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Explore Critical Evaluation of Film & Short Film Reviews with Cup of Tea Critiques, your online source for sharp insights on movies and television. Click here to see what we have to offer! Tea Brew Legend Our critiques are tagged with a tea brew that evokes a feel for the movie or television show. So, instead of likes, ratings, emojis, or thumbs up or down, they are assigned a tea that, based on its benefits, gives you a sense of the production's feel and substance. Below we show several plants that teas are made from. So, scroll to figure out which tea best fits the movie or TV show that matches your mood. We hope you enjoy our critical evaluation of film & short film reviews Photo by Emma Van Sant on Unsplash Tea: Barley Category: Herbal Barley tea is good for oral health, which translates nicely to shows that have a lot of dialog like: The Accident , Between the Temples , and Flamin' Hot — to name just a few! Genre: Movies and TV shows with a lot of dialog Tea: Chamomile Category: Herbal Chamomile tea induces sleepiness. This is not to say that shows marked with this tea are boring; they're actually rather calming — not action packed. Try the Oscar-nominated film, American Fiction , The Long Game, or The Old Oak for example. Genre: Family dramas Photo by Rebecca Asryan on Unsplash Tea: Coca Category: Herbal Coca tea can produce psychosomatic effects, making it perfect for marking movies and shows about drugs or disorienting presentations such as Back to Black , Lonesome Soldier , and The Substance . Genre: Movies and TV shows about drugs or with disorienting presentations Licensed from Adobe Stock Photo by David Dawson on Unsplash Tea: Dandelion Category: Herbal Dandelion tea is a bitter herbal tea that fits with movies and shows with difficult or heavy subjects like Fair Play , the Oscar–nominated film, Killers of the Flower Moon , Monkey Man , and Presumed Innocent . Genre: Movies and TV shows with heavy subjects Tea: Ginger Category: Herbal Ginger tea has many benefits, one of which is protecting the brain against disease. This translates perfectly to thought-provoking movies and shows, for example: the Oscar-nominated film, Drive My Car , Life After , Maestro, and War is Over! . Genre: Thought-provoking movies and TV shows Photo by Joris Neyt from Pexels Photo by Uwe Nake on Unsplash Tea: Ginkgo Biloba Category: Herbal Ginkgo Biloba tea slows signs of aging, so what better movies and shows than fun, youthful , and lighthearted ones like Nobody is Crazy , Rye Lane , and The Wonderful Story of Henry Sugar . Genre: Youthful, lighthearted, and fun movies and TV shows Tea: Ginseng Category: Herbal Like Chrysanthemum, its floral counterpart, Ginseng tea acts as a stimulant. We reserve this designation for suspenseful and intense thrillers that contain some violence. From, Leave the World Behind, Longlegs , and Rebel Ridge are among these. Genre: Suspenseful and intense thrillers Photo by Rodion Kutsaev from Pexels Licensed from Adobe Stock Tea: Honeybush Category: Herbal Honeybush tea is calming. But unlike chamomile, this one is best for non-family dramas with adult themes like A Good Day Will Come , Challengers , and Rez Ball . Genre: Nonfamily dramas with strong adult and/or socioeconomic themes Tea: Jasmine Category: Green Jasmine tea is sweet and relaxing, making it a great sip for movies and shows with heart, positive vibes, and warm messages like the ones in these: Babes , Bob Marley: One Love , Perfect Days, and the Oscar–nominated film, The Holdovers . Genre: Movies and TV shows with heart, positive vibes, and warm messages Photo by Tanya Nedelcheva on Unsplash Photo licensed from Shutterstock Tea: Masala Chai Category: Black Masala Chai is a black tea that promotes strong bones, oral and digestive health, and reduces the risk of stroke, making this drink perfect for movies and shows about toughness or athletic competition like Lawmen: Bass Reeves, Napoleon, and The Brothers Sun . Genre: Movies and TV shows about toughness and athletic competition Tea: Matcha Category: Green Matcha improves mental focus, making it perfect for navigating mysteries and figuring out whodunnits such as Decision to Leave , Fight Night: The Million Dollar Heist, The Independent , and The Night Agent . Genre: Mysteries or whodunnits Photo by Michael Burrows from Pexels Photo by Simon Lee on Unsplash Tea: Mint Category: Herbal Mint tea has a cooling effect and is known to reduce fever, which makes it a good fit for movies and shows filmed in cold weather or blizzards, such as Blow the Man Down, Society of the Snow, and Wind River . Genre: Movies and TV shows in cold weather and blizzard conditions Tea: Oolong Category: Oolong Oolong tea is fat burning, supports weight loss, and helps mental performance, making it compatible with movies and shows that make you laugh or involve physical activity like dance and exercise. Chevalier, Florida Man, and Mr. and Mrs. Smith are just three examples! Genre: Movies and TV shows that make you laugh or involve physical activities like dance and exercise Licensed from Adobe Stock Photo by Jared Subia on Unsplash Tea: Peach Category: Floral Peach tea has a sweet and pleasing aroma, making it perfect for movies and shows with a springtime feel and imagery of the season, such as Bloodline, Florida Man, and I Love That for You . Genre: Movies and TV shows with a springtime feel or with images of the season Tea: Rosemary Category: Herbal Rosemary tea has a sharp pine fragrance and is proven to boost memory, making it perfect for signaling stimulating shows with intense action like Civil War , Lawman: Bass Reeves , and Monkey Man . Genre: Movies and TV shows with intense action Photo licensed from Shutterstock Photo by Mohammed Amiri on Unsplash Tea: Saffron Category: Herbal Besides the beauty of its color, Saffron tea promotes eye health, which transfers well to movies and shows with great visual effects like Dream Scenario , Leave the World Behind , the Emmy– and Golden Globe– nominated series, The Bear, and The Substance . Genre: Movies and TV shows with great visual effects Tea: Sage Category: Herbal Similar to its floral counterpart (Lavender), Sage tea is an anxiety/stress reducer, which makes it great for watching films with low-key characters like those in Bob Marley: One Love, Living, and Perfect Days . Genre: Movies and TV shows with low-key characters Photo by Phillip Larking on Unsplash Tea: White Category: White White tea is fat burning, supports healthy weight loss and skin, and slows aging. All are qualities that make it a good fit for shows that make you laugh or involve urgency like chase scenes or other rigorous physical activity such as those in Full Time and I Got This . Genre: Movies and TV shows that make you laugh, or involve urgency, like chase scenes or other physical activity Licensed from Shutterstock Tea: Yarrow Category: Herbal Like Ginger, Yarrow tea promotes digestive health, reduces fever, cold, and cramps, and even relieves itchy skin, making it appropriate for movies and shows about illness or that are set in hospitals or other medical institutions such as those in A Girl Upstairs, From, the Oscar–nominated film, Killers of the Flower Moon, and Swarm . Genre: Movies and TV shows about illness or set in hospitals or similar medical institutions Licensed from Adobe Stock Sign-up for new reviews, exclusives, deep dives, and more First name Last name Enter your email here I agree to the terms & conditions Sign-up Thanks for joining us!

< Back A Lot of Nothing expresses the power of feeling powerless Anonymous Content, 2022 104 min Director/Writer: Sarah Kelly Kaplan / Sarah Kelly Kaplan and Mo McRae Reading Time: 5 minutes A Lot of Nothing Treacherous (FZWPDWAOPLBCQGMG) 00:00 / 06:09 📷 : Licensed from Shutterstock Ginger: Thought-provoking movies and TV shows White: Movies and TV shows that make you laugh, or involve urgency, like chase scenes or other physical activity Chris Chaisson 2023-03-21 A Lot of Nothing presents the successful, charming couple of James (Y'lan Noel, Insecure ) and Vanessa (Cleopatra Coleman, Infinity Pool ). Living in their extravagant house in the Hollywood Hills, the two lawyers hear a news report one night about a fatal police shooting involving their uniformed next-door neighbor, Brian (Justin Hartley, Smallville ). They disagree on their comprehension of the news story, with James suggesting they should not jump to conclusions and Vanessa insisting that Brian is guilty. As they come to an agreement about Brian’s probable guilt, they then debate on what, if anything, they should do about it. After they each experience a stressful day of work, James comes home and unwinds while Vanessa, left to bring in groceries alone, spots Brian and heads over to confront him about his involvement in the shooting. After Brian is disrespectful and threatening in his response, Vanessa heads off and tells James, who heads over to Brian’s house to clear the air. When he fares no better, he and Vanessa kidnap Brian at gunpoint, forcing him into their house and tying him to a chair in the garage, all to coerce him into a more remorseful tone. As the evening progresses, their plan goes farther and farther off the rails. A Lot of Nothing certainly has its flaws, with a couple of far-fetched moments and plot details introduced way too far along in the story. As in other works, if you find the film humorous enough, you may overlook its biggest weaknesses. Nonetheless, the film serves as an examination into how a sense of powerlessness can strongly influence one’s behavior. Despite being a well-to-do couple working for established law firms, James and Vanessa ultimately feel like they cannot incite change in any methodical, level-headed way. Mo McRae’s directorial debut provides social critiques without being preachy, particularly in its first act. For instance, James bristles at his White co-worker’s use of the term “baby mama.” Vanessa copes with being talked over by her male colleagues and having her fair skin complexion used to insult her. These moments serve as snapshots of what members of marginalized groups can experience in spaces dominated by the majority. They often do not feel that they have the power to express their objection to the language or treatment of others, and the frustration from such encounters festers. Despite its serious synopsis, this indie flick swings from a humorous tone to suspenseful and back several times. For instance, in the scene preceding Vanessa’s first intimidating encounter with Brian, James speaks very seductively to his Peloton machine in a goofy aside. Similarly, the opening scene oscillates between the fearfulness James and Vanessa feel over the revelation about their neighbor and their brainstorming which Martin Luther King quote to post to Facebook. The humor infused into the story differentiates it from many other films on the subject of police brutality. While it may sound ill-fitting, the comedic element endears the film’s main characters to the audience. On the topic of characters, the situation escalates once James’s brother Jamal and his pregnant fiancée come over for dinner. As in many stories, such as Rachel Getting Married (2008) or the aptly-named Brothers (2009), the presence of a sibling can shed light on the way a protagonist behaves. Jamal is much more militant than James, consistently inferring that James is conforming to White society. Similar tension exists between Jamal’s earthy fiancée, Candy, and the more practical Vanessa, who rolls her eyes at Candy’s talk of veganism, energy and overused proverbs. They share a contentious conversation once Jamal and Candy arrive, all while trying to conceal the fact that they are holding Brian captive. The presence of in-laws with different philosophies on life allows McRae and co-writer Sarah Kelly Kaplan to show Black characters as more than a monolith, again without preaching this point to the audience. A Lot of Nothing does not tie up every loose end. However, it gives its viewers a decent amount to chew on, offering different perspectives and three-dimensional characters. It effectively dodges the temptation to have each party involved provide the exact spiel you’d expect from scene to scene, keeping the interest level up despite some absurd turns in the story. Despite its weaknesses, the SXSW Festival award-nominated indie manages to be visually interesting and thought-provoking. There is no pinpoint accurate comparison for A Lot of Nothing , but a film that bears a slight resemblance is the 1982 Martin Scorsese flick The King of Comedy . Robert De Niro plays Rupert, an unsuccessful comic who develops an obsession with his idol, talk show host Jerry Langford, and proceeds to stalk and kidnap him after an initial rejection. While Rupert is clearly demented, his actions stem from a sense of desperation and powerlessness, similar to James and Vanessa. Both films show their protagonists taking drastic and illegal action in response to these feelings, wasting massive amounts of duct tape in the process. Previous Next Sign-up for new reviews, exclusives, deep dives, and more First name Last name Enter your email here I agree to the terms & conditions Sign-up Thanks for joining us!

The Untold Story of Mild Sauce will make you chuckle and reminisce < Back The Untold Story of Mild Sauce will make you chuckle and reminisce Ill-Hio Films, 2021 13 minutes Director/Writer: Anton Deshawn / Johnathan Craig and Anton Deshawn Reading Time: 3 minutes 📷 : Used with permission, Anton Deshawn The Untold Story of Mild Sauce Cats And Dogs Living Together (ECIADMH14RKW9MLT) 00:00 / 03:16 Oolong Movies/shows that make you laugh or involve physical activity like exercise/dance Ginkgo Biloba Youthful, lighthearted, and fun movies and TV shows Chris Chaisson 2023-04-11 For anyone who vividly remembers ‘90s R&B and VH1 programming, The Untold Story of Mild Sauce will offer quite a few chuckles. Shot in mockumentary style, the story raises the curtain on fictional R&B group Mild Sauce, a four-person boy band comprised of Vonn, Juju, Heno, and Dre, and their manager Stony Mack. Between narration and confessional-style interviews, director Anton Deshawn splices in Mild Sauce’s music videos. The choreography and vocals are clearly meant to poke fun at hit songs by the extremely popular groups of the era, namely New Edition, Boyz II Men and Dru Hill. Interestingly enough, the humor hits harder now that R&B music has transitioned away from this style. In the ‘90s and early 2000s, boy bands in pop and R&B were so revered that it would be tough to imagine anyone producing a satire of them. Contemporary groups largely consist of individual acts that collaborate across other genres and lean heavily on sex appeal. The generation-old trends that The Untold Story of Mild Sauce mocks make it easier to look back and laugh at styles that were universally admired at the time. The funniest element of The Untold Story of Mild Sauce is without a doubt the lack of accountability that permeates the actual VH1 Behind the Scenes -style interviews. Generally, the artists and managers alike never own up to any of their transgressions. They instead point the finger at other parties, rationalize their actions or simply deny details that have already been proven true. Mild Sauce turns this into a recurring gag, where the members do not take responsibility for the downturns in their careers or in their personal lives. In one particular interview, a Mild Sauce member will not even give kudos to a female R&B group (likely a nod to TLC or En Vogue) that outsold them at the time. Similarly, Stony Mack does not own up to ripping off the band, just as most managers never do. As is common in VH1 Behind the Scenes stories, a publicist, manager or record label executive takes advantage of the group’s success and cheats them out of money. Mack’s denial is consistent with a vast majority of stories we hear from the music industry, where the swindler acts as though other expenses prevented the band from getting paid out. The interview segments cleverly mimic those from every documentary or biopic that we watch about feuding artists and deceitful management. At this point, so many of our favorite musicians from the past have decided they hate each other, so we may as well poke fun at the never-ending feuds. The Untold Story of Mild Sauce serves as part satire, part time-machine, and executes both equally well. Available on Kweli TV Previous Next Sign-up for new reviews, exclusives, deep dives, and more First name Last name Enter your email here I agree to the terms & conditions Sign-up Thanks for joining us!

< Back The Baltimorons shows characters breaking out of their perceived limitations Duplass Brothers Productions, 2025 101 minutes Director/Writer: Jay Duplass / Jay Duplass and Michael Strassner Reading Time: 6 minutes The Baltimorons Christmas Wish (XCUORJD1HGJNHVFV) 00:00 / 07:44 📷 : IFC Films and Sapan Studio Jasmine: Movies and TV shows with heart, positive vibes, and warm messages Mint Movies and TV shows in cold weather and blizzard conditions Reba Chaisson 2025-10-16 The popular adage says that what happens in Vegas stays in Vegas. The trip to what is known as Sin City is meant to be an escape from reality, which includes but is not limited to the past due bills and stressful relationships we leave behind. Much more so than other vacations, the high people get from Vegas is not only natural, but it is heightened. No real need for weed, but I wouldn’t know (wink). Jay Duplass’s The Baltimorons , though, has nothing to do with Vegas, but everything to do with its aspects of escapism that elevate the senses. Set in Baltimore and led by Michael Strassner and Liz Larsen as Cliff and Didi, respectively, The Baltimorons is about a roughly thirty-five-year-old man struggling to stay sober using humor and maintaining connections to the people and activities that bring him joy. You wouldn’t know this from the film’s opening, which shows Cliff walking up a narrow staircase to an attic, proceeding to stand on a stool and put his belt around his neck, and clumsily falling flat on his bottom. The absence of any sound other than Cliff’s groan and the stool hitting the wooden floor make an otherwise sad scene quite hilarious, thus setting the tone for the movie. The inciting incident in the film occurs when Cliff and his fiancée, Brittany (Olivia Luccardi), arrive at her parents’ home for Christmas Eve dinner. When she sees a text come across his phone regarding plans to hang out with his friends later, the two argue as they exit the car. Distracted while texting his friend, Cliff crashes into the Luccardis’ entry door, knocking out his tooth. In search of a dentist, he finally finds Dr. Didi Daw, a mid-forty-year-old divorcée, who agrees to meet him at her office. When Cliff’s car is towed while receiving care and Didi’s plans for family dinner are abruptly canceled, the two wind up spending the day together. With humor, jazzy Christmas music, and festive holiday decorations in mostly neighborhood settings, The Baltimorons maintains a light tone while dealing with what are normally heavy subjects. When Cliff calls his best friend Marvin (Rob Phoenix) for help getting out of a jam for instance, Marvin, who is a Black man, is incredulous to learn of Cliff’s request, responding “You want me, a Black man, to break into a tow yard?” It is only then that Cliff realizes he was asking his friend not only to commit a crime but that the perception (and likely consequences) of Marvin doing such a thing is very different than they would be for someone who is White. This exchange in the film is brilliantly executed, as its point is dulled neither by its brevity nor its humor. Complementing these humorous and teachable moments are the quiet spaces left for more serious, intimate dialog to soak in. Surprised, for instance, that Cliff wants to have dinner with her, Didi asks him “Why do you want to have dinner with me?” “Because we’re having fun,” he responds. Didi’s question suggests she has doubts about her own attractiveness. This is not unusual for women who have experienced divorce. Therapist Lara Farrokh writes that “[they] often feel like potential partners will see them as ‘used goods’ — as if women are like cars which devalue with age and use.” Cliff’s response in this tender exchange speaks to his feelings of vulnerability, which is an unusual depiction of men, particularly for those of higher weight. This group is often treated as if they are made of metal exteriors, as if they don’t experience physical or emotional pain like others, or that they cannot and should not be taken seriously. Cliff flips these conceptions on their head. The class and age differences between Cliff and Didi are subtly highlighted in the The Baltimorons . When Cliff sees Didi’s home, he jokes that she has good credit. The comment calls attention to Didi’s lifestyle in contrast to the numerous past due bills casually strewn on Cliff’s table at his home. And when Didi indicates she is unfamiliar with sketch comedy, Cliff happily explains the art form to her. Such moments in the story speak to the social class and generational gaps, respectively, between the two adults. The contrasts allow us to hold up a mirror to ourselves to consider where we fall on each spectrum. We can even reflect on how we conduct ourselves when we encounter people in social and age locations different from our own. The Baltimorons brings to mind similar indie films like Raine Allen‑Miller’s 2023 debut feature, Rye Lane , and Nora Ephron’s 1993 classic, Sleepless in Seattle . Both depict serendipitous events that bring two people together. Like The Baltimorons , they use wit and humor to avoid being heavy and preachy while they invite questions about friendship and complicated romantic relationships that we stumble into. While Cliff periodically updates Brittany on his whereabouts, ensuring her that he will be home soon, it becomes clear that neither he nor Didi are quite ready to go back to their lives. What is never spoken out loud, however, is how different their lives are. That is, despite the difference in age and social class, the two gravitate toward one another. When she and Cliff perform an impromptu set at a sketch comedy club, he admits to her that he didn’t think he could ever do anything like that sober, suggesting how invaluable her support meant to him. When Didi’s ex-husband takes several verbal jabs at her, Cliff interjects to humiliate him, indicating how he is becoming protective of her. I love this film about two people who can be seen as needing an escape to avoid the realities of their lives at a time of year when people often feel lonely. In addition to being funny and entertaining, The Baltimorons teaches us that the social dimensions we occupy don’t have to be hard lines or barriers that keep us from engaging one another and enjoying the rich relationships that can evolve from that. Indeed, Cliff and Didi would probably describe their time together as fun, surreal, and just what they needed at that time. But where does Brittany fit in all of this? As Cliff’s fiancée, she not only wonders but worries about where and why he has gone AWOL on one of the most significant family holidays of the year. Unfortunately for her, he might as well have been in Vegas. Previous Next Sign-up for new reviews, exclusives, deep dives, and more First name Last name Enter your email here I agree to the terms & conditions Sign-up Thanks for joining us!

< Back Footnotes illuminates the highs and lows of a pandemic-era romance Box Party Films, 2023 95 minutes Director/Writer: Chris Leary Reading Time: 4 minutes Footnotes Home Inside (LJBFFLYOBAYC6VUN) 00:00 / 05:03 📷 : Used with permission, Chris Leary Barley: Movies and TV shows with a lot of dialog Jasmine Movies and TV shows with heart, positive vibes, and warm messages Chris Chaisson 2023-06-23 We’ve all heard idioms such as, “Absence makes the heart grow fonder.” However, platitudes like this ignore the reality of how humans survive in a new environment. Adapting involves making new friends in your new surroundings and letting go of connections from your old one. Those who believe in soulmates feel like their heart will always yearn for the same person regardless of distance, but for everyone else, it is important to turn the page. Chris Leary’s touching pandemic-era romantic drama Footnotes highlights these diverging mindsets. The co-stars of this indie film set at the height of the pandemic in 2020 are Will (Chris Leary), a 20-something building manager in Los Angeles, and his new tenant Apurna (Sharayu Mahale). They meet in February, when she moves in, and hang out to pass the time after the economy shuts down due to COVID. Early on, Apurna addresses the elephant in the room, saying that she will not sleep with Will. After clearing the air, the two hit it off, swapping stories and sharing intimate details about themselves over the course of several months. While their relationship is platonic, they clearly have romantic chemistry, evident when Apurna is silently jealous of Will having a date with another girl. Despite their budding unspoken romance, Apurna takes a trip home to New England to visit family around the holidays. Now apart, only time will tell whether their feelings grow or simply dissipate. During the pandemic, many couples experienced severe turbulence in their relationships, as their increased time together exacerbated any conflict between them. Footnotes presents the flipside of this dynamic, illustrating how the pandemic also had the opposite effect of bringing two people together who likely would have never formed a bond. Both homesick and living alone, Will and Apurna become friends in large part due to going stir-crazy. Through his dialogue, writer/director Chris Leary takes viewers back to the very relatable phenomenon of the struggle to socialize after a lack of human interaction or to reexamination of their place in life, both of which many people experienced back in 2020. Just the same, Will and Apurna’s exchanges foreshadow what is to come in their relationship, particularly as they talk about their exes. Though there are no flashbacks in the story, the sentiments they share reveal their flaws as potential partners. Will puts people and his relationships with them on a pedestal, while Apurna hedges, staying non-committal. Their imperfections feel very real and apply to someone in most people’s dating history. Even if the co-stars come off as flaky on one side or possessive on the other, Apurna and Will are operating in a very uncertain time period and have no idea of what the future holds. Remembering this uncertainty that many of us felt at the time makes their actions and emotions understandable. A new romantic connection can be exciting but also intimidating in what feels like an alternate universe, prompting people to return to what may be a more familiar past. Apurna is faced with such a mix of emotions as she reverts to her past by returning home. While Will seems too dependent on Apurna to maintain his emotional state, struggling to take care of himself when she leaves, his difficulties appear similar to the stories told by single people about their emotional challenges during the pandemic. Despite its minimal cast, Footnotes also manages to depict cultural differences. Apurna’s Indian heritage is discussed in her conversations with Will and depicted when she returns home, both in a way that does not feel forced. While being traditional, her parents still have their own personalities, as is shown when Apurna’s mother engages in a Jane Fonda-like workout on TV, or her dad stares in confusion at the box of Special K cereal Apurna brings home with her. These slice-of-life moments keep all of the characters from feeling like stereotypes and keep the story from being too centered on Will’s perspective alone. Footnotes feels most similar to the 2009 Joseph Gordon Levitt-led film 500 Days of Summer . Like Will, Tom (Levitt) is a hopeless romantic who has put his love interest on an unreachable pedestal and is crushed by reality. Sadly, Footnotes lacks a flash mob scene set to Hall and Oates but does deliver on the other emotional swings of a romantic drama. Previous Next Sign-up for new reviews, exclusives, deep dives, and more First name Last name Enter your email here I agree to the terms & conditions Sign-up Thanks for joining us!

< Back Are Mumblecore Movies Relatable or Just Boring? Examining a Subgenre of Indie Filmmaking Chris Chaisson 11/15/23 Reading Time: 9 minutes 📸: Used with Permission, Scott Saslow (scottsaslow.com Instagram: @scottsaslow Twitter: @saslow_scott) During the pandemic, many consumer trends changed, some temporarily and others permanently. One particular uptick was younger people tuning in to YouTube live streams of lo-fi hip-hop. Loosely defined, lo-fi (low fidelity) hip hop is a music genre that consists of short, downtempo, repetitive beats meant to give a raw, unpolished sound. Rather than mixing and mastering to create clean audio for mass consumption, producers leave the static, feedback, and other aural imperfections in. The style stems from both the desire for a more authentic sound and the limitations of the artist’s recording equipment. As a genre, lo-fi hip hop’s raw sound and down-to-earth feel not only create a sense of nostalgia and heart but also hope, particularly for anyone that does not have the means to record on high-tech gear. What does this have to do with film? Lo-fi hip hop has its doppelganger in the world of film with a subgenre that many cinephiles call mumblecore . This label describes movies in the independent space that contain imperfect dialogue, naturalistic acting, and minimal budgets. Much like lo-fi, the genre was born out of directors’ lack of resources and connections to shoot more polished, grandiose productions. Over time, it became a preferred style for some romantic comedy (rom-com) filmmakers. Once a handful of directors succeeded in gaining traction with these films, the movement over time attracted more familiar faces and increased budgets for the filmmakers themselves. In addition to bigger name actors gravitating towards such projects, the familiar faces already in the mumblecore space became household names. Mark Duplass, a mumblecore mainstay as both actor and director, starred in the popular FX series The League and Apple TV+ hit, The Morning Show . Adam Driver played a supporting role in 2012 mumblecore favorite Frances Ha before going on to star in both small screen and big screen productions, such as episodes VII and VIII of Star Wars . Not to be outdone, the star of Frances Ha , Greta Gerwig, just directed one of the top grossing movies in cinema history, Barbie . I must say, if you were cool at all growing up, you probably won’t relate to anything you see onscreen. The films are called mumblecore for a good reason. There is a lot of staring at feet, “I dunno,” and unnecessary apologizing. At some point, you may shout at the screen, “Just say something! Anything!” The characters in this genre wear their neuroticism around their necks. Their mannerisms and speech reflect the same lack of assurance about the direction their lives are going in (or not going in). Your late teens and early twenties can certainly be a confusing and scary time, and for some people, it is hard to break out of their shell. The portrayals of aimless characters serve as a reflection of where most twenty-somethings are mentally. Knowing your life path at that age is admirable and reassuring, but it takes many people a decent amount of time to figure it out as they gather life experience. In mumblecore movies, the characters typically get around to voicing some of their insecurities or uncertainties, likely reminding viewers of their own sentiments at such an age. For instance, in the 2014 Lynn Shelton indie, Laggies , Keira Knightly’s 20-something year-old character, Megan, panics after her boyfriend proposes and hides out for a few days at a teenager’s house. At one point in the film, Megan utters, “I'm sure it does seem kind of stupid to make some sort of rigid plan for the future. But... It's stupider not to start paying attention to who you are and what makes you happy. Otherwise, you just float.” Her aside is both relevant to the plot and a message for twenty-somethings watching the film to process. Despite, or maybe even because of, their technical imperfections, mumblecore movies have received critical acclaim on the festival circuit. Many originators in the mumblecore genre earned recognition from critics and audiences alike. Drinking Buddies , directed by Joel Swanberg, won Narrative Spotlight at SXSW in 2013. Girls creator Lena Dunham’s first feature, Tiny Furniture , won numerous festival awards, including Best First Screenplay at the Film Independent Spirit Awards in 2011. Plenty of criticisms of this style could be voiced by…well, critics. One particular critique is that the movies do not have enough conflict from scene to scene. When you show awkward teens and tweens hanging out and struggling to have conversations, the story is lacking an antagonistic force. Nothing is stopping the characters from getting what they want, since at times, they don’t even seem to want anything. Traditional Hollywood movie plots rely on goal-oriented characters striving to achieve something, which is how the audience finds them endearing. Watching a 25-year-old with no hopes or dreams could frustrate a viewer who wants to root for him or her. Furthermore, the element of imperfect dialogue can be cumbersome for audience members to endure. It is certainly truer to real life, as we don’t all have perfectly timed exchanges, quips, and witty responses to one another. True conversations are rarely as rhythmic as the ones we witness onscreen and often just trail off. However, movies are entertainment, and a conversation with no flow to it becomes either boring or uncomfortable. Despite these perfectly valid bones to pick with mumblecore, any criticism can have pushback. If you sit down to watch a slice-of-life film about characters and relationships, what better way to display them than through imperfect dialogue and occasional conflict? Most of us are not constantly at odds with those in our social circle; if so, it may be time to do some vetting. When meeting new people, we often try too hard to make an impression, straining to say something relatable, speaking out of turn, or making a joke that falls painfully flat (I just got a shiver thinking about something I said 15 years ago to break the silence). It may not be the height of entertainment to watch characters do the same for 90 minutes, but one could argue this flaw is as endearing as any buttoned-up character could exhibit. Mumblecore movies likely won’t offer the same escapism as Mission: Impossible , but they can bring about nostalgia and appreciation for the struggles of young adulthood. A harder critique to push back against would be the exclusivity of the mumblecore subgenre. Often, the main characters and their priorities tilt heavily toward a middle-class, white-collar perspective. The protagonists may be “broke,” but they are generally college educated and have parents to support them, whether they are part of the story or not. Generally, they have no one financially dependent on them and no dire concern relating to their situation (i.e. getting evicted). Most mumblecore characters seem as though everything is going to work out for them, which makes each of them a little less of an underdog. That said, many films and television shows follow exceedingly rich people who are petty beyond belief and somehow still endearing to the audience. Additionally, as the community of mumblecore filmmakers can be somewhat insular, the projects often lack racial diversity among both the main characters and the communities in which the films take place. One notable exception is the 2008 indie Medicine for Melancholy , starring former The Daily Show regular Wyatt Cenac, about two San Franciscans bonding over their status as minorities in a city being gentrified. Its director, Barry Jenkins, went on to direct the Best Picture winner Moonlight , further illustrating what a great foot in the door this genre provides for aspiring filmmakers of all demographics. Mumblecore has proven over the years to be somewhat malleable, as it extends beyond slice-of-life comedy. An offshoot of the movement has coined the phrase “mumble-gore,” indie movies with the same types of characters and dialogue but in the horror genre. One such unsettling movie is the 2014 Mark Duplass hit Creep , where a videographer drives to a remote location for a gig and meets a strange man who wants to make videos for his unborn son (or so the videographer thinks). Sometimes, mumblegore movies will have several silent or one-actor scenes that later culminate in extreme violence, such as Blue Ruin (2013). Other times, these projects feature similar conversations between characters as the comedies, except the nerdy or awkward character is actually a lunatic. They can go in several directions, but the common thread is the same minimalistic feel. Some might wonder what the future of this subgenre holds. It is likely to continue evolving, especially since as smartphones evolve, more creative and motivated people have the technology to make something . One can only hope that the plots expand to include more perspectives, as that is the best way for any movement to continue growing. As for the other criticisms, they are all a matter of taste. Maybe heavily rehearsed dialogue, fancy set designs and top-flight visual effects are too perfect for some. In any case, mumblecore provides us with more of the variety we always seek in our entertainment. Previous Next Sign-up for new reviews, exclusives, deep dives, and more First name Last name Enter your email here I agree to the terms & conditions Sign-up Thanks for joining us!

< Back Challengers shows us what it’s like to handle a different type of loss Frenesy Film Company, 2024 131 minutes Director/Writer: Luca Guadagnino / Justin Kuritzkes Reading Time: 7 minutes Challengers Afterpxrty (YYABID45DSUN9L0A) 00:00 / 08:14 📷 : Used with permission, Bartos Gyorgy https://www.instagram.com/bartosgy https://www.facebook.com/methwarddesigns https://www.bartosgyorgy.com/ Masala Chai: Movies and TV shows about toughness and athletic competition Honeybush: Nonfamily dramas with strong adult and/or socioeconomic themes Reba Chaisson 2024-05-01 Loss is often viewed as the death of a loved one, but it can also refer to the sudden loss of an ability we once had. In both instances, we grieve. After denial, anger, bargaining, and depression, the stages of grief note that we accept our loss and figure out a way forward by discovering or nurturing a newfound purpose. But according to psychologists , sometimes we never get to acceptance. Because the loss is so devastating, we carry the emotional weight wherever we go, and it manifests in our treatment of others. In addition to being a story about a love triangle, Challengers is about the damage such baggage can inflict on us and those we care most about. Played by Zendaya ( Spiderman: Homecoming , The Greatest Showman ), Tashi is a confident but sociable 18-year-old tennis phenom who believes a match is about “a relationship” with her opponent. She is quick on her feet, powerful with the racquet, and has an intense yell when she wins a long and active volley. Smitten by her beauty, talent, and passion for winning, roommates and best friends Art and Paul, who are strong tennis players themselves, fall for Tashi while attending one of her matches. Their mouths drop the moment she removes her sweater and steps onto the court. The heads of the spectators turn left and right with the movement of the ball, but Art and Paul stare only at Tashi, as if in a drunken daze despite neither having had a drink. In a conversation with Art and Paul during a party at her home, Tashi mentions that she’s going to Stanford in the fall. When Paul (Josh O’Connor) asks why she prefers to beat up on college girls in tennis rather than go professional, she laughs flirtatiously and responds, “You know nothing about tennis.” It’s a “relationship” with the other player, she explains. Paul and Art become so enraptured by Tashi that a years-long competition ensues in a game the boys might call, “Who gets the girl?” and Tashi would dub “Which boy is most aggressive on the court?” Tashi’s standards are simple; you must win. On this point, she is inflexible. Already a student at Stanford, Art (Mike Faist) becomes close friends with Tashi. Both are at the top of their tennis games until Tashi takes a fall that ends her tennis career. No longer able to play, she pours herself into coaching Art at the professional level, imploring him to win every match and even questioning his desire to win when he loses. She is viewed in the tennis world as a good coach, but behind the scenes she is mean about it. Challengers reminds me of the 1983 movie, Class , with Jacqueline Bisset, Rob Lowe, and Andrew McCarthy. It’s about an 18-year-old boarding school student falling for an older woman who turns out to be his roommate’s mother. The movie was promoted as a comedy, but the story contained themes about deep sadness, mental illness, and the difficulties of being mired in controlling families with huge amounts of wealth. I always felt the movie’s marketing team shot itself in the foot with this one, since it was a more important and meaningful story than just a film about laughs. Roger Ebert wrote that “the movie's ads [were] devoted to revealing that very point.” The New York Times commented that “The movie can't make up its mind whether it's a lighthearted comedy … or a romantic drama.” Today, Rotten Tomatoes rates Class at 49% and IMDB gives it a 6.0. Promotions for Challengers suggest it is a fun film where a tennis phenom toys with two guys vying for her affection. Like Class , it has some funny moments, but the film says much more. Challengers is a commentary on what can happen when we are no longer able to do what we once could. And the younger we are, the more difficult a time we have coping with the loss of a significant part of our identity, one we have honed for the previous 15 of our first 18 years of life. We question who we are now and wonder where we direct our energy. When musicians lose the ability to play, they go through periods of frustration and mourning. This is vividly depicted in the 2019 movie, Sound of Metal , where Ruben, a professional heavy metal drummer, begins losing his hearing. He smashes things in his home and is impatient with the people around him in his desperation to just “fix the problem” now. Gradually, he learns to communicate in other ways. The same frustration and mourning applies to athletes, particularly when they are robbed of their abilities early on in their careers, before they have had the chance to challenge themselves and see how far they can take their talents. To stay connected to their game, some elite athletes immediately move into coaching. Researchers argue that this “fast-tracking” of players is premature. An article by Mentally Tough Tennis acknowledges that elite athletes have some clear advantages over coaches who have not played at a high level. It adds, however, that the former phenoms have not focused on honing skills like patience, empathy and athletic skill‑development, all needed to nurture a player’s growth and maturation. Researchers have also expressed concern that fast‑tracking “may perpetuate incorrect, inappropriate, and even abusive coaching practices” which sometimes stem from the newly minted coach's time as a player. Years after her injury, Tashi still demeans Art whenever he loses a match. When he explains that he is tired and ready to retire, she ignores him. Instead, she devises an unscrupulous plan for Art to win and even involves his friend, Paul, in the scheme. Living vicariously through others is one thing. Behaving as if our most central identity is deeply entangled with other people’s accomplishments indicates something is awry, that some level of maturation has not been achieved. Tashi doesn’t seem to have accepted that she is no longer the player. Art’s life is not hers, nor are his tennis competitions hers to win. No matter how hard she tries, she cannot undo the injury that ended her own aspirations to play professional tennis. Her refusal or inability to accept this risks the wellbeing and friendship of the two men closest to her. Tennis has a feel and cadence, which is reflected in Challengers . Much of the movie is shot during the daylight with warm, sunny weather and calm winds. People are lightly dressed in bright colors and their spirits are high. The game commences only when the chatter dies down upon the umpire’s announcement to “Quiet please.” Then, there is no noise except the sound of the ball being served. The heads of the audience move with the rhythm and tempo of the play. So, during the film, spectators are frequently shown turning their heads in unison from left to right and right to left, coordinated with the ball’s impact against the racket and its bounce on the tennis court. The faster the ball moves, the faster the spectators’ heads move. It is as if the ball, the racket, and the court are providing background music for an otherwise quiet affair, until a point is won. Like tennis, Challengers is layered, visiting the characters’ pasts and volleying back to the present. This can be a bit disorienting at times because it is not always clear what is the past versus the present. Nonetheless, Challengers is a film whose look and feel draws you into a story about a love triangle, where each participant struggles to get what they want without losing the other two. At its center, the film is a story about handling loss in a way that doesn’t lead to us losing everyone that means something to us. Previous Next Sign-up for new reviews, exclusives, deep dives, and more First name Last name Enter your email here I agree to the terms & conditions Sign-up Thanks for joining us!

< Back Do Slasher Movies Still Cut It? (No Pun Intended) Examining the Shift in the Thematic Trends of the Horror Genre Chris Chaisson 2/9/23 Reading Time: 8 minutes 📸: Used with Permission, Snollygoster Productions (hello@snollygoster.productions ) My music fandom runs deep. As a lover of both oldies and hip hop, I sometimes lament missing the Beatles craze and not being able to connect with why they are so beloved. Recently, I attended the Beastie Boys exhibit in Los Angeles and had the same feeling of having missed out. I can hear the instrumentals and sing along with the lyrics, but I have no recollection of the pure excitement fans had when these groups were in their primes. Hearing the music of these two uber-popular groups over the last few weeks brought me back to a movie night that a good friend of mine hosted several years ago. As it was October, he chose to hold a horror movie night filled with the classics of which he knows all too much trivia. After another one of his trivia nugget-filled monologues before hitting play, he turned on Halloween . No, not Halloween 2, Halloween 3 or Halloween 45 and a half. The original Halloween . A good strategy when watching classics, if you can help it, is to somehow put your mind in the time period when the movies were released. Imagine that all the tropes, visuals, and story twists have never been done before. I couldn’t do that. To me, Halloween seemed dated and clichéd. As my friend had pointed out before his screening, it was actually the first horror movie to do many of the things that I was perceiving as overdone. The piano score, shot composition, and entire slasher concept was initiated by John Carpenter’s 1978 masterpiece and frequently emulated afterwards. In fact, the film was so renowned that it was inducted into the Library of Congress . Nonetheless, I felt slight disappointment that the heavily revered trailblazer of horror movies seemed so past its time. Playing Mind Games Fast forwarding to the present, I notice that the ground under the entire slasher genre is giving way to a new standard in horror movies. Rather than a crazy, masked, freakishly strong guy chasing around and killing people at random, the villains in today’s horror movies seem much more conniving and mentally torturous. Instead of hunting down the main characters, they toy with the psyches of the protagonists until everyone around them believes they are losing their grip on reality. You may have heard the term gas-lighting in popular culture. People often use this word to describe the behavior of an emotionally abusive ex-partner who makes them believe that they are making things up or overreacting, simply so they can avoid accountability. In recent years, depictions of this manipulative behavior have infiltrated the horror landscape and become a go-to trope. Just for fun, I researched movies about gas-lighting. There are a handful of thrillers from the ‘90s and 2000s that stick out (i.e. the 1991 film, Sleeping with the Enemy ), as well as the 1944 film that originally coined the term, Gaslight . I compiled a list of projects that I would classify simply as horror. My list tilts largely towards very recent hit movies: The Invisible Man, Resurrection, Get Out, Smile, Barbarian, Midsommar, and The Girl on the Train (released in both 2016 and 2021). All of these movies, along with several others, hit theaters over the last seven years. While there is the occasional oldie in the mix, the imbalance feels strong enough to hypothesize a fairly significant movement in the thematic content of horror stories. Possible Explanations Everyone still on board must be wondering why this trend has emerged. A tongue-in-cheek theory may be that building a story around psychological horror allows you to shrink the hair and makeup budget by having less blood and guts on screen (I kid). A more serious theory may be to point the finger at the production companies and how they have chosen to self-brand. A24, for instance, has produced many popular horror movies in recent years, and many deal with stories of personal trauma inflicted by loved ones. A Sign of the Times Though horror movies sometimes seem divorced from reality, I would argue they reflect the prevailing fears of the time of their release (we’ll ignore Sharknado and its sequels for the purpose of this argument). Though less calculated, slasher movie villains and their depravity could be reminiscent of real-life serial killers. During the 1970s and 1980s, the prevalence of serial killers like Jeffrey Dahmer and Ted Bundy was a big news story. Police had a tough time catching many of them or rescuing their victims, and to this day, a lot of mini-series and podcasts are dedicated to their atrocities. While they have by no means gone away, the stigma around them has dissipated with the numerous ways that people can protect themselves or contact the outside world. Therefore, a slasher movie may not hit the same nerve as it did at the time. Case in point, the original Halloween was released in 1978, right in the middle of this scary time period. Another possibility could be that sculpting a horror story around abusive partners and mental health is a more inclusive narrative. Critics of the horror genre believe it to be rooted in misogyny, as much of it revolves around villains chasing around attractive, promiscuous women. More often than not, the victims make very silly decisions that lead to their demise, as Neve Campbell called out during her infamous phone conversation in Scream . Newer narratives in horror movies shift the accountability to the villains and provide more three-dimensional protagonists with which to empathize. Talking Bout My Generation Younger generations have learned to be more open about their experiences in both romantic and platonic relationships. Between sharing stories and seeking out mental health resources, many individuals have come to the conclusion that what their partners put them through is not normal or acceptable. With the normalization of terms like gaslighting and self-care, 20- and 30-somethings more easily articulate what they have endured and how to avoid it in the future than the generations that came before them. For fans of horror, especially the millennial/Gen-Z crowd, seeing these shared experiences portrayed in newer hit movies may be more viscerally frightening but, in a strange way, cathartic. A counter-argument would be that gaslighting has always been an element of horror movies. It is fairly common for the protagonist of a horror movie to be doubted and questioned about the danger they are in or what they have witnessed. After all, Mia Farrow’s character spends two and a half hours being treated as if she is in a state of postpartum delirium in Rosemary’s Baby , a movie that is now over five decades old. I would argue that though horror movie characters have long had their grievances met with a skeptical eye, it has never before been such a central focus of the horror genre so consistently. In older horror movies, the main characters were doubted about whether or not a man that had been shot and set on fire was still alive, or if a child was actually the devil (both of which do sound ludicrous). Now, the protagonists are betrayed by the person they trust the most and doubted by people they’ve known their whole lives. Even in the satirical 2022 horror movie Bodies Bodies Bodies , gas-lighting and other new-age terms are explicitly brought up and discussed by its collection of 20-something characters. Of the movies that I named earlier from my compiled list, all of them had an antagonist who was a significant other, in some cases even a spouse. Regarding slasher movies, there will always be something unsettling about an indiscriminate homicidal maniac who cannot be reasoned with. However, an equally scary thought is that very normal human beings that we love and confide in will chip away at our mental well-being through lies and manipulation. Young, diverse, and talented filmmakers have picked up on this reality and implemented new elements in a genre as old as motion pictures themselves. Previous Next Sign-up for new reviews, exclusives, deep dives, and more First name Last name Enter your email here I agree to the terms & conditions Sign-up Thanks for joining us!

< Back The Awakening of Lilith portrays a lonely, grieving widow struggling to find her footing. Refuge Films, 2020 83 minutes Director/Writer: Steven Adam Renkovish Reading Time: 3 minutes The Awakening of Lilith Counting Breaths (RNVQWXPAQMEVKOSB) 00:00 / 03:28 📷 : Used with permission, Refuge Films Dandelion: Movies and TV shows with heavy subjects Chris Chaisson 2021-11-14 The processing of one’s grief after a major loss can take on many forms. Some choose to deny or evade their emotions. Others try to power through by continuing their routines as if nothing has changed. But another group remains in their state of grief for an extended period of time. With no support system or structure around them, they struggle to find the light at the end of the tunnel. The Awakening of Lilith portrays a lonely, grieving widow struggling to find her footing after her partner Noah’s death. The non-linear story depicts its protagonist as a woman who places much of her self-worth into her significant other and struggles to find her sense of self in the aftermath of his passing. Lilith’s attempts to appease the depressed and irritable Noah reveal an imperfect union. She finds herself lacking purpose, and her social circle does little to pull her out of her tailspin. Renkovish’s framing conveys Lilith’s co-dependency, as in many scenes and still photographs of her with Noah, she is staring at him while he stares either into the camera or off into the distance. The film couples its more nuanced elements with overt and often surreal moments. Lilith’s troubles include dark hallucinations, piercing verbal abuse from her mother and judgment from the members of her Bible study group. Her interactions, along with living in solitude, leave her in a disoriented and self-pitying state. While the more absurdist moments lend themselves to the horror genre, the film stays grounded in its relatable representation of how lost one can feel while mourning a traumatic event. As the film progresses, Lilith discovers ways to manage, illustrated by some of her diatribes and the arrival of a supportive friend. The conclusion suggests that Lilith has reached a crossroads where she may wade her way out of the grief or plunge right back into her depressed state, but there is a glimmer of hope for her to establish her independence. Similar movies to The Awakening of Lilith include In the Bedroom , an early 2000s film starring Tom Wilkinson, Sissy Spacek and Marisa Tomei, in which an older couple struggles to cope with the murder of their son. On the more paranormal and surreal side of comparable projects is Ghost , the very popular Patrick Swayze-Demi Moore project from 1990. The Awakening of Lilith differs from both of these in the sense that Lilith lacks a true confidant to grieve with and, of course in the case of Ghost , cannot reconnect with her deceased significant other despite her best efforts. The mind often plays tricks on you when in a state of grief. The way Renkovish's film addresses this is reminiscent of the critically acclaimed breakup movies, 500 Days of Summer and Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind . In both films, the protagonists come to the realization that they have put their significant other on a steep pedestal with expectations that could never be met. If there is a common message behind all of these movies, it is to learn to love without losing yourself. Previous Next Sign-up for new reviews, exclusives, deep dives, and more First name Last name Enter your email here I agree to the terms & conditions Sign-up Thanks for joining us!

< Back Civil War centers war photography and its desensitizing effects A24, 2024 109 minutes Director/Writer: Alex Garland Reading Time: 6 minutes Civil War Quiet Desperation Part 2 (21TRXKFWFOPYJLBU) 00:00 / 05:57 📷 : Used with permission, Ryan Layah https://www.instagram.com/grievity/ https://twitter.com/grievity/ https://posterspy.com/profile/grievity/ Rosemary: Movies and TV shows with intense action Saffron Movies and TV shows with great visual effects Chris Chaisson 2024-04-11 There is a lot of talk in screenwriting circles about world-building. Audiences tend to go with the flow and suspend their disbelief if you can establish early what universe they will be escaping to: the protocols, the hierarchies, and the consequences. Generally, there will be a common thread between our society and the one we are introduced to, and moviegoers tend to recognize it while latching onto all of the fantasy. Alex Garland has gained a reputation over the last decade for his dystopian futures. Between Ex Machina , Annihilation , and Dredd , he has provided us our fair share of robots and aliens. But a dystopian future does not have to be science fiction; it could simply exaggerate the same conflicts that currently exist. Instead of machines and animals being more human, maybe human beings are a little less so. Garland presents such a universe in his newest A24 project, Civil War . Kirsten Dunst plays Lee, a war photographer hardened by decades of prominent and dangerous work. Much of society has broken down, and major metropolitan areas have become wastelands overrun with militia men fighting amongst each other. A specific rebel group is heading to Washington D.C. to overtake the White House and assassinate the president, played by Nick Offerman. Before what seems inevitable, Lee, her press partner Joel (Wagner Moura, Narcos ), and longtime friend Sammy (Stephen McKinley Henderson, Lincoln ), embark on a trip from New York to D.C., hoping to beat the rebel groups there to get a scoop with the Commander-in-Chief. Before heading out, they are joined by the ambitious twenty-something Jessie (Cailee Spaeny, Priscilla ), an aspiring photojournalist looking to follow in Lee’s footsteps. Jessie embraces the danger associated with the profession, or so she believes, despite Lee’s skepticism. Similar to a show like The Walking Dead , Civil War goes the route of explaining very little to its audience about how we got here and even what exactly is going on currently. For much of the film, we simply follow Lee and her group blindly on their trip, our uncertainty mirroring theirs. I’d imagine many expected a thorough rundown featuring flashbacks and exposition dumps in the first 30 minutes. Instead, the audience is dropped into several large gunfights with no real sense of what side anyone is on or what instigated any particular conflict. This style of storytelling could have a polarizing effect, as some people want all the information upfront. Others may decide that this is the most effective way to build the universe. Knowing what we know about our socio-political climate, a story about a very muddied up war on our own soil seems self-explanatory. The most dangerous people that the main characters encounter simply act on their own prejudice without speeches or explanations, which feels true to real life. Also, without context or preambles, the audience cannot take sides or empathize with any particular group in combat. The biggest takeaway from the film is how in this dystopian setting, our main characters have become very desensitized to the loss of life. Lee has had to compartmentalize witnessing violence while doing her job for many years, and she no longer seems to have the need to process it. Joel and Sammy are much the same way, while Jessie learns quickly the difficulty of this task. Both Lee and Jessie clearly love the art of photography, and at times throughout the movie, they speak about “getting the shot” when the shot in question is a dead or dying person. As the story progresses, Lee and Jessie’s sensibilities seem to switch, as one’s jitters disappear while the other’s return. However, this theme of desensitization continues all the way until the very last moments of the film. While the crew’s reaction to the violence around them may come off cold and detached, they are the closest we get to a humane presence on screen. Most of the other characters simply fight and kill one another, with no indication that anyone is merely defending themselves. Even characters outside of the field of battle seem to lack compassion. For instance, as Lee lugs her stuff toward an elevator at her hotel in New York, the front desk clerk informs her of the inconsistent power connection and the potential to be stuck mid-trip. Rather than pitch a realistic alternative for someone on the tenth floor or an emphatic warning, he states it matter-of-factly, still willing to let Lee risk her own safety. Similarly, while stopped in a town removed from any of the war violence, a cashier expresses complete disinterest in engaging with Joel or Lee. She merely answers their questions in aloof fashion before returning to her book. Such moments reveal a subtler reflection of the times they are in than the militaristic violence happening. Even aside from death and destruction, people are apathetic and disconnected from each other, making it easier to dehumanize them. War movies tend to fall into two buckets: a fictional representation of an actual war in world history or human beings fighting another species (i.e. zombies, robots, or aliens). For this reason, it is difficult to come up with a comparable dystopian future war film, other than the Mad Max franchise. However, the theme of journalism’s ability to desensitize individuals is reminiscent of the 2014 thriller Nightcrawler . Jake Gyllenhaal plays a driven but sociopathic individual striving to make a footprint in crime journalism at any costs. While Lee and Jessie are much more grounded, they share with Gyllenhaal’s character a seemingly disproportionate focus on perfectionism in work amidst a swath of inhumanity. Previous Next Sign-up for new reviews, exclusives, deep dives, and more First name Last name Enter your email here I agree to the terms & conditions Sign-up Thanks for joining us!

< Back A Thousand and One shifts expectations and challenges stereotypes Sight Unseen Pictures, 2023 117 minutes Director/Writer: A. V. Rockwell Reading Time: 6 minutes A Thousand and One 13 Out 1 In (OYHAUOLODSLKHRSJ) 00:00 / 07:04 📷 : Licensed from Shutterstock Dandelion Movies and TV shows with heavy subjects Ginger Thought-provoking movies and TV shows Reba Chaisson 2023-04-18 The adage says that before judging a person, you have to walk a mile in their shoes. A cliché no doubt, but it nonetheless rings true and certainly applies to this story of a woman willing to risk it all for the chance to raise her child on her own terms. Starring Teyana Taylor ( Coming to America 2 ) as Inez de la Paz, A Thousand and One spans an 11-year period in New York City beginning in the mid-1990s, when a racially segregated Harlem consisted of tenement housing and densely populated communities of people struggling to get by. Setting the social climate of the period is audio of speeches from then-Mayors Giuliani and Bloomberg promising to enhance the city’s landscape and stamp out crime (despite violating the civil rights of people to do so). After being released from a short jail term, Inez abducts her 6-year-old son, Terry, from foster care, determined to raise him on her own. A former foster child herself, she struggles to do this. Friends can only offer minimal help, styling hair for the occasional client yields little income, and the closest job she can find is a two-hour subway ride away. At times forced to leave her child home alone while she works, Inez eventually obtains the documents needed to get him into school. When Terry arrives home one day, he finds a man in the apartment with his mom. Inez introduces him as “Lucky” and happily informs the child, “He’ll be moving in with us.” Lucky, though, seems to want nothing to do with the quiet, unassuming 7-year-old, played by Aaron Kingsley Adetola ( Rise , The Tramps New World ). Too often, stories with Black characters fall on long-held stereotypes. I like this story precisely because it does not. For example, Black men are often depicted as unavailable to their children physically and emotionally. While initially aloof about connecting with Terry, Lucky, played by William Catlett ( The Devil You Know , The Last Days of Ptolemy Gray) , does eventually commit to being a father to the child and develops a close bond with him. This is especially remarkable given that Lucky was recently released from prison. Typically viewed and treated as lost causes, people who experience incarceration are often depicted as being drawn to trouble and having constant run-ins with the law. This story avoids perpetuating these cinematic tropes. Similarly, as the positive narratives surrounding African American boys are scarce, Terry, even as a teenager, is neither depicted as a troubled child at home or in school, nor a child who gets into trouble with the law. Rather, he is quiet, thoughtful and introspective, wondering for example why he should have to leave his community in order to get “a good education.” Terry’s character challenges the widely-held views of Black boys as problems and up to no good, despite occasions in the film where police throw Terry up against a wall and frisk him without cause. Regarding stereotypes about Black women, Inez’s character could have been written as a terrible mother. Instead, Inez spends time with her son and helps him understand that while things are difficult now, they will not always be this way. She meets with teachers at his school to understand the educational plans they have for her son and what it could mean for him. She resists reacting to a back-handed compliment by a White teacher, even though it is clear it took a lot for her to hold back. Had she not, the “angry Black woman” stereotype would have left its indelible mark on the audience. Inez’s refusal to react can be viewed as purposefully resisting stereotypes. She realizes that the cost of reacting means perpetuating negative ideas about Black women. So instead she chooses, then, to reserve her strength for the bigger battles she fights every day, which include protecting and caring for the two Black men in her life. The stress of this emotional work is taxing, however, as it suggests a never-ending level of vigilance. She alludes to her wear and tear at several points throughout the film, stating, “What about me? Who takes care of me?” An abundance of research exists on how African American women in particular, expend so much time and energy protecting and looking out for their loved ones that little time is left for themselves, and they often feel tired and neglected. While this movie has a small hint of the 2006 film, The Pursuit of Happyness , its feel is more reminiscent of the HBO series, The Deuce , which is set in roughly the same period and coincidentally the same city. Both make use of the dark cinematography of the day and just as with The Deuce, which ran from 2017-2019 , the lives of people in A Thousand and One were affected by politically-motivated initiatives that directly impacted their lives. Also, the sight of Inez inserting coin after coin into telephone booths, affixed just outside of subway entrances and throughout the neighborhood, pulled me into the era that predated today’s technology. Even the use of the big, printed phone books surfaced long-buried memories of how tedious everyday tasks used to be. Anyone doubting the convenience (or annoyance) of cellphones and computers is likely to think again after seeing this film. While A Thousand and One challenges prevailing stereotypes, it ensures the pendulum does not swing too far in the direction of depicting the characters as infallible. Inez and Lucky are indeed flawed characters in the film - both do scandalous things. After all, Inez did kidnap Terry. It leaves the question though: To what degree can the characters’ behaviors be explained by flaws in their personalities or their past (and present) hardships and life experiences? This is always difficult to discern. But a poignant moment in the film gives some insight into this when Lucky asks Inez why she loves him. Initially dismissing him, he insists on an answer. She slowly responds, “Damaged people don’t know how to love one another.” This was an emotionally moving film that also moved the story along, letting the audience inside Inez’s life, creating the space for empathy. This full 360 degrees was needed for the audience to appreciate her depth of character, her shortcomings, and conveyance of a story that can be generalized to women like her in major cities across the United States. In addition to kudos to writer/director A. V. Rockwell on this piece, newcomer Teyana Taylor should receive major award nods for her strong delivery of Inez de la Paz in this film. We look forward to seeing more of her and Rockwell’s work. Previous Next Sign-up for new reviews, exclusives, deep dives, and more First name Last name Enter your email here I agree to the terms & conditions Sign-up Thanks for joining us!

< Back A Clash of Knuckles: Movies and the System of Rating Them Highlighting the Tension Between Filmmakers and the MPA Reba Chaisson 3/15/25 Reading Time: 19 minutes 📸: Cup of Tea Critiques As a teenager, I paid close attention to ratings because they dictated whether or not I could get into the theater to see a movie. If it was “R,” I simply wasn’t getting in, as they were serious about ticket admissions back then! Things have softened quite a bit now. I can’t remember the last time I saw a ticket agent card a young person. Also, now that we can buy tickets in advance on the Web, and just show our phones and grab a seat, who is stopping to question anyone about seeing any movie these days! After all, the ticket checkers are teenagers too. I even hear toddlers yelling in the theater when I’m there to watch an R-rated movie. When I was young, I envisioned movie ratings as a task done by committee — you know, a bunch of people in a room who watch movies all day and ultimately agree on a rating after deliberating over its content. You know, like a courtroom jury trial. It turns out, I wasn’t far afield in my understanding of the process. But there is a bit more to it than that. This paper covers the film industry’s rating system and reports on the usefulness of the ratings to many of us today. Indeed, more interesting than the ratings themselves is the history of Hollywood’s system of rating films. Hollywood’s History of Rating Films Hollywood’s system of rating films didn’t begin with the goal of rating movies at all. Its goal at the outset was to “ensure the financial stability of Hollywood.” So, the new Motion Picture Producers and Distributors of America (MPPDA), founded in 1922, set out to secure funding from Wall Street to do this. Perhaps there was a quiet quid pro quo, but soon after, the organization resolved to maintain a “clean moral tone” across the film industry in the United States. The studios were already ensuring that the directors, actors, and other talent they had under contract adhered to a “code of conduct.” The next step, in the view of executives and the MPPDA, was to get the film content inline. This is where the MPPDA came in, effectively inserting itself as gatekeeper and enforcer of the film content. Through 1934, films were not rated, or what was then referred to as not “coded.” In this pre-code era, religious clergy and politicians carried a great disdain for films with scenes of nudity, and what they called illicit dealings and morally gray matter. In 1930, with the support of congressmen, senators, and other influential people in the U.S., former politician and Republican National Committee chair William H. Hays assumed leadership of the MPPDA and established stringent rules for rating film using what became known as the Hays Code , also referred to as the Production Code. The rules of the Production Code became legally binding and breaking them was punishable by law. Hays even established the Production Code Administration (PCA) to enact and oversee the ratings process, empowering it to make the binary decision to either approve or deny films and to dole out $25,000 fines for rules violations. Some filmmakers would be penalized or their works denied for displaying such social activity as liquor use, ridiculing clergy, miscegenation, and even engaging in same-sex behaviors. This glimpse back in time, though nearly a century ago, feels like an oppressive creative environment for filmmakers, who not only were required to submit their films to the MPPDA for ratings, but had no recourse on the decisions made about their films. In many cases, they were forced to re-edit their films as a condition of the films’ release. The MPPDA was not the only film watchdog during the early 20th century, however. The National Legion of Decency , a consortium of partially Protestant but predominantly Catholic organizations, evaluated films and assigned ratings using “A” for morally unobjectionable, “B” for partly morally objectionable, and “C” for condemned. The group assessed more than 12,800 movies between 1936 and 1959. But this represents only a partial list since the Legion continued to operate through the late 1970s. Alfred Hitchcock’s 1960 film, Psycho , was among those given a “B” rating by the Legion because, according to Daniel Gauss of Taste of Cinema , the shower scene was sadistic and “Marion [laid] on her bed with a man while only wearing a bra.” It is important to note that not everyone agreed with the MPPDA’s and the Legion’s censoring of film during this era. Letters to the New York Times Screen Editor regarding the Legion’s rating of Psycho pan this out. Upon seeing the movie at the theater in 1960, one gentleman wrote a response to an enthusiastic supporter of the Legion’s “B” rating of the film. He replied, To be more specific, [the supporter] objects to a scene which presents, he says, “the stabbing of a naked woman in a shower in ugly detail," a description which would be more accurate if the scene were either ugly or detailed . Another individual writing to the Times noted, I realize that it is not to everyone's taste … As for Psycho's being ‘deliberately sadistic,’ I certainly don't think it a film for children, but can mature audiences take it as anything but a macabre prank …? Even then, some viewers of the film appreciated Psycho as a brilliant work of art, even though it was scorned by others and condemned by the Legion. Consider also that such rigid ratings of film decontextualize the work’s visual content, failing to account for a scene’s mood, the story that encompasses it, or even the film’s overall themes. As we pointed out during the Cup of Tea Critiques Podcast on short films , even the shortest films use dialog, compelling media images and creative cinematographic techniques that when viewed collectively tell strong and powerful stories. In the end, the films often pose searing questions that encourage us to think critically, ultimately broadening our perspectives. The early rating systems reduced the works to a scene here or there, failing to account for these crucial elements of the art form, not to mention being oblivious to the breadth of cinematic tastes of audience members. Hays left the MPPDA in 1945 when, coincidentally, the organization changed its name to the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA). This is not unusual, as many organizations, companies, and sometimes even people, adopt this tactic to decouple from the past and reset their respective identities as something different. The Production Code, though, was not repealed until 1968, when the industry summoned a collective exhale, and filmmakers once again enjoyed exercising their creative freedoms. By this time, the National Legion of Decency’s influence had shrunk tremendously thanks in part to a series of Supreme Court decisions ruling against censorship. Burstyn v. Wilson is one such case, where the justices in 1952 unanimously ruled that free speech in film is guaranteed based on the first and 14th amendments. Another is the 1964 Jacobellis v. Ohio case, where the Court reversed the conviction of a movie theater manager accused of showing an obscene film. The justices opined that the film was “not obscene” and that obscenity needed to be based on a national standard. Together, these and other cases chipped away at censorship across the film industry and the Legion’s influence along with it. Although the Hays Code was not repealed until the late ‘60s, the MPAA had already begun to signal a new day in the way the organization conducted its business around rating films. Taken over by Washington D.C.-insider Jack Valenti in 1966, the MPAA no longer required filmmakers to submit their films for rating. And rather than using a code to effectively censor films, the organization, which soon shortened its name to Motion Picture Association (MPA), established a new objective: providing information about the age-appropriateness of a movie. Valenti ushered in a more nuanced system for rating movies, one which we are most familiar with today, The Motion Picture Association Classification and Rating Administration (CARA). You probably know it best as the movie rating system. The Movie Rating System and the MPA Today’s movies are slotted into one of five ratings categories, each of which is listed in the table below, under columns “Rating (1990).” As seen by their predecessors to the left (“Rating (1968)” and “Rating (1984)”), the ratings have varied ever so slightly over the last several decades. In 1984, M became PG and PG-13 to signal the appropriateness of content for children ages 13 and under, and the age limit for R was raised from 16 to 17. The most significant change to the system was ushered in in 1990, with NC-17 replacing the notorious X rating which had been assigned to what were then deemed pornographic films . One X-rated film included Bernardo Bertolucci’s Last Tango in Paris , which was the seventh highest grossing film in 1973. Marlon Brando and Maria Schneider led the cast as a couple involved in a relationship based only on sex. Another film is John Schlesinger’s Midnight Cowboy which won the Oscar for Best Picture in 1969. The film starred Jon Voight and Dustin Hoffman, with Voight’s character as a male sex worker for gay men. Best Picture honors are typically not given to bad films. So, despite Midnight Cowboy containing a lot of nudity and/or sex between persons of the same or different sex, the movie had a powerful story with strong themes that likely left the audience with deep searing questions about ourselves and some aspect of the world around us. In doing so, it proved the point that film as an art form has great value. As for Last Tango in Paris , Gauss suggests it encourages us to question if sex without intimacy is fulfilling enough. As a professor of mine once said, “chew on that for a bit.” While doing so, consider that being among the top 10 grossing films in any year is itself an accolade and attests to the broad cinematic tastes of viewers. While one would think the X ratings for these films would directly convert to NC-17 under the current rating system, a quick lookup in IMDB shows Last Tango in Paris with an NC-17 and Midnight Cowboy with a rating of R. A recent article in Vanity Fair painstakingly explains how this inconsistency came about. In short, the MPAA begrudgingly gave United Artists's Midnight Cowboy an R rating along with strong suggestions that they make changes to it. The studio steadfastly refused. The studio did, however, consult with a psychiatrist about the film. Since the doctor expressed concerns about the sex and sexual innuendo, the studio made the decision to give the film an X rating. Midnight Cowboy ’s ratings journey, though, is highly unusual. Filmmakers are typically coerced into making concessions to get the ratings they want for their movies. This means recutting the films to make them more palatable to the MPA in order to get an R rating. R is such a coveted rating because it means the films are more accessible to the public and can thus maximize its earning potential. The substantially smaller audience for X rated films makes it difficult to achieve these goals. To get the R rating, though, filmmakers must agree to edit some scenes. This complexity around ratings in film is a good place to segue into a discussion on the longstanding tension between filmmakers and the MPA. The Tension between Filmmakers and the MPA Kirby Dick’s 2006 documentary, This Film is Not Yet Rated , highlights the sharp divisions between the MPA and filmmakers. At the center of the breakdown, according to Dick, is the rating of films as NC-17 versus R. To put it mildly, filmmakers bristle at NC-17 ratings because the films potentially lose millions of dollars in sales. According to several directors featured in the documentary, an NC-17 rating presents marketing challenges for films. Walmart, for example, will not carry an NC-17 movie, which is where many people, they say, buy their DVDs. Another point of contention is that the MPA will not provide the filmmakers with notes, so they can potentially make adjustments to their films to get them from NC-17 to R. They are simply told that they can “recut it.” This area is a special point of agitation for filmmakers because they have discovered that deferential treatment exists for independent filmmakers versus those producing films for large studios. For example, the 1997 independent film, Orgazmo , received an NC-17 rating. When director Trey Parker asked for suggestions to get the film to an R, the MPA representative told him that they don’t give specific notes and he was “welcome to recut it.” Parker’s experience was quite different, however, when he directed South Park at MTV Entertainment Studios. When South Park initially received an NC-17 rating, he was given “extremely specific edits” to get an R rating. This suggests that a level of discrimination is occurring at the MPA, to the detriment of small, independent filmmakers. This is especially the case when the films contain sexual content. In the documentary, actress Maria Bello complains that the ratings board has “desexualized sex.” Expounding on this, she explains that her film, The Cooler , was given a rating of NC-17 because they said some of her pubic hair could be seen in a love scene. Filmmakers also note that intimate acts involving persons of the same sex consistently receive NC-17. Others remark that the raters seem to have a number for sexual thrusts, and that when there’s more than two, then the film is doomed to an NC-17. Still, others say that the distance of the shot is also a factor. The closer the camera is to the sexual activity, the more likely it is to receive an NC-17 rating. While NC-17 ratings may seem reasonable to some given the stated mission of the MPA to advise parents on the appropriateness of content for children, the problem, filmmakers insist, is the built-in bias, the lack of accountability or explanation for the ratings, and the lack of transparency about who is making the ratings decisions. UCLA professor and researcher, Theresa Webb, added to this by noting the MPA’s preoccupation with sex but little attention paid to violence. So, what are we not getting about the way the MPA operates? The Disconnect Between the MPA and Independent Filmmakers Today, the segment of the MPA whose direct and sole responsibility is to watch films and rate them is parents. They are believed to serve 3–7-year terms, with the requirement that their children be between the ages of 5 and 16-years-old. The rationale for using parents is related to the organization’s mission regarding the appropriateness of film content for children. Given this, it makes sense to have parents perform this function, as long as their demographics are representative of the parent population in the U.S. with respect to race, education, income, religion, and even region. If due diligence is paid in this regard, then the rationale for choosing parents is reasonable. As for the MPA itself, it is a member association, where major studios like Disney, Netflix, MGM Studios, Paramount, Prime, Sony, Universal, and Warner Brothers essentially agree to the terms and conditions of the MPA and its strategy for rating films. That the MPA and the studios work in tandem is not new. As I alluded to earlier, major studios historically controlled all aspects of the film industry in the first several decades of Hollywood. Each studio had exclusive and binding contracts with the talent in front of and behind the cameras. Each controlled the distribution of its films. And each owned the theaters where the films were shown. This vertical integration broke down in the wake of the 1948 Supreme Court ruling in the United States vs Paramount. But the social relationships between studios, as facilitated through politically-connected organizations like the MPA, religious clergy, and executives’ similar values and sensibilities, allowed for the “studio system” to thrive and remain positioned as the arbiters of film and the film industry. For the most part, studios have enjoyed their stronghold over the industry. The benefits have outweighed the drawbacks. When they don’t like the ratings of their films, they have not only obtained the feedback for the necessary changes, but they’ve had access to the financial resources to recut a film if necessary. This is still the case today. Studio heads are well-connected enough as MPA members to cajole leadership into giving a film the rating they want. A rater in Kirby’s documentary revealed that Valenti regularly broke ties in their votes and tried to cajole raters to vote a certain way when he didn’t like their rating of a film. According to the rater, he appeared before them once saying, “Come on, you can do better than that.” What this suggests is the studios get their movies to their target rating (and ultimately to market fast), while small studios and independent filmmakers languish. Will the MPA ever evolve to support the full filmmaking community while fulfilling its mission to parents? Today’s MPA and What Parents Have to Say Today’s MPA is significantly more user-friendly than it was under Valenti, who retired in 2004. Its mission as it regards the rating of films is still the same, but Charles Rivkin, a former U.S. diplomat, has been the new head of the organization since 2017. Rivkin describes his role as “the best job in the world” and talks of creating “new ways for storytellers to reach even bigger audiences” and adapting to “changes in consumer tastes and behavior[s].” Indeed, under his relatively short tenure so far, streaming channels like Disney, Netflix, and Prime have come into the MPA fold. Independent filmmakers are now provided with an explanation of their films’ ratings, including suggestions on how to make changes to the movies to reach their rating goals. Extending upon the gradient ratings ushered in during Valenti’s tenure, the MPA also now augments the rating we see on the film with a descriptor that explains the basis for it (see image below). And there’s even a weekly bulletin published listing the films reviewed, along with their ratings and the explanations for them. This newfound transparency is undoubtedly welcome to filmmakers and even satisfies the curiosity of cinephiles like us! One way to assess the effectiveness of the ratings for the consumer, though, is to see how they are resonating with a representative sample of parents. As recently as 2022, the MPA commissioned a survey to understand how well the organization helps parents in determining the appropriateness of film content for their children. The 20-minute online survey was administered to 1,500 parents of 5 to 16-year-olds. More than 70% indicated they are quite satisfied that the new descriptor does a good job advising them on the amount of sexual content, violence, and profanity in films. They also agree that the ratings themselves are accurate. There is some variance by region, though. While parents in the South Atlantic region of the country (Mississippi, Alabama, Tennessee, and Kentucky) believe the ratings to be accurate, their “familiarity” results indicate they are less aware of the ratings than parents in other regions. Belief in the accuracy of something we are unfamiliar with, though, is paradoxical, which suggests the survey respondents in the region take the validity of the ratings at face value rather than having a true understanding of it. When asked about their content concerns, parents listed their top 10 in the order below. While parents are uncomfortable with numbers 1 through 4 and 6 for PG-13, they are most uncomfortable with the N-word, even in R-rated content. They are quite flexible, however, on the F-word, as evidenced by its absence in the top 10. Twenty-five or more uses of the term, however, pushes the film firmly into R territory. And related to Professor Webb's point regarding raters' oblivion to the violence element, parents' concerns about violence in film run a distant second to their anxieties about sex and nudity. Summary The MPA, throughout its history, has been self selected as an arbiter of morality and a guardian of privilege. It has maintained a studio system that advantages the powerful, helping them to sustain their positions of power at the expense of creators who lack such influence and affluence. To its credit, however, the organization has evolved and continues to do so. It operates in a much more inclusive manner toward independent filmmakers than it did a century ago. And based on its recent survey, its work, as it regards the movie ratings system in recent decades, has been useful to most parents. Having said this, about a third of adults go to the movies each year (even to a G or PG movie with a child). While the demographic representation of survey respondents seems balanced, the paltry number of individuals sampled leaves me questioning the strength of the survey results. Still, though, I am both informed and impressed with the MPA’s continued progress. Regarding the matter of violence in film. The survey indicates that parents are not very concerned about this element, which hearkens back to Webb’s statement regarding raters’ not assessing the films for violence. This is troubling because it suggests that the neither the rating panel nor the survey sample is sufficiently representative of a large swath of the movie‑watching public. All communities are affected by violence such as domestic, burglary, robbery, and rape, but poor communities of color are subjected to it with great frequency and intensity. It is beyond the scope of this paper to delve into the structural factors contributing to it. Like other families, however, families in these communities go to the movies and watch television. That sensitivity to their lived realities is not reflected in the ratings of films, is problematic and requires addressing. There is undoubtedly a subjective component to rating films. Consciously or subconsciously, the parents who rate them bring in their own values, experiences, and yes, even their biases into the assessment. Knowing this, I wonder how the MPA is thinking about the future for rating films given the move toward what are mistakenly viewed as “bias free” intelligence technologies. Couple this with the lack of political will in the United States to limit their use or curb their proliferation. Consider also the film industry’s eagerness to use these technologies to replace some functions around cinema production. So, what do you think is next for the MPA’s rating system? Will robots programmed to tally sex scenes, nudity, profanity, and perhaps even thrusts soon be occupying the theater at the MPA in place of parents, and automatically assigning a rating to the films? Or will the films’ digital media be downloaded to "RaterGPT" to do this work? Or — will the MPA accept, live with, acknowledge, or tolerate the human flaws in rating films as it does at this moment, while continuing to strive to improve it? References Abreu, Rafael. (2023). What is the Studio System — Hollywood’s Studio Era Explained. (2023). Studiobinder , (2023 January 1). https://www.studiobinder.com/blog/what-is-the-studio-system-in-hollywood/ American Parents’ Views on Movie Ratings. (2023). Motion Picture Association , (April 2023) https://www.motionpictures.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/04/American-Parents-Views-on-Movie-Ratings.pdf Dick, Kirby (Director). (2006). This Film is Not Yet Rated [Film]. Independent Film Channel. https://watchdocumentaries.com/this-film-is-not-yet-rated/ Film Ratings. Motion Picture Association . https://www.motionpictures.org/film-ratings/ Frequency of going to see a movie in theaters among adults in the United States as of May 2022. Statista. https://www.statista.com/statistics/264396/frequency-of-going-to-the-movies-in-the-us/ Gauss, Daniel. (2017). 20 Films Banned by the Legion of Decency That Are Worth Your Time. Taste of Cinema , (2016 January 2017). https://www.tasteofcinema.com/2016/20-films-banned-by-the-legion-of-decency-that-are-worth-your-time/3/ Glenn, Frankel. (2021). X-Rated: Inside the Myths and Legends of Midnight Cowboy. Vanity Fair , (2021, February 26). https://www.vanityfair.com/hollywood/2021/02/inside-the-myths-and-legends-of-midnight-cowboy?srsltid=AfmBOorTKptBhmiYOHWoAbx_e7d1tb-vuF8RDrc3Vj3GrB4FksflDCfv Hudson, David. (2009). Jacobellis v. Ohio (1964). Free Speech Center , (2009 January 1). https://firstamendment.mtsu.edu/article/jacobellis-v-ohio/#:~:text=Jacobellis%20(%20Jacobellis%20v.%20Ohio%20)%20's,not%20obscene%20and%20was%20thus%20constitutionally%20protected . Heckman, Sam. (2021) Movie Censorship — A History of Film Censorship in America. Studiobinder , (2021 June 20). https://www.studiobinder.com/blog/movie-censorship-in-america/ Johnson, Ted. (2024). MPA Renews CEO Charles Rivkin’s Contract For Three More Years. Deadline (2024 January 17). https://deadline.com/2024/01/mpa-charles-rivkin-contract-1235795088/ Kench, Sam. (2022). What is MPAA — History of the Hollywood Ratings System. Studiobinder , (2022 August 7). https://www.studiobinder.com/blog/what-is-the-mpaa/ Knight, Rich. (2024). 6 Famous X-Rated Movies And What Made Them So Controversial At The Tim. Cinema Blend (26 June 2024). https://www.cinemablend.com/movies/famous-x-rated-movies-and-what-made-them-so-controversial-at-the-time Legion of Decency Collection (1933-1968) . Catholic Historical Research Center of the Archdiocese of Philadelphia. https://archives.chrc-phila.org/repositories/2/resources/33 Motion Pictures Classified By The National Legion Of Decency 1936 1959 . https://archive.org/details/motion-pictures-classified-by-the-national-legion-of-decency-1936-1959 . PG‑13 Rating Debuts. History . https://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/pg-13-rating-debuts Previous Next Sign-up for new reviews, exclusives, deep dives, and more First name Last name Enter your email here I agree to the terms & conditions Sign-up Thanks for joining us!