- Black Writers Week 2026: Table of Contents (June 18, 2026)
Intro to Black Writers Week 2026 by Robert Daniels
FEATURES
250 Years Later and Blacks Are Still Politically and Racially Enslaved by Carla Renata
From My Block to Wakanda: Movies and Black Travel by Reginald Ponder
To Make People Aware of Something is Great: A Conversation with Maya Cade by Robert Daniels
Can the New Anti-Heroine Heal My Inner Black Girl? by Lyvie Scott
Through My Lens: The Accidental Archivist of ‘90s Howard University by Lance R. Williams
I Am Telling You: Dreamgirls at 20 by Odie Henderson
Film Criticism’s Crisis in the Letterboxd Era by Brandon Lewis
Cinematic Albums of the 2020s: Music That Feels Like a Movie by Cortlyn Kelly
What the 2025 Federal Arts Cuts Mean for Documentary Filmmaking by Ife Olatunji
J. Christopher Hamilton on Culture, Capital, and Creative Leverage by Sonia Evans
The Legend of Us: Expanding the Chosen One by Sherin Nicole
A Father Learning Beside His Children: What Jiu-Jitsu Taught Me About Fatherhood by Andre Hammel
The Urban Environment: A Conversation with Tatsu Aoki, Avant-Garde Filmmaker by Danielle Momoh
What is the State of the Black Movie Star? by David Moses
Radical Whimsy: Exploring the Creative Mind of Boots Riley by Brandon Towns
When Sci-fi Was Horny: “Logan’s Run” at 50 by Brandon David Wilson
REVIEWS
The Death of Robin Hood by Brandon David Wilson
Captivating Third Season of “House of the Dragon” Is More Complex Than Ever by Kaiya Shunyata
Toy Story 5 by Robert Daniels
Never Change! by Craig D. Lindsey
Paramount+’s “The Agency” Expands Its Scope With An Exhilarating Second Season by Kaiya Shunyata
Leviticus by Cortlyn Kelly
- Happy Heavenly Birthday, Roger Ebert: June 18, 1942 – April 4, 2013 (June 18, 2026)
Editor’s Note: We are re-publishing this 2025 piece to celebrate Roger Ebert’s birthday. He would have been 84 today. Happy birthday, Roger.
Roger enjoyed celebrating his birthday! Birthday party? Sure! Birthday surprise? Even better! The secret is that he simply enjoyed savoring life, and a birthday was just another occasion for celebration. In between these occasions was his writing, which he did prolifically, and also as a sort of celebration. I thought about that today, June 18, which would have been his 83rd birthday. It started early, with people sending me notes, emails, or social media posts reminding me. So I decided to write a brief article in celebration of him.
The main facts you probably know: He was born in Urbana, Illinois, the twin town to Champaign, Illinois, home of the University of Illinois, where he fell in love with journalism. His Mom and Dad were Annabel and Walter. His father was an electrician at the University. It was his dad’s wish to see Roger secure a position as a professor at the University one day, so that he could “sit back with his feet on the desk, pipe in mouth, pontificating to the students” instead of working as hard as the electricians. His mother, a bookkeeper and homemaker, idolized her only child. Early on, they recognized his intellect and his gift for communications. Later, the world would also.
In a way, Roger fulfilled his father’s wish by teaching a night class at the University of Chicago for 37 years, lecturing to students about some of the greatest films ever made. He took on this role just one year after being hired as the film critic for the Chicago Sun-Times in 1967. His gift was apparent in the first sentence of his first review for the otherwise forgotten picture, “Galia,” of which he wrote, “[It] opens and closes with arty shots of the ocean, mother of us all, but in between it’s pretty clear that what is washing ashore is the French New Wave.” Later that year, while many of his colleagues were taken aback by the uncomfortably realistic violence in “Bonnie and Clyde,” Roger wisely sensed that it would go on to be hailed as a classic. Upon seeing the debut feature, “I Call First,” at the Chicago International Film Festival, Roger predicted that its director, Martin Scorsese, would prove to be a filmmaker of great importance.
