Christopher Saunders

LATEST ARTICLES ( 667 )

• Sound on Sight Article: John Osborne on Film

  

  Why no posts this week? I've been working on a new Sound on Sight piece, discussing John Osborne's Look Back in Anger. We've discussed that play and film here... Read more

  Posted on 07 March 2015 ENTERTAINMENT, MOVIES

• Hitler: The Last Ten Days

  

  An Anglo-Italian co-production, Hitler: The Last Ten Days (1973) is an uneven revisiting of Nazi Germany's destruction. Alec Guinness gives a good... Read more

  Posted on 01 March 2015 ENTERTAINMENT, MOVIES

• Cromwell

  

  One of the traditional epic's last gasps, Ken Hughes's Cromwell (1970) flattens a fantastic story. Alec Guinness and a game supporting cast struggle against an... Read more

  Posted on 28 February 2015 ENTERTAINMENT, MOVIES

• The Theory of Everything

  

  To most people, Stephen Hawking is either an inscrutable genius or Lisa Simpson's robot buddy. The Theory of Everything (2014) reminds us that even scientists... Read more

  Posted on 26 February 2015 ENTERTAINMENT, MOVIES

• Nightcrawler

  

  (2014) was one of the Academy's notable exclusions last night (though let's face it, the right movie won). Dan Gilroy's thriller succeeds in its eerie... Read more

  Posted on 24 February 2015 ENTERTAINMENT, MOVIES

• New Column: The Battle for Lawrence of Arabia

  

  Apologies for my absence! I just started writing for another film site, Sound on Sight, which published my inaugural piece today: The Battle for Lawrence of... Read more

  Posted on 17 February 2015 ENTERTAINMENT, MOVIES

• The King of Marvin Gardens

  

  Bob Rafelson followed Five Easy Pieces (1970) with this high-toned oddity. The King of Marvin Gardens (1972) is a fascinating miscalculation, its overbaked... Read more

  Posted on 12 February 2015 ENTERTAINMENT, MOVIES

• American Sniper

  

  Clint Eastwood's American Sniper (2014) is this season's Gone Girl, an unassuming genre flick generating a thousand think pieces on its cultural significance. Read more

  Posted on 08 February 2015 ENTERTAINMENT, MOVIES

• Chinatown

  

  Roman Polanski's Chinatown (1974) is a very '70s film noir, the plot turning on government corruption, corporate greed and personal coverups. Read more

  Posted on 07 February 2015 ENTERTAINMENT, MOVIES

• Mister Roberts

  

  (1955) seemed a slam dunk to Warner Bros.: John Ford directing Henry Fonda in a reprise of his long-running stage role. It turned into a nightmare, with directo... Read more

  Posted on 01 February 2015 ENTERTAINMENT, MOVIES

• Donovan's Reef

  

  John Ford's Donovan's Reef (1963) is a frivolous oddity that critics love dissecting. Peter Wollen describes it as "a kind of Valhalla for the homeless heroes o... Read more

  Posted on 31 January 2015 ENTERTAINMENT, MOVIES

• Selma

  

  Decades removed from denunciations as a race-baiting Communist, Martin Luther King Jr. ranks alongside the Founding Fathers as a sanctified American. Read more

  Posted on 27 January 2015 ENTERTAINMENT, MOVIES

• Groggy on Moviepilot: Z

  

  Another week, another piece on Moviepilot: this time on Costa-Gavras's Z. Writing this article required some actual research: certainly I know more about 20th... Read more

  Posted on 24 January 2015 ENTERTAINMENT, MOVIES

• Garden of Evil

  

  Henry Hathaway's Garden of Evil (1954) is a badly overblown Western. The movie's graced by beautiful photography and three excellent leads, yet feels clunky... Read more

  Posted on 23 January 2015 ENTERTAINMENT, MOVIES

• The Confession (1970)

  

  After savaging Greece's military junta in Z (1969), Costa-Gavras targets Stalinist barbarity in The Confession (1970). Based on Czech official Artur London's... Read more

  Posted on 19 January 2015 ENTERTAINMENT, MOVIES

• Oscar Announcements

  

  We start by recognizing that after Birdman, all the Best Picture nominees are shit.First, another Moviepilot article to pimp, this one on The Day of the... Read more

  Posted on 17 January 2015 ENTERTAINMENT, MOVIES

• Behold a Pale Horse

  

  (1964) was a rare flop for Fred Zinnemann. A portentous revenge saga, its soggy storytelling never comes to life, while miscast stars flounder in unsuitable... Read more

  Posted on 15 January 2015 ENTERTAINMENT, MOVIES

• The Golden Globes, Etc.

  

  The Golden Globes were last night, so that everyone knows, more or less, what to expect on Oscar night. The winners are:MOTION PICTURESBest DramaWINNER:... Read more

  Posted on 13 January 2015 ENTERTAINMENT, MOVIES

• The Jackal

  

  In the mid-'90s, some Universal Studios wiseacre decided to remake The Day of the Jackal (1973). Then Jackal's creators, novelist Frederick Forsyth and... Read more

  Posted on 12 January 2015 ENTERTAINMENT, MOVIES

• Groggy on Moviepilot: Algerian War Movies

  

  My latest Moviepilot piece dropped today: Shadows of Savagery: The Algerian War on Film. This article covers 54 years' worth of films about France's "savage... Read more

  Posted on 11 January 2015 ENTERTAINMENT, MOVIES