Movie Review: Jean-Luc Godard’s Les Carabiniers
Note: This review is part of a series on the films of Jean-Luc Godard. Links to the other pieces are at the bottom of the review. No one enjoys higher stature in the contemporary arts than an...
View Article#9: MAD #1-28, Harvey Kurtzman & Will Elder, Wallace Wood, Jack Davis, et al.
It’s a funny thing, but as with many of the great cartoonists, Harvey Kurtzman’s work is far better known than the artist who created it. His most famous creation, MAD, long ago transcended the medium...
View ArticleExplaining the Joke
Many of you have probably seen this. It was created by the blogger D. B. Echo, who posted it online on August 15 last year. It has since gone viral. Paul Krugman himself posted it to his New York...
View ArticleN’est-ce pas dégueulasse?: A Reading of Jean-Luc Godard’s Weekend
The index to the Godard roundtable is here. _________________________ Jean-Luc Godard, arguably the most controversial director of the post-World War II film renaissance, may also be its most...
View Article“Hasn’t anyone lost anything tangible?!” : Bloom County as realism
I just watched Meryl Streep’s portrayal of Margaret Thatcher in the recent biopic The Iron Lady on Netflix, and, as the writing was nowhere near equal to Streep’s uncanny performance, my favorite part...
View ArticleDystopia is a Jacuzzi You Never Want to Leave
Here’s my pitch for a dystopian novel. It takes place in Wealthy Powerful Nation (WPN), a country that is secretly spying on its citizens. In fact, those citizens life in a state of near-total...
View ArticleOutside Charlie Hebdo
I’m really appreciative to all the Francophones on various sites who have taken the time to put Charlie Hebdo’s work in a rich cultural context, opening up the magazine’s visual aesthetic and...
View Article“Punching down” versus “sinking to their level:” why choose?
Everyone seems to love “On Satire,” Joe Sacco’s cartoon for the Guardian responding to the Charlie Hebdo massacre, but some may not. Some may detest “On Satire” because the cartoon was reverent toward...
View ArticleA Year in the Merde
Well, it’s been a long week. The hagiography has come and gone, the backlash has come and gone, balanced views have been proposed and interest is fading. What remains are protests in the Middle East...
View ArticleVoices from the Archive: Crumb, Racism, Satire, and Hyperbole
This is from our R. Crumb and Race Roundtable, in a long back and forth in comments with Jeet Heer and others. I thought it was a good summation of why I don’t think Crumb’s approach to race works, so...
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