Ryan Williams

  • Movie News

Festival Beat: Timeless Titles Grow Old But Never Die at TCM Classic Film Festival 2019

Repertory cinema is alive and well across the world, and the TCM Classic Film Festival is the zenith of repertory…

5 years ago
  • Book Reviews

Book Review: Miyazakiworld: A Life in Art

In this exploration of Japanese animator Hayao Miyazaki’s filmography, professor Susan Napier paints a fascinating portrait of the world this…

5 years ago
  • Book Reviews

Book Review: Understanding Steven Spielberg

Much has been written about Steven Spielberg. He is, after all, the highest-grossing director of all time, and has managed…

5 years ago
  • MM Guide 2019

Pictures Worth a Thousand Jobs: Netflix’s Blockbuster Deal with ABQ Studios is Poised to Bring Thousands of Jobs to New Mexico

In a year where Netflix has continued to grow at an astounding rate, the streaming platform’s biggest leap was its…

5 years ago
  • Winter 2019

Milwaukee Film Festival 2018: Cream City Hosts Cream of the Crop in Local, Awards-Contending, and Lost Silent Cinema

Milwaukee may not be the first city that jumps to mind when thinking of the film industry as a whole.…

5 years ago
  • Other

Deep in the Heart of Waco: Behind the Scenes of the Small Texas City and its Burgeoning Film Festival

Located right in between Texan powerhouses Houston and Austin, Waco has been slowly but surely making a name for itself…

5 years ago
  • Interviews

Unlocking the Key: Charlie Plummer on his Horrifying Discovery of The Clovehitch Killer

Building up an impressive resume, Charlie Plummer continues his budding career with this viscerally effective horror film. Telling the tale…

5 years ago
  • Festivals

2018 Beyond Fest Preview: Five Screenings to Catch at Los Angeles’ Expertly Programmed Genre Festival

Returning for the sixth time, Beyond Fest continues to build on its reputation as the home to all of Los…

6 years ago
  • Criterion Crash Course

Criterion Crash Course: Moviemaking Lessons from Criterion’s The Tree of Life

Whether you’re a moviemaker, critic, or devoted film collector, lovers of cinema can all agree: A Criterion Collection release is…

6 years ago
  • Movie News

“Someone to Last Your Whole Life”: James Ivory on Celebrating Maurice Over 30 Years Later

Hot off of his Academy Award win for Best Adapted Screenplay, James Ivory's 1987 follow-up to A Room with a…

6 years ago
  • Book Reviews

Like Brothers: Mark and Jay Duplass Explore Their Fraternal Filmmaking Bond in New Memoir

“How do you make it in this brutal fucking business?” This is the question that indie moviemaking mainstays Mark and…

6 years ago
  • Other

Keep on Keepin’ On: Mario Van Peebles on How His Father Brought Sweet Sweetback’s Baadasssss Song to Life

A trailblazer in radical 1970s cinema, Melvin van Peebles' home-grown experimental milestone gained a new audience at this year's TCM…

6 years ago
  • Directing

Exclusive: Andover Examines Love, Death and Resurrection (Video)

There is nothing as permanent as death and there is no desire as strong as the desire to transcend death.…

6 years ago
  • Directing

Taylor Made: Deon Taylor on How His Self-Made Moviemaking Journey Led Him to Direct Traffik

One of the hardest working filmmakers in the industry, Deon Taylor has been making features for over 10 years. His…

6 years ago
  • Cinematography

Discover Cinematographer Roger Deakins’ Most Trusted and True Visual Techniques (Video)

One of the most celebrated cinematographers in filmmaking, Roger Deakins has, until last night, been always the bridesmaid and never…

6 years ago
  • Directing

Getting to the Heart of Lady Bird: What Makes Greta Gerwig’s Debut Tick

In the pantheon of mother-daughter movies, it might seem like a simplistic statement to say that what makes Greta Gerwig’s…

6 years ago
  • Directing

The Art of Fear: How Christopher Nolan Uses Perspective to Express Fear in Dunkirk

Garnering Christopher Nolan his very first nomination for the Academy Award for Best Director, Dunkirk represents the apex of his…

6 years ago
  • Directing

A Living Thing: How Paul Thomas Anderson Makes Emotions Visual

With Phantom Thread giving Paul Thomas Anderson his first Best Director nomination since 2007, the American auteur has scored his biggest success…

6 years ago
  • Movie News

Logan Lucky: How Interactions Between Genres Led to an Oscar Nomination for James Mangold’s Superhero Film

In this video essay, Evan Puschak of Nerdwriter seeks to examine the many different ways by which genre conventions can…

6 years ago
  • Other

Inside The Shimmer: Oscar-Winning VFX Supervisor Andrew Whitehurst Takes Us Behind Annihilation‘s Stunning VFX

Many filmmakers have attempted to translate the unknowable horrors of the Lovecraftian mythology to a visual medium. With Annihilation, Alex…

6 years ago
  • Directing

Exclusive: Andrea Bocelli Looks Back On His Rocky, Rewarding Life in This Clip From The Music of Silence (Video)

The Music of Silence casts a poetic lens on the life of Andrea Bocelli, the famed Italian singer who has persevered…

6 years ago
  • Directing

Blow by Blow: How Francois Truffaut and His New Wave Contemporaries Deconstructed Filmmaking

As one of the founding fathers of the French New Wave, Francois Truffaut used cinema to capture “truth 24 times…

6 years ago
  • Festivals

Telluride or Die: Telluride’s Student Symposium is a Young Filmmaker’s Dream Come True, Says a 2017 Grad

I had the honor of attending last weekend's Telluride Film Festival as a member of its 44th Student Symposium, which…

7 years ago
  • Directing

Wonder Women: 10 Female Directors Who Made the Jump From Indie to Mainstream

It's always been tough for female directors to find the same amount of work that male directors have. Thankfully, in…

7 years ago