Review: The Night is Short, Walk On Girl

Add The Night is Short, Walk On Girl to the canon of “great drinking movies.” The characters here drink more liquor than any mortal human could possibly imbibe without dying, much less without blacking out; they also have better adventures than most of us do when under the influence, though most of us don’t do the … Continue reading →

“How The Venture Bros. Brilliantly Blurs the Line Between Hero and Villain”

If there’s a fundamental theme in The Venture Bros., it’s failure. If there’s a fundamental dynamic that dramatizes the element of failure, it’s self-involvement: All of the major characters in the series tend to cause their own problems, and this is as true of the first two episodes of Season 7 as any other episode in … Continue reading →

“The 50 Best Slasher Movies of All Time”

It’s been so long since I put together my big blurb contribution for Paste Magazine‘s list of the 50 best slasher movies of all time (of all time!) that I actually…forgot we hadn’t yet published it. But we hadn’t! And now we have! I wrote about Tenebrae, the Dario Argento meta classic, and you’ll also see re-ups … Continue reading →

“Only Spike Lee could have made ‘BlacKkKlansman'”

I don’t think it’s over the line to cite BlacKkKlansman as one of Spike Lee’s best films, and I’m the guy who usually seethes at claims of “masterpiece” directed at movies that haven’t been out in theaters for even a day. Is BlacKkKlansman that? Is it a masterpiece? I’m not sure. Time will tell. But it does stand out … Continue reading →

“Trillium’s Field Trip Beer Fest Brings Brewers and Drinkers Together”

I know what you’re gonna ask: “How does he do it? How does Crump make it to, and make it through, as many beer festivals as he does?” Well my friends, it’s quite simple: I run, I bike, I take evening walks around my neighborhood, I lift, and I try to eat healthy*, and somewhere in … Continue reading →

Review: Far From the Tree, 2018, dir. Rachel Dretzin

Rachel Dretzin probably didn’t make Far From the Tree anticipating that members of her audience might come back around to Donald Trump mocking a disabled reporter at a campaign rally in 2015 (nice voting, schmucks!). Speaking for myself, that’s exactly what I kept thinking of watching the film (which is based on Andrew Solomon’s non-fiction novel … Continue reading →

“Best of Criterion’s New Releases, July 2018”

This month via The Criterion Collection: Dragon Inn. That’s pretty much all you need to know. I went nuts over A Touch of Zen, King Hu’s other grand wuxia film, back in July of 2016, when Criterion added that one to their library and I wrote about the release, though apparently my writing on the matter never published … Continue reading →

“‘Never Goin’ Back’ Is One Of The Raunchiest, Most Satisfying Comedies In Years”

Welp, A24 isn’t really doing much to promote Augustine Frizzell’s excellent Never Goin’ Back, so I guess it’s up to me, a critic, to champion this gross, tender, raunchy, outrageous, sweet-hearted, and absolutely hilarious film. (It’s one of my favorites of the year. And one of the best I saw at this year’s Independent Film Festival … Continue reading →

“How the Director of The Spy Who Dumped Me Made a Graphic, Funny, Feminist Action Film”

Upfront, I didn’t have high expectations for The Spy Who Dumped Me; I don’t have faith in studio comedies, and I especially don’t have faith in studio action comedies, because they tend to treat the action with indifference and just joke through fight scenes where characters reasonably should be taking matters seriously. But Susanna Fogel isn’t fucking … Continue reading →

“The Best Beer from the Vermont Brewers Festival”

Well, that’s another Vermont Brewers Festival under the belt right there. Writing about beer is a challenge, I’m telling you. Writing about beer when part of the job means talking to people who make beer about beer while you’re drinking beer. Movie festivals, music festivals; they’re a cinch. You drink as part of the festivities. Drinking itself … Continue reading →

“Daily Dose: Amo Amo, ‘Closer to You'”

Today’s Daily Dose for Paste Magazine, brought to you by: Me! Okay, strictly speaking it’s brought to you by Amo Amo, a new band from Los Angeles enjoying the producorial talents of one Jim James, but I wrote a couple hundred words about the song. That ain’t nothing. It’s a good song, too, else I wouldn’t … Continue reading →

“Every Movie Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson Has Made, From Best to Worst”

I’m betting you don’t need me to explain what this one’s all about, but all the same: I ranked every movie starring or featuring Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson. Boom. That happened. What’s especially cool about this list, apart from the fact that it is 100% scientifically factual and if you disagree with me you are wrong*, is that … Continue reading →

“Films by Women: Five Movies to Watch in July”

July has been a wasteland of a month for films by women. Not that there aren’t films by women out there in theaters for you to watch, or at home, and it’s not that those movies are bad or anything; it’s just that compared to other months, finding those movies has proven a Herculean task, and that’s … Continue reading →

“Sobering And Funny, ‘Blindspotting’ Wants To Return Feeling To Our Collective Consciousness”

Revisiting my audio recording of the interview I conducted with Daveed Diggs and Rafael Casal at this year’s Independent Film Festival Boston, I finally figured out what I would have really liked to have said about the film at the time but didn’t: Racism’s really hard to talk about, even couched in a piece of art like Blindspotting. It’s … Continue reading →

“Unfriended: Dark Web Is Too Real For Its Own Good”

I never thought Unfriended would work as a concept. You can base an episode of Modern Family around a Skype call; you can’t make a horror movie using the same aesthetic. Except you can! Turns out that what you actually can’t do is make a sequel to that movie, at least not if you’re going to do that … Continue reading →

“Hulu’s ‘Castle Rock’ Explores The Stephen King Multiverse, But It’s Light On The Horror”

Castle Rock is maybe the single best embodiment of the problems I have reviewing TV: After just a few episodes, I’m not sure where it’s going, and I’m not sure how to review something like that. Maybe that’s not the point when you’re reviewing TV. Maybe just learn to review the TV you have. Regardless, Castle … Continue reading →

Review: The Third Murder, 2018, dir. Hirokazu Kore-eda

If you thought The First Murder was good, and if you liked The Second Murder, too, wait until you get a load of The Third Murder! Okay: Sorry. I’ve already made this joke on Twitter. It wasn’t funny then (lies! It was hilarious), and it isn’t funny now (see last parenthetical, asshole). But I couldn’t help myself. Talking about … Continue reading →