Regular readers have noticed that my film blogging has been lighter of late—and if anything, that trend is going to continue, for reasons that will become clear soon.
For now, though, I want to highlight a welcome development in film blogging that I’m very much looking forward to following in the months and years ahead.
Two of my dear friends and fellow film writers have joined the new Film channel at Patheos: Jeffrey Overstreet of Looking Closer and Peter Chattaway of FilmChat.
I’m especially pleased to see Peter coming out of a long blogging and writing hiatus. Jeff has remained consistently prolific as long as I’ve been reading him, but I’ve missed Peter’s presence for awhile, and it’s great to see him easing back into the game.
If you aren’t familiar with Jeff’s writing, you can’t do better than to start with his contemplative, symphonic review of Wes Anderson’s delightful Moonrise Kingdom, now in theaters. Here’s how Jeff introduces his review:
Of Gods and Men made Steven Greydanus say that he felt like he had become a critic in order to be prepared to review that movie.
I’ve only felt that way about a few films. Moonrise Kingdom is one of them.
When someone like Jeff writes something like that…saddle up!
As for Peter, check out his photo essay on close-ups in Alien and thoughts on conceptual and visual contrasts between Alien and Prometheus—and, if you’re interested in biblical films, Peter’s notes on movies in development on the early life of Christ, with his rundown of every Oscar-winning British thespian who could be in the running for the role of Herod in one production. That’s the kind of rigorous, methodical analysis you get from Peter.
I’ll be reading…and linking…as often as I can.
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What? No love for Tim over at Antagony & Ecstasy?
I love everybody.
Looking Closer is a superb film blog, which I would highly recommend to just about everybody, including people who aren’t serious about movies. Jeffrey Overstreet makes cinephiles like Francis de Sales made saints. And it’s certainly nice to visit FilmChat and see something other than a bare list of films watched and months-old posts on Canadian box office stats.
I also recommend - to other readers, not to SDG, who knows all about it - Filmwell, a film blog that Overstreet and several other good writers contribute to. Posts tend to be long and substantial, but it’s not updated very often, so reading it regularly is a manageable task. For good samples of the material, see this fascinating essay on the philosophy of The Tree of Life, and Jeffrey Overstreet’s review of The Avengers.
So at least we’ll have other things to read while we sadly watch SDG disappear into the wasteland of TV.
Pachyderminator: FWIW, I have something more significant on my plate than TV. More later.
Cool! I’ll watch for the big announcement, then.
It is very cool…though not for my critical career. That’s going to be receding a bit for awhile.
Please tell me this special announcement involves making either graphic novels or movies!
You should bring in someone to keep DecentFilms going while you’re receding, though. It’s a valuable site and I’d hate to see it fade away. Maybe Simcha’s husband could keep it going for you? He reviews films, too, I think.
To clarify: I have no plans to walk away from Decent Films or the Register, short term or long term. My writing will become scarcer for awhile, maybe significantly, but I’m not going away, and five years from now I hope to be doing exactly what I’m doing now.
As for my endeavors, direct beneficiaries will be limited and local, though I hope for indirect benefits redounding to every area of my life, including my existing apostolate work. (That might be enough clues to guess what I’m up to.)
Decent Films, for better and for worse, has taken shape as an irredeemably personal project. In principle, that could change, but I don’t think that’s what we really need.
What we really need is for someone to build a RottenTomatoes-like or Metacritic-like aggregation site for good Christian film writing. (And by good Christian film writing, I mean: not MovieGuide.)
For years Jeff Overstreet did a weekly Film Forum column at CT.com that was really excellent, but it was an ephemeral resource in that you can’t go to it and look up all the blurbs on a given film, nor can you view all blurbs for all films from a given source.
That’s what we need, if someone has the chops and the vision to build it.
It sure is. It sounds like you’re receding from Catholic film criticism in order to do Catholic stuff. SDG, you wound me. I wouldn’t have expected this of you.
Just kidding. I actually would, and I admire and respect it…but that doesn’t mean I like it.
Wow! Sounds like a trip to the Deaconate ; )
Ding ding ding!
Well, the Church is certainly getting a good one! You might be the first to deliver homilies in a “movie review” format ; )
A thought: With your inspired gift of story telling, maybe you could chronicle here your journey through the Deaconate? It would surely lead others to consider the call.
God’s blessings on this new chapter in your life!
Actually, a lot of preachers try to do that. SDG would likely do it better than most, though.
I definitely second that.
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