10 Years Later: Still No Country for Old Men

It’s been ten years since the release of what some might refer to as Joel and Ethan Coen’s masterpiece. Released in 2007 amidst numerous politically-minded, morally serious parables about U.S.’s intervention in the Middle East, No Country for Old Men…

Fargo 3×10 Review: “Somebody to Love”

Somehow, Fargo’s final episode, “Somebody to Love,” manages to be both stupidly excessive and disappointingly anti-climactic. The ending, which pits the show’s two defiant moral figures sitting face to face, is perhaps its one inspired moment, but everything that precedes it…

Movie Review: Shimmer Lake

I wrote my first screenplay a few years back, having just discovered and fallen in love with filmmakers the likes of Quentin Tarantino and the Coen Brothers. The script was called “The Assistant” and told the story of the henchman…

Movie Review: The Wedding Plan

The Wedding Plan is a film wherein the protagonist has an extended philosophical conversation with her seamstress – a character who appears in only one scene – about God, His will, faith, and religion. It’s a film whose closing shot reflects its opening shot in a breathtaking way. It’s a film that consistently defied my expectations and predictions. It’s a film that has the plot of a 90s romantic comedy but the weight and assurance of a Coen Brothers’ classic. As far as I’m concerned, Burshtein has cemented a status not only as one of Israel’s most important auteurs but as a filmmaker international audiences should have their eyes on.

TV Review: Fargo 3×05 “The House of Special Purpose”

The fifth episode of Fargo’s third season seems to be about boundary pushing and it’s well timed. We’re halfway through the season, and though plenty has happened, our characters’ journeys, intertwined under the absurd laws of the universe, haven’t yet…

TV Review: Fargo 3×04 “The Narrow Escape Problem”

Fargo’s fourth episode opens with Billy Bob Thornton reading Peter and the Wolf, a symphonic fairy tale told primarily through musical expression and voice-over narration. With Gloria as the heroic Peter and Varga as the villainous Wolf, the allegory between…

TV Review: Fargo 3×03 “The Law of Non-Contradiction”

Fargo’s third episode is going to be a hard one to top (a surprise considering Hawley’s absence from the writer’s credits). Not only is it a deeply powerful character study “The Law of Non-Contradiction” is also an existential tract as…