Press Play

"The best video essay source on the web." (Roger Ebert) This is a web site built around original video essays and critical, personal writing about movies, TV, music, comics and whatever else interests its contributors. Co-founded by Matt Zoller Seitz, TV critic for New York Magazine, and Ken Cancelosi, it is published by Seitz and Cancelosi and overseen by editor-in-chief Kevin B. Lee and managing editor Max Winter.

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TRAILER MIX: GANGSTER SQUAD

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The trailer for "Gangster Squad" isn't selling nostalgia so much as retrograde, standard-issue images of masculinity.

By R. Kurt Osenlund
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May 15, 2012 8:55 AM
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Video

All of the 2011 Best Picture nominees have their merits, but one towers above the rest: "The Tree of Life," writer/director Terrence Malick's film about...well what is "The Tree of Life" about, anyway? For a free-associative non-linear movie that skips back and forth through time and space, and that includes a lengthy early section recounting the creation of the universe, the movie was a surprising commercial success, dominating discussion among cinephiles throughout a summer moviegoing season that is usually overshadowed by much louder, dumber movies. And at the center of the discussion were very basic questions about writing and direction – about storytelling generally – that cut to the heart of what movies are and what they can be.

By Matt Zoller Seitz & Serena Bramble
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February 21, 2012 12:13 PM
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