In 1975, Roger’s uncommon insights and ability to convey complex ideas in accessible and engaging ways led him to become the first film critic to receive the Pulitzer Prize. It was an accolade that regularly accompanied his name in the early years of his movie review show, which began in November of that year and paired him with his rival, Chicago Tribune critic Gene Siskel. As the show evolved into the hit series, “Siskel & Ebert” (and later “Ebert & Roeper”), propelling the two Midwestern critics to unlikely stardom, it became clear to viewers that their tireless analyses were because of their love of the art form. Later, it became evident to me that Roger’s fiery arguments with Siskel on air were fueled by what he believed to be the vast potential of what cinema could achieve. For Roger, movies were also a doorway into understanding the people who shared this earthly journey with us.
What impressed me the most about Roger, in addition to his intellect, was his “Goodness!” He had a sincere desire to contribute to the world in a way that would make it better. To Roger, film at its highest level was a machine capable of generating empathy, inviting audiences to experience the world through the perspective of another. His form of empathy honored humanity by breaking down barriers, illuminating the oneness of all living things, and celebrating the qualities that make each of us unique. Whether it was through his writing or his humor, he was fun to be around. His profound love of humanity was undeniable. As was his love for me and our grandchildren…
Roger never lost his wide-eyed awe at what could be experienced, not just through the lens of a camera. In his final moments, he wrote the most profound review of his life. Shortly before he passed away, he talked about this world being “an elaborate hoax.” He described a vastness unimaginable to the average human brain. However, it was a place of hope where knowledge, without judgment, was imparted instantly. And where in the end, there is only love. His words later inspired singer Clem Snide to write his powerful song, “Roger Ebert.” I am not surprised that whatever is “out there” for us was something positive for Roger. I am hoping that wherever he is, it is somewhere bright and happy and full of hope, where our dreams come true. Where Roger is held and celebrated on his birthday. And where there is only love.
- Radical Whimsy: Exploring the Creative Mind of Boots Riley (June 18, 2026)
Boots Riley is the most dangerous man in Hollywood. He’s not a filmmaker. He is an enigma, a revolutionary fighting against capitalism with a pen and a lens. From his musical prowess as the frontman for the conscious hip-hop group The Coup to his community activism with the International Committee Against Racism (InCAR) and California’s Anti-Racist Farm Workers’ Union, Boots is the living embodiment of the phrase “artists must choose a side.” And he chose to fight for freedom.
Riley is one of the few prevailing filmmakers who are deeply politically conscious, and his views ooze from script to screen. His filmography, best described as “Star Wars for Radical Politics,” focuses on helping people find the tools to change the world around them. By adopting comedy to smuggle his message past the capitalist gatekeepers and reach the masses, Boots creates his own film genre: radical whimsy. His work asks audiences how to create a movement that affects those in power.
With his latest release, “I Love Boosters,” a film exploring booster culture in the Black community and worker exploitation in the fashion industry, Riley continues to show moviegoers that the only way to challenge corporate power is with a global militant labor movement. Since power under capitalism comes from capital, by ceasing the means of production, the working class can collapse this system under its own weight.
Overcoming capitalism means understanding that we are in a system, and that the system shapes how we relate to each other. The late revolutionary and founder of the Rainbow Coalition, Fred Hampton, famously said: “We’re going to fight racism not with racism, but we’re going to fight with solidarity.”
Although understated, there is a significant emphasis on cross-racial solidarity in Boots’ work. In “I Love Boosters,” Demi Moore’s character, Christie Smith, capitalizes on the underpaid labor of her employees at Metro Designers retail stores, the hazardous working conditions in clothing factories in China, and the manufactured exclusivity of her overpriced clothes sold in the ghetto for profit and to inflate her ego. In isolation, the actions taken to combat these seemingly disjointed injustices agitate Smith, but do not affect her bottom line. However, only when these movements become one does the narrative change, and our protagonists win.
Yes, admittedly, this ending is a bit unrealistic; nevertheless, the message is clear: survival is not enough. To give birth to a better reality is to fight in tandem. Yet, this goal is easier said than done. Capitalism is greedy, like a snake eating its own tail. It is sustained by the belief in itself, and that belief is infectious.
We can see the consequences of that greed in Boots’ directorial debut “Sorry to Bother You,” in which LaKeith Stanfield’s character, Cassius “Cash” Green, quickly rises in the ranks of corporate America by using his “white voice” to appear more amiable to a porcelain-skinned society. Despite Green’s discomfort with the unethical work as well as his own shucking and jiving behavior, we watch him reap the benefits of playing by the script. Although these rewards are short-lived, his lack of solidarity segregated him from his community, and he is further dehumanized by the white gaze.
