REVIEW: 2001: A Space Odyssey [1968]

This conversation can serve no purpose anymore. Goodbye. The opening chapter of Stanley Kubrick‘s seminal 2001: A Space Odyssey is entitled “The Dawn of Man” and depicts the evolution of apes from animal to wielder of tools—a transition marked by the mysterious appearance of a black monolith standing upright to frame the moon at its tip. We watch this scene as metaphor, seeing this otherworldly structure as a symbol of God or science ushering in a new age of machine and therefore weaponry. It’s simultaneously enlightenment and destruction, technology providing…

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REVIEW: April Flowers [2017]

“I’m not afraid of love if that’s what you mean” When writer/director Christopher Tedrick scholarly describes his film April Flowers as being based on the idea that the 21st century is an “Era of Choice”—a term coined by Temple Associate Professor Edward C. Rosenthal in an MIT-published paper—romance isn’t necessary the first thing that springs to mind. And yet romance is quite possibly the most relevant and universal example to use for this idea of infinite opportunities causing crippling stress and fear. Just think about it. We live in an…

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