called “Election Year: Politics on Film,” where we will consider some classics of the political world. The sessions take place at 2 pm Pacific Time via Zoom. Full lineup and more info here.
New episode of “The Music and the Movies” this week, this time listening to selections from films that were NOT nominated for Best Score this time. So: music from movies such as MAY DECEMBER, ASTEROID CITY, and SALTBURN, a zany Finnish cover song from FALLEN LEAVES, a schmear of Leonard Bernstein, and a great track from A THOUSAND AND ONE. Plus a certain song from ANATOMY OF A FALL that actually plays a role in the plot – you know the one. Listen at the Voice of Vashon page, at least for the next couple of weeks or so.
I will be delivering a new talk for Humanities Washington next Friday, March 1, at the Camano Island library at 7 pm. This is called “Un-American Activities: The Blacklist Era and Hollywood,” which is what it sounds like; there’s more information here. The event is free, so if you’re in the neighborhood, please stop by.
Dune: Part Two (Denis Villeneuve, 2024). I’ll review this later, but first impression: a big, and sometimes thrilling, improvement on the first part of the saga – Villeneuve really captures the epic scale here, with certain shots that fulfill the storybook visions you have in your head for a saga like this (even if you haven’t read the book). The damn thing still needs the scope of a longer-form project, but this half does have life. New cast members give a much-needed boost, too.
Raising Arizona (Joel Coen, 1987). Apparently I haven’t yet over-watched this movie, an American comedy classic. I still remember the first time seeing it, the thrill of realizing how its opening stanza was unfolding, how nobody made movies like that anymore, and how confident all that was. I should be writing about Ethan Coen’s Drive-Away Dolls later this week, and there’s one little echo I want to explore. There’s nothing extraneous in this movie, which befits the Coens’ meticulous style, but the one exception, which I cherish, is John Goodman’s delicious “I love to drive,” which exists as yet another example of how closely the Coens hear the way men speak.
Although my radio show “The Music and the Movies” has been on hiatus for a while, we have a couple of new shows in the well. Now available is our annual look at the five films nominated for Best Score, featuring my selections from the soundtracks of Killers of the Flower Moon, Oppenheimer, Poor Things, American Fiction, and (yes, John Williams again) Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny. Listen to that show at the Voice of Vashon site, at least for the next couple of weeks.
Coming up: Scarecrow Academy returns for its sixth year! Our free online “semester” kicks off on Saturday, March 2, with a nine-week series called “Election Year: Politics on Film,” where we will consider some classics of the political world. The sessions take place at 2 pm Pacific Time via Zoom. Full lineup and more info here.
Drive-Away Dolls (Ethan Coen, 2024). Probably there’s an embargo for this. I will say things in future.
Pain Hustlers (David Yates, 2023). A decent reason for the straight-to-streaming movie to exist: zero box-office potential, serious subject rendered in an amusing way (not satire a la Don’t Look Up, more of an American Hustle vibe), a bunch of good actors allowed to sustain performances outside the action-movie/superhero universe – what a relief to see Chris Evans outside a diet/exercise regimen. The subject is the corrupt world of Big Pharma, and the movie is colorful and informative on that score. Emily Blunt leads the cast, skillfully.
My radio show “The Music and the Movies” has been on hiatus for a bit, but we return for a couple of shows. The new one plays Sunday night at 7 pm on KVSH, in case you’re in hailing distance of Vashon Island, WA, and live via the Voice of Vashon website. I’ll post a link to the archived show next week, too.
Salt of the Earth (Herbert Biberman, 1954). The famous independent feature made by blacklisted filmmakers, and quite a good film, too, as well as an artifact of its times. Even if its account of a New Mexico miners’ strike has the ideological ingredients thoroughly baked in, there are complexities that complicate the argument, like the racism that surrounds the strike, and the fact that the heroic strikers themselves are male chauvinists who need to be enlightened by the women in the community. Written by Michael Wilson, produced by Paul Jarrico.
Moving On (Paul Weitz, 2022). No need to make any great claims here, but the premise is something that Billy Wilder might have appreciated. A woman (Jane Fonda) travels to the funeral of an old friend, planning to murder the friend’s widower (Malcolm McDowell) as retribution for raping her 46 years earlier; she enlists the help of another old friend (Lily Tomlin, in the Eve Arden role) in this plot. It’s played for comedy. As you can imagine, there are some tone issues, but some grace notes, too (Richard Roundtree makes the most of his genial role as Fonda’s long-ago ex-husband). It is not, at least, like every other movie courting a certain demographic.
The Front (Martin Ritt, 1976). It’s wobbly at times (Ritt seems uncertain about the comic-dramatic tone, and the pacing suffers because of that), but it remains one of the best Hollywood accounts of the blacklist era, against thin competition. Woody Allen is good casting for the schnook-turned-front role, even if he occasionally looks at sea within a scene; Zero Mostel is a moving presence, and Andrea Marcovicci was in the midst of her moment. Ritt, Mostel, screenwriter Walter Bernstein and supporting players Herschel Bernardi and Lloyd Gough had been blacklisted. The opening credits are without sound; maybe a warning to the audience that they’re not actually about to see a Woody Allen comedy? Nice exchange: Allen’s character sees writer Michael Murphy’s messy apartment and sallow complexion and assumes that the blacklist has taken its toll, and that he shouldn’t have to work like this; Murphy says, “I always work like this.”
Wonka (Paul King, 2023). The digital palette is eye-wearying, and the songs demand a largeness of spectacle that can grind you down. I get why so many critics revile it. And yet – a great deal of the patter is fun, and the class-conscious Marxist critique (what else can you call it?) is constant, and Keegan-Michael Key’s bloated policeman is as nasty a caricature as Roald Dahl’s original gallery of weirdos. Timothee Chalamet successfully embodies a hero for kids, which is what he’s supposed to be; the actor is very much in the spirit of transforming himself into a cartoon, which I mean as a compliment. Literally transformed into a cartoon is Hugh Grant, an Oompa Loompa who dogs Wonka’s heels with the obsessive focus of a Victorian nightmare. He sings the Oompa Loompa song, thankfully. So I’m not saying it’s a great movie, or a good one, but – it’s more fun than you think it is.
The Evil Eye (Mario Bava, 1963). American-release version of Bava’s The Girl Who Knew Too Much, and the Italian cut is supposed to be better. The incomprehensible storyline and slow pace do tend to detract a little from Bava’s imaginative camera sense, and we have to blame Bava for the sometimes painful comic/romantic touches – he seems much happier concentrating on how a knife gets pulled out of someone’s back. Bava certainly works hard on every shot, and for fans of the let’s-go-to-Europe travelogue cinema of the late 50s-early 60s, this film has an amazing collection of locations.
HATEFUL DEEDS is a novel of political satire and suspense. Read more and download it here!
FRANKENSTEIN
FRANKENSTEIN is my take on the 1931 film's making and legacy, plus some old-school film criticism. From Columbia University Press's "Cultographies" series. Click the image to order.
The long-suppressed 1877 diary of a ROTTEN agent, now available for the first time!
Rotten
Be More Rotten
Learn more about the blood-soaked yet critically-acclaimed graphic novel, and order the trade paperbacks and the “lost diary” right now.
Rotten Diary
Get the long-suppressed diary of a ROTTEN agent! From Moonstone Books
What a Feeling!
What a Feeling!
My other website: a you-are-there journey through the flabbergasting world of 1980s movies.
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