In the end, Black capitalism did not save Cassius; standing with his community did. On the surface, Riley’s unrelenting belief in the effectiveness of a mass labor movement feels idealistic compared to the reality of the brash, systemic dismantling of social movements. From the FBI’s active dissolution of the Black Panther Party to Ronald Reagan’s historic union busting, the future can seem bleak. However, Boots has described his art as “ultimately optimistic,” and given the growing political tensions in the United States, I think we all could use a little hope.
Boots teaches us that we do not have to wait for a shepherd to lead the herd; we can overcome injustice ourselves. In “I’m a Virgo,” where, after being christened the villain by the same oppressive system he once admired, Jharrel Jerome’s 13-foot character Cootie attempts to become a martyr. However, his activism falters because he wants to be a symbol for people to believe in rather than a catalyst for them to forge their own change, which isolates him from the very movement he hopes to inspire.
In contrast, Kara Young’s character Jones, an activist with psychic abilities, embodies a vision of collective liberation. Although she is the most vocal participant in this crusade, Jones advocates not for herself but for the heroism of revolution against capital, pushing the people around her toward their own agency. Riley further illustrates this distinction by having Jones defeat the so-called “hero” of the story, proving that systemic change is never the work of a single extraordinary person. His optimism in the effectiveness of a mass labor movement is rooted in the faith in the power of ordinary people to dismantle the systems built to oppress them, even when, and perhaps especially when, those systems are the very ones funding his art.
Despite his leftist politics, Riley is not above online discourse. Digital rumblings of keyboard warriors among Reddit and X (formerly known as Twitter) criticize him for producing anti-capitalist art while simultaneously acquiring funding from the same evil, greedy mustache-twirling corporations he pokes fun at in his work. I argue this sentiment lacks nuance because art has the power to change the world, but it needs the financial backing to reach a broader audience to enact that change. Riley’s radical whimsy is impactful because he uses the same system to dismantle it by crafting messages that are easily digestible for the politically uninclined. “Sorry to Bother You,” like “I’m a Virgo” and “I Love Boosters,” adopts Black absurdity to deconstruct the absurdity of Capitalism and the cruel joke of the American Dream.
Chester Himes, author of My Life of Absurdity, once said, “Realism and absurdity are so similar in the lives of American blacks that they cannot tell the difference.” The magic of Boots’ work, both sonically and cinematically, is that it is never untrue. By operating on the thin line between realism and absurdity, he creates worlds where oppression does not have to be the norm. He gives viewers a PSA on class consciousness masked by vibrant colors, visual gags, and visceral relatability.
In an interview with Chinaka Hodge for the California Institute of Integral Studies, Boots recounts a story from his youth where the song “Fight the Power” by Public Enemy energized the community of the Sunnydale Projects to resist police brutality to protect a mother and her children, regardless of the threat of gun violence. This act was the moment Boots understood the significance of activism within art.
This song, which was commissioned by Spike Lee for his film “Do the Right Thing,” was the result of the Hollywood machine; the same nefarious executives that finance Riley’s projects. Not to discredit this heroic deed based on the lyricism of Chuck D and Flavor Flav, but this music compelled the public to take action by provoking empathy. Police brutality on Black bodies is nothing new, yet the music challenged the status quo, and change happened.
This is the shift Riley also tries to achieve in his art. By bringing the unimaginable to the silver screen, he inspires general audiences to descend into collective action and build solidarity through this shared theater experience. Through radical whimsy, Boots Riley shows us what is possible.
But if all else fails, Boots, do you still have the guillotine?
- What is the State of the Black Movie Star? (June 18, 2026)
While watching Kristoffer Borgli’s “The Drama,” I thought a lot about Zendaya’s Blackness within the shell of this character. The film never questions her identity in any meaningful way. We know that she is biracial; this is acknowledged in the film’s text. We may also surmise that her race played some role in her bullying and that it plays some role in how she is treated by her fiancé and her “friends.” But the film is not interested in any of these possibilities beyond gesturing to them.
This is a pragmatic move on the part of Borgli (who is not just white, but foreign to the unique nature of racism in America), but it is not an original approach. The history of Hollywood is littered with far more directors who chose to avoid or even disregard race than those who’ve made a genuine effort to do something more daring. That lack ends up shaping Black actors, especially the Black movie star. There is a spectrum that defines the particulars of what the Black artist or movie star looks like. As Richard Dyer says in The Matter of Whiteness, “White people set standards of humanity by which they are bound to succeed and others bound to fail.”
