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POP CULTURE BLOG: Paris Sewell on the need to re-discover & re-celebrate cinema's early pioneers of color

I am someone who loves watching films. I love the classic era, the modern era, and everything in between. I am also someone who loves celebrity culture and is a fan of different actors. However, when I look back into the classic era in Hollywood, it is dominated by white faces. Yes, I know the culture and the times are different but contrary to popular belief, there were quite a few people of color celebrities back in the day; these pioneers should get re-evaluated and re-discovered. It would be inspiring to young people of color to know about the hard working people who blazed the trail before them…

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Stanley Donen's CHARADE: THE BEST HITCHCOCK HITCHCOCK DIDN'T MAKE by Craig Hammill

There have been many Hitchcock homages: David Fincher’s Panic Room, Francois Truffaut’s Don’t Shoot the Piano Player, Steven Spielberg’s Duel/Jaws/Jurassic Park (re-workings in a way of The Birds), even Paul Thomas Anderson’s The Phantom Thread (which is a kind of ingenuous re-working of Rebecca). All of them dynamite. All of them also supreme examples of their own filmmakers’ voice/art.

But for this programmer’s money, the only filmmakers who actually managed to out-Hitchcock Hitchcock at his own game are director Stanley Donen and writer Peter Stone when they collaborated to make 1963’s Charade starring Cary Grant and Audrey Hepburn.

Charade follows…

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KYMM'S 365 DAY MOVIE CHALLENGE #7: Dilwale Dulhania Le Jayenge (India, dir by Aditya Chopra,1995)

I think it’s time to bring Bollywood Club to Secret Movie Club! Two great clubs that go great together.

Once a month, my friend Amber, who is a Bollywood fan, carefully curates a film for us Bollywood newbies to enjoy. So far, after half a year or so, we are big fans of Shah Rukh Khan (SRK), who has been one of the biggest stars of Bollywood for the past thirty years.

In Dilwale Dulhania Le Jayenge (which translated from the Hindi as basically “The good hearted will take the Bride”), he is…

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POP CULTURE BLOG: How the original and rebooted SAVED BY THE BELL pilots reflect changing societal norms

For this week, I decided to compare the original Saved by the Bell to the recent reboot. I always wanted to watch the show with the revival of the ‘90s culture. For this battle, I am going to be watching the pilot (the first episode) for both. I am going to be comparing the plot, how society reflects what is being shown, along with how I feel about it.

The original is…

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STRIPPERS, PSYCHE, SOUL: Film writer Paris Sewell on Katori Hall's dynamite P-VALLEY

I finally decided to watch P-Valley after seeing the trailer for the upcoming movie Zola (I am so excited for that movie, you don’t understand). Something about content involving strippers is just *chef’s kiss*. I think the reason why I love them is because they represent who I want to be: confident, strong, talented and beautiful.

This show revolves around stripper culture. The main character, “Autumn Night”

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INTO THE ZONE PART 2: ANNHILATION (adap/dir by Alex Garland, 2018, USA) by film critic Jared Watson

The color that arrives on earth by way of meteorite in Lovecraft's 1927 short story isn't just one color, but described to be a spectrum of colors. Colors that infuse themselves into the very chemical makeup of life, altering it, contorting it into something alien. A spectrum of color can be achieved by fracturing light into its individual attributes. A process that Alex Garland's 2018 sci-fi horror Annihilation explores…

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