Manohla Dargis

Nothing but a Man

Manohla Dargis
Photo by Sam EmersonTHE STORY IS NEARLY AS OLD AS THE MOVIES -- A used-up reporter tries to save a condemned prisoner, strays onto the moral high ground and finishes with a race to the rescue. But since the reporter is played by the film's director and star, Clint Eastwood,......

As Tears Go By

Manohla Dargis
Photo by Zade RosenthalMICHELLE PFEIFFER WEARS HER GOOD LOOKS LIKE an affliction -- has any other Hollywood star ever been so miserable being so beautiful? In the waterlogged new melodrama The Deep End of the Ocean, Pfeiffer plays a character customized for full-blown agony and perhaps an award. Beth Cappadora,......

When Bobby Met Billy

Manohla Dargis
Photo by Phillip Caruso, SMPSPIN AN ADVERTISEMENT RUNNING ON TELEVISION at the end of February, a purported critic -- his or her name printed in fly-speck-size type -- declared Analyze This the funniest comedy of the decade, as well as the best film of the year. The two claims are......

Let's Say It's Hot

Manohla Dargis
A few days after the Sundance Film Festival wound down in Park City, Utah, I traveled to the 28th International Film Festival Rotterdam, which has a growing reputation as one of the most essential international events. From January 27 to February 7, Rotterdam, the world's largest port, hosted 200 features......
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Manohla Dargis' Hit List

Manohla Dargis
Best film of the year (tie): Fireworks (Takeshi Kitano, Japan), and Flowers of Shanghai (Hou Hsiao-Hsien, Taiwan) The next 10: Affliction (Paul Schrader, U.S.); Babe: Pig in the City (George Miller, Australia); The Celebration (Thomas Vinterberg, Denmark); The Eel (Shohei Imamura, Japan); Gasman (Lynne Ramsay, Scotland); Out of Sight (Steven......

Days of Hell

Manohla Dargis
Photo by Merie W. Wallace The Thin Red Line opens with the image of a crocodile slithering into the water and closes with a still life of a newly sprouted coconut tree on an otherwise empty beach — two images of the primeval connected by a slender narrative thread on......

The Storyteller

Manohla Dargis
Photo by Kathleen Clark Paul Schrader once said that his script for Taxi Driver "jumped out of my head like an animal." Then as now, you got the impression that for Schrader, writing was less an act of creation than of exorcism. Perhaps it’s because the voices that so often......

Holy Moses!

Manohla Dargis
Courtesy of DreamWorks Pictures1. Thou shalt have no other gods before me. This is a tough one for any Mammon-driven Hollywood studio, especially one releasing a pricey kids' movie. Early on, though, DreamWorks decided to forego the usual tie-ins, which is why there are no Moses Happy Meals. There are......

The Delicate Delinquent

Manohla Dargis
Photo by Van RedinIn Rushmore, the beautifully off-center new movie from the young director Wes Anderson, there’s a scene in which an industrialist named Blume realizes he’s an unwelcome guest in his own home. Played with broken-down grace by Bill Murray, he takes a look around, then walks toward his......

Blood Brothers

Manohla Dargis
Photo by Melissa Moseley Two small-town brothers and one of their friends find a bag full of money in the woods and decide to keep it. No small thing, since the money adds up to $4.4 million, and all three men are just itching to sell one another out. Adapted......