Many of the stars of blaxploitation existed as stark examples of said cognitive dissonance. Pam Grier, Richard Roundtree, Fred Williamson, Glynn Turman, Marlene Clark, Vonetta McGee, Jim Brown, and Richard Pryor were all major movie stars of that era. But their stardom and appeal (despite being nearly as owed to white audiences as to Black) were viewed as specifically Black, and, as such, were not universal, standard, definitive, or normal. It was an aberration within the confines of what Dyer describes as “the dominant image of the world.” These stars would eventually be reduced to role players rather than leads in worlds dominated by whiteness, wherein they were sometimes as doomed to fail on-screen as they were off-screen.
The Black movie star, therefore, exists in what W.E.B. DuBois called “double mind,” a double consciousness of sorts—forced to view ourselves through our own eyes and through the eyes of those who other-ize them: white eyes. Under this guise, the tenuous history of the Black movie star (tracing from Bert Williams to Zendaya) finds its most recognizable marker in Sidney Poitier.
Both the front and back of Poitier’s career would see him performing within frames written and directed by white people. If Black social consciousness had never happened in the late ‘60s and early ‘70s, we might never have known Sidney any other way. James Baldwin once said, “He trembled for Sidney”—this was due to what Baldwin viewed as “in the terrifying position of being part of a system that you know you have to change.” Sidney acknowledges this in his own words: “[Black people] were so new in Hollywood. There was almost no frame of reference for us except as stereotypical, one-dimensional characters. I had in mind what was expected of me, not just what other Blacks expected, but what my mother and father expected”.
Zendaya speaks of an evolution of sorts. “What my white peers would be able to get away with at this point in their career is not something that I will be able to do,” she says. “I don’t want to jeopardize it at any point because I am not allowed the room to mess up.” There’s a real angst in both of their answers, a tension, a complication that never finds its way into the front-facing text of the otherwise white films they occupy. When Zendaya says, “I’m not allowed the room to mess up,” that is an admission of omission in line with the necessary requirements for any black person seeking to enter predominantly white spaces. Poitier’s Black existence is the epitome of righteousness—if righteousness were synonymous with white guilt.
Poitier’s “Credit to the race” films (which served, at their core, the idea of the individual as exception to the rule, rather than proof of collective humanity) were meant to be an avatar of rebuttal to the racist caricatures white people themselves created, rather than a depiction of a fully realized person. Poitier the movie star can look at you lovingly, but he can’t have sexual desires. He can slap you, but he can’t whoop your white ass. He can be Black, but not a “n***a.”
This parallels Angelica Jade Bastién’s words on Zendaya’s performance in “Challengers” for Vulture: “I think she gives them the veneer of Black women’s anger but not the full experience of it.” When asked to further expound, she says, “It’s kind of weird for ‘Challengers’ to have that white-boy line because it’s a movie that doesn’t actually give a shit about race. Do you think white people are comfortable with Black women’s actual, fully embodied anger?”
In the films Poitier directed (“Buck and the Preacher,” the “Uptown Saturday Night” trilogy, and “A Warm December”), he is cruel, janky, sexy, ludicrous, existing in grey areas, as something more apart, though not fully exempt from a counter to white supremacy. The problem with trying to deconstruct the fallacy of white supremacy is that you have to start from a place where the construct of white supremacy is a truth. Your career is either collaboration in a lie or a debate.
The bulk of roles at Poitier’s peak could not have been occupied by white men, but they were written by white men, directed by white men, and tailored for the consciousness of white audiences. Fast-forward some 60-plus years, and Zendaya’s roles in “Dune” and “Challengers” are still framed by whiteness, but now also lack any meaningful specificity around race. Tashi (“Challengers”) and Emma (“The Drama”) are bi-racial; Chani (“Dune”) is Fremen.
What do any of these roles have to say about what her identity means to the movie or to the people around them? It’s clear these kinds of roles are a reward for sacrificing specificity and denying all the complexities that race entails. No longer bound by the strict boundaries of the political-only sphere, Black actors or actors of color in these roles get to be something closer to the movie stars their white counterparts are.
