Theory & Criticism

What could possibly be more terrifying than the reality Americans wake up to every day? Certainly not the typical horror films filled with witches, vampires or zombies, which may carry some allegorical weight but rarely land with the force they intend to. No, the real horror is watching our leaders lie on national television, appoint officials who echo the language and behavior of fascists, and watching our basic human rights erode in real time while the country collectively

Alejandro Amenábar’s debut Thesis fuses horror and thriller to probe our fascination with violence. This essay explores its metafilmic nature, tracing how voyeurism and desire emerge through plot, form, and setting—offering a prophetic reflection on today’s audience.

We’ve all watched a movie with that pretentious person who insists that every single narrative element is a metaphor for something. You might hear them say “the curtains were blue to symbolize death,” or “the speed limit sign was 55 to symbolize drug abuse,” and other far-reaching, nonsensical comparisons. More often than not, these people's favorite movies are the ones where nothing that is happening is actually happening. Take American Psycho , where every scene can be unde

In the world of cinema, the concept of “betterment” often coincides with violent themes: narratives of ambition, vindication, or survival. But what happens when two films—one a somber European mystery and the other a cerebral sci-fi epic—approach self-improvement from the perspective of listening to yourself ? Krzysztof Kieślowski’s The Double Life of Véronique (1991) and Bong Joon-ho’s Mickey 17 (2024) might seem worlds apart, yet both explore how memory, intuition, and pass

Cult cinema is fundamentally atypical. During your first viewing of a ‘cult classic,’ you might find it difficult to contain your...

The Brutalist (2024), directed by Brady Corbet, is an ambitious VistaVision epic spanning architecture, immigration, class struggle,...

Throughout his career as a filmmaker, Luca Guadagnino has defined himself as a master—both aesthetically and diegetically—of depicting...

Tumblr is a microblogging and social networking website founded in 2007 that allows members to post multimedia content. Popularized in...