About the author
"Life of Pi" Isn't Enough
Life of Pi, Ang Lee's new film based on the 2001 fantasy adventure novel by Yann Martel, tackles the uncinematic tale of a teenage boy surviving at sea with a Bengal tiger. With few typical Hollywood conventions—no romance, chase scenes or celebrities—Lee and writer David Magee are nonetheless challenged with the task of entertaining audiences for a full two hours. The book is organized in three sections, and...
An Oversimplification of Her Beauty
Combining live action, animation, interviews and formal narration, Terence Nance’s feature film An Oversimplification of Her Beauty is a creative patchwork that delves deep into the emotional life of the main character. Triggered by the seemingly minor event of being stood up, Terence takes the opportunity to reflect and brings us on a journey where self doubt is explored in drawings, clay or papier-mâché, and re...
A Neighborhood Divided
The documentary Battle for Brooklyn, co-directed by Suki Hawley and Michael Galinsky, follows community activist Daniel Goldstein as he fights to preserve his community in the face of the massive Atlantic Yards development that threatens to carve up Prospect Heights. The proposed project would displace many lifelong residents as well as those new to the charming Brooklyn neighborhood. However, not all of Goldstei...
Unraveled, but Not Undeceived
Marc Simon's latest documentary, Unraveled, delves into the mind of Marc Dreier, an attorney convicted of fraud. Overshadowed by the Bernie Madoff scandal, Dreier's story, though in the press, might still be news to viewers. What's most unusual is Simon's access to Dreier for the weeks he is under house arrest prior to his sentencing. House arrest is a drudgery, even in the swanky, New York apartment of a multimil...
I Am, the Movie
I couldn’t help it, with a film titled "I Am" it just seemed fitting to share it with the readers at The Curator, the web publication of IAM. Plus, the theme was applicable. It’s a film about one man’s journey to answer some of the most profound questions of life: what’s wrong with our world, and what can we do to make it better? The man on this journey is Tom Shadyac, a Hollywood film director whose com...
Tiny Furniture and Tiny Milestones
In Tiny Furniture, Aura (Lena Dunham), a recently single college grad returns home to her mother’s TriBeCa loft with no idea what comes next. While her mother and over achieving younger sister are off touring colleges, Aura takes in Jed (Alex Karpovsky), a broke, YouTube comic ‘celebrity’ on a so-called business trip. Aura is too busy with her own self-pity to mind Jed leeching off of her kindness, nor does s...
Insecurity, Creativity, and Superiority
At the end of The Social Network, David Fincher’s film chronicling the creation of the social networking site Facebook, I found myself asking the question, What motivates my own creativity? Why do I feel the need to make or say something meaningful? I know the answer isn’t all benign. Mixed with the joy of creating and communicating are feelings of insecurity and the need to prove my worth. In the film, ingenuity...