These roles are all steeped in superficialities. Chani is sold as a warrior queen of sorts in Denis Villeneuve’s iteration of “Dune,” but in two films, we know as much about her as we do the worms, and we see her about as much. She is highly valued by her people, but every time we see them or her, Paul (Timothée Chalamet) is there dominating. How ferocious, how angry, is she with him before she falls in love with her oppressor? How serious can we take a film’s racial complexity when it casts Zendaya and Javier Bardem as the most prominent faces of a tribe so clearly analogous to MENA peoples, while denying those same peoples any role of prominence in the first place?
These pictures were always about sanding down the less palatable aspects of non-white identity. In Zendaya’s roles, like “Dune,” her Blackness and her star-ness are tethered to a definition of movie stardom that ultimately defines itself through whiteness and casts people who look like her as the other.
When I watch Zendaya, my worst fear is that she’ll become her generation’s Morgan Freeman—someone who spent the majority of his career being that great neoliberal construction of pop “universality,” which of course means appealing to whiteness. An actor we’ve never been afforded the ability to see surrounded by Blackness, seen through, and made for our eyes. I fear seeing a talented actor like Zendaya left unrealized, as a bifurcated identity reduced to its status quo mono.
Every non-white actor worth their salt would love the freedom of their white counterparts, to have the privilege of being able to be in any number of unique stories, personalities, or bodies, to not be so reduced by their own body as to deny the existence of their body to gain that freedom. Think about James Baldwin writing about Poitier’s role in “In the Heat of the Night” in The Devil Finds Work: he says, “it gave me the impression, according to my notes the day I saw it, of something strangling alive, struggling to get out.” Seventy years later, I could say the same about Zendaya’s Blackness in any of her roles.
While I admire the intentionality behind Zendaya’s choice not to take away roles from dark-skinned Black women, I question the efficacy of a strategy that trades one form of reduction for another. After all, in the great boom of the Black ‘90s, did the presence of Halle Berry deny the presence of Angela Bassett or Nia Long? Theresa Randle, AJ Johnson, Vivica A. Fox, or Regina King?
Discourses that develop around this subject tend to devolve into conversations around the individual when the systems at play are as in question now as they were then. Whatever the Black or biracial movie star is going to be in the future, that racial context cannot be ignored for the sake of access to that level of stardom, especially when that level of stardom should be in question itself. We cannot trade the work for half, or even all, of one’s identity. We should center those questions around what can be added, not subtracted.
- When Sci-fi Was Horny: “Logan’s Run” at 50 (June 18, 2026)
The fact that, despite many years of development, no one has managed to give us a remake of “Logan’s Run” in 50 years almost makes you believe in the existence of a benevolent intelligence controlling filmdom. Not that the original film, released by MGM on June 23, 1976, is a masterpiece beyond improvement. As a matter of fact, the film is quite flawed. But despite those shortcomings, it is, through and through, a snapshot of a particular turning point moment in the culture.
Those of you in the middle sliver of a Venn diagram of film nerds and science-fiction fans already know the film came out exactly 11 months before a little film by George Lucas changed everything forever. And so it is all but impossible not to look at “Logan’s Run” as the last gasp of a certain kind of horny science-fiction, forever vanquished by The Force.
Based on the same-titled 1967 novel written by William F. Nolan and George Clayton Johnson, the film—directed by English journeyman filmmaker Michael Anderson—is set in a 23rd-century utopia that could only have been imagined in the Summer of Love. Beautiful young people swan about in colorful, lightweight tunics, living in a giant mall in a domed city. There is no work, no marriage, no nature. There is only pleasure and spectacle. And the One Big Rule: You die at 30.
Apparently, the original novel set the city denizens’ lifespans at 21, but the filmmakers thought that would be too limiting for casting. Michael York played the eponymous “sandman” (which, in this world, is the closest equivalent to the police, but the only crime they are charged with stopping is the cardinal sin of “running”—trying to escape the city to dodge the death sentence) named Logan 5. His partner, Francis 7, is played by the late Richard Jordan.
Both men were over 30 when the film was made. Jordan was actually pushing 40. Yet somehow, the gap between their characters’ ages and their own serves the film. It’s as if the depravity of their professional violence (when we see them dispatch a runner in the film’s first third, they treat it like two office workers making sport of who can land buckets in the wastepaper basket) has aged them prematurely.
