Queer confessions

One night in April 1984, I drove three friends across the Delaware River into Trenton, NJ. There, we ate a meal at Pat’s Diner. I tell a version of this pivotal story in Chapter 10 of my INTERROGATING MEMORY book. I plan to write a longer version soon. To prepare to write this story, I … Continue reading Queer confessions →

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 →

My 2025 Personal Film Festival, Part 1

On the evening of January 4, 2025, my wife Nell and I watched Saturday Night. Jason Reitman’s 2024 film chronicles the final 90 minutes before the first episode of what is now called Saturday Night Live aired at 11:30 pm EST on October 11, 1975. We thoroughly enjoyed the film’s you-are-there verisimilitude, strong performances and … Continue reading My 2025 Personal Film Festival, Part 1 →

When David Lynch went to Philadelphia

One Saturday night when I was about nine years old, I found myself lying in bed, leafing through a hardcover book of biographical sketches while half watching a movie on the small black-and-white television set in my bedroom. Perhaps I was watching a film starring Spencer Tracy, because at one point I turned to his … Continue reading When David Lynch went to Philadelphia →

How the Berger family flew to America…by steamship

When I completed the final draft of the first edition of Interrogating Memory: Film Noir Spurs a Deep Dive Into My Family History…and My Own in January 2021, I had already learned a great deal about my paternal great-grandfather David Louis Berger; I had known next to nothing about him before I began to write … Continue reading How the Berger family flew to America…by steamship →

I Never Wrote the Most Important Story I Ever Wrote, Conclusion

Part 1 of this essay may be found here. Part 2 of this essay may be found here. Part 3 of this essay may be found here. Part 4 of this essay may be found here. Part 5 of this essay may be found here. Part 6 of this essay may be found here. Part … Continue reading I Never Wrote the Most Important Story I Ever Wrote, Conclusion →