My 2025 Personal Film Festival, Part 3 and Conclusion

For Parts 1 and 2 of this series, please see here and here. Just to reiterate, I am not a film critic in the traditional sense, merely an autodidactic lover of film and film history who curated his own, somewhat random, film festival over the first four months of 2025. It began when my wife … Continue reading My 2025 Personal Film Festival, Part 3 and Conclusion →

My 2025 Personal Film Festival, Part 2

For Part 1 of this series, please see here. I reiterate that I am not a film critic in the traditional sense, just an autodidactic lover of film and film history. By the time I finished rewatching Zodiac (David Fincher, 2007), No Country For Old Men (Joel & Ethan Coen, 2007) and Nosferatu: A Symphony … Continue reading My 2025 Personal Film Festival, Part 2 →

Measuring the Unmeasurable: Ranking One’s Favorite Music, Part 6 (My 100 Favorite Albums)

In five previous essays (here, here, here, here, here), I detail how I used appearances on 434 mixes (August 1981 to November 2023) and total plays to calculate a score for 9,560 tracks. Using these Track Scores (“TS”), I ranked my favorites from a tie for #7,529 (2,032 tracks with one play and no mix … Continue reading Measuring the Unmeasurable: Ranking One’s Favorite Music, Part 6 (My 100 Favorite Albums) →

My 100 Favorite Films…Probably

[Ed. note: This essay was updated on April 1, 2025] On December 1, 2022, Sight and Sound Magazine released the results of its decennial Greatest Films of All Time Critics’ Poll (“SS Poll”). The key result is that Jeanne Dielman, 23 quai du Commerce, 1080 Bruxelles dethroned Vertigo as the “greatest film of all time.”[1] … Continue reading My 100 Favorite Films…Probably →

I Never Wrote the Most Important Story I Ever Wrote, Part 2

Part 1 of this essay may be found here. I cannot remember exactly when I first saw Hammett. By which I mean, when I first watched the second half of the 1982 film, a fictional account set in 1928 San Francisco, just before the eponymous writer published his first novel. One night, while I was … Continue reading I Never Wrote the Most Important Story I Ever Wrote, Part 2 →

Listen, you mug!

I have repeatedly sung the praises of the Film Noir Foundation (“FNF”) on this website. Its steadfast devotion to rescuing, preserving and restoring vital pieces of our shared cultural heritage is exemplary. The annual NOIR CITY festival has been an essential part of my own film noir “personal journey,” even if I have not attended … Continue reading Listen, you mug! →

Final Results for the Most Heroic Character in Film Noir

At midnight EST on February 6, 2022, I posted this poll on Twitter, using the handle @drnoir33: Here is the Sweet 16 first round matchup between Intrepid Investigators. Who was more heroic: Barton Keyes in DOUBLE INDEMNITY Det. Lt. Mark McPherson in LAURA You decide! #FilmNoirHeroes The attached poll gave voters 24 hours to choose … Continue reading Final Results for the Most Heroic Character in Film Noir →

Who Is the Most Heroic Character in Film Noir?

A few days, I published an essay distilling my thoughts about a hypothetical Film Noir Cinematic Universe (“FNCU”). In a tweet I wrote to make readers aware of this essay, I said, “While there are a ridiculous number of villains in #FilmNoir, I was genuinely surprised how many legitimate #heroes there are.” ***WARNING: SPOILERS AHEAD*** … Continue reading Who Is the Most Heroic Character in Film Noir? →

Is a Film Noir Cinematic Universe possible?

A few nights ago, while scrolling through “Recommended” videos on YouTube, I found Austin McConnell’s attempt to create his own cinematic universe using comic book characters in the public domain. Curious, I began to watch it. I was quickly charmed by his idea and impressed by the research he conducted into the Golden Age of … Continue reading Is a Film Noir Cinematic Universe possible? →

Crafting the “Soundtrack” to my Interrogating Memory book

In 2005, Rupert Holmes published his second novel, a murder mystery called Swing. Being, well, Rupert Holmes, he also wrote and recorded an accompanying seven-track CD of swing-inflected music; both are well worth finding. The combination, meanwhile, led him to quip, “I’ve been singing songs from my new book.” In the past month, I received … Continue reading Crafting the “Soundtrack” to my Interrogating Memory book →