The decision to make 30 the cut-off was fortuitous. Because the film, in this way, marked the beginning of the Baby Boomers turning 30 with its release. Much has been made of the film as a critique of ’70s Boomer hedonism. This is the Me Generation projected into a gleaming but dark vision of the future. I have referred to the film’s setting as a utopia up to now, but if science fiction has taught us anything, it’s that a utopia is just a dystopia without scrutiny.
It is particularly rich to look at this city from the perspective of the present day. The city is run by AI, which means the villain in the film is, like much of the best science fiction, a system and not a person. Spectacle has become a religion. Those becoming tricenarians submit to a ritualistic public euthanasia that looks like a Las Vegas floor show. The show is called Carrousel [sic]. They are lustily cheered on as they die with the idea that their pyrotechnic ends are a sacrifice for the community and that they will be “renewed,” born again in one of the city’s incubators (reproduction is now handled by the machines, meaning sex is now purely a recreational pursuit).
The city’s emphasis on death as spectacle is the first clue that this is actually the bad place, and it should be noted that Carrousel was an invention of the screenwriter, David Zelag Goodman, and it did not appear in the novel. Cinema’s need for spectacle dovetailed beautifully with the decadent ethos of this dystopia.
If you’ve ever talked to a science fiction aficionado of a certain age, you know that the genre was positively libidinous before “Star Wars.” “Logan’s Run” has become a relic of that era. After a day of death dealing, Logan (at home, clad in a fantastic black caftan) orders up a sex partner who appears in his bachelor pad via teleporter. The first choice the AI gives him is a man, and Logan effectively swipes left with a look meant to telegraph to us that Logan is straight (or that he simply found that particular man too eager).
Finally, he settles on Jessica 6 (played by Jenny Agutter, who was actually under 30 at the time she made the film). When she seems reluctant to perform as a willing sex partner upon meeting him, Logan asks her if she prefers women instead. It should be noted that his tone is casual, without rancor, suggesting that bisexuality is widely accepted in this world.
The absence of conspicuous consumption remains one of the most striking bits of world-building in “Logan’s Run,” despite a mall in Dallas serving as the city’s central public location. It’s almost inconceivable that the absence of consumerism and materialism would exist in the film had it come along just 7 or more years later. The ’80s forever robbed us of the idea that capitalism was something the human race would inevitably simply evolve past in the next few centuries (see also the anti-capitalist wokeness known as “Star Trek”).
Much as Trinity sends Neo on his quest in “The Matrix” (a film that has many structural similarities to “Logan’s Run”), Logan’s interaction with Jessica raises questions for him about what he has always accepted as normal. She sets him off on a journey that will take him, literally and figuratively, beneath and outside the world he’s known and call everything into question. Watching it this time reminded me of the work of Peter Weir, who, time and time again, told stories about people who realized something (so huge that they’d been taught not to see it) and how this new knowledge changed them forever.
Logan and Jessica’s run take them through abandoned churches, a sex club (despite a lot of skin and even some bare breasts, this film was rated PG—welcome to the 1970s), and even a gatekeeping murderous robot voiced by the inimitable Roscoe Lee Browne (a sonorous Black man’s voice being issued from a metallic figure cannot help but feel like a precursor to Darth Vader, but unlike James Earl Jones, Browne actually performed from inside his cumbersome robot suit). Browne’s voice drove home another curious feature of the film: the complete (or at least nearly total) absence of people of color in this future. Lest we get too nostalgic, it’s always good to keep in mind how often “utopia” meant “whites only” in films of a certain era.
By the time Logan and Jessica reach the outside world—with Logan’s former partner relentlessly on their heels like a demented Inspector Javert—the film has begun to feel like both ancient myth and also a reworking of the Book of Genesis. They are a new Adam and Eve, perhaps in reverse, finding themselves in paradise after regurgitating the apple. Until we realize this Eden is, of all places, Washington, D.C. In the decayed Halls of Congress, now overgrown with flora and taken over by cats, they meet an old man (played by Peter Ustinov), confront their pursuer, and then head back to the city for one last showdown with the machine that has kept humanity imprisoned in an endless adolescence of the soul.
Upon release, “Logan’s Run” made $25 million against a then-voluminous $9 million budget. It was a modest hit and spawned an ill-conceived, short-lived TV series. Critics were mixed on it: Roger Ebert shrewdly saw it as neither a masterpiece nor an abomination, calling