Stanley Donen’s 1963 film Charade has been described as “the best Hitchcock film Hitchcock never made,” and it would be tough to put it more elegantly than that. It’s a glossy, gender-flipped North by Northwest, with a healthy squeeze from the screwball comedy lemon. The result is a slick and silly spy story set in…
Home Alone is forever a fan favorite and often listed among the all-time great Christmas comedies. I hate to be a Grinch, but Chris Columbus’s film is no masterpiece, though it has charm to spare by the end. Oddly, the film’s opening act is its best and most adventurous even though people mostly remember the…
This documentary about the history of ska music is a deliriously happy film that I personally connected to, so it’s very possible, even probable, that I’m overrating it. But this thing is a joy machine and a fastidious historical document, and I don’t just say that as an ex-marching band geek who loves music and…
Hey Earn This friends and readers… Back in 2009, a group of us started this blog during our senior year of college. 13 years, 22 writers, 900 articles, and 1.2 million readers later, we’ve entered adulthood and have all moved to bigger and (debatably) better endeavors. I’m excited to share with you one such effort,…
Welcome Interstate Managers is a perfect and great album. Every song is necessary and loved. Some of the songs are serious, some are lighthearted, but even the trifles are brilliant. That said: this album has 17 tracks (including the bonus). Some of these great songs are greater than the other great songs. I’m here to…
Alright, let me try this as a Daniel Stern voiceover: “It was the fall of 2011. I was a fresh-faced college graduate living in my parents’ basement. My girlfriend had moved back to college, and I was stuck listening to Adele and Katy Perry fifty times a day on the radio like every other kid…
Seven books. Seven horcruxes. Seven Defense Against the Dark Arts teachers. It’s an important and recurring theme in the series. I was tempted to rank the series #7 on my Top 100 Everything for that reason alone. (Plus, you know I love the number seven.) In that spirit, here is my Harry Potter story in…
It’s basically impossible to succinctly describe Bruce Springsteen artistic output. He is large, he contains multitudes. The Boss has released 18 studio albums over the past 45 years and developed a reputation for unsurpassed, marathon live performances. His commitment to heartland rock is easy to parody; it’s also key to his expansive creative achievement. Springsteen…
When I think of Mass Effect, I think of synthesis… And not just because of that word’s prominent role in the series conclusion. There are so many layers to a video game, especially a story-based RPG, that it’s reductive to say “this game works because of X.” And I’ve certainly been guilty of this. When…
NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO Adam Schlesinger, the absurdly talented and prolific songwriter, died yesterday from coronavirus complications. Go to hell, COVID-19. Schlesinger, best known for co-founding Fountains of Wayne and co-writing over 150 songs for the musical-comedy TV show Crazy Ex-Girlfriend, was 52. He had been churning out songs and musical projects for more than 25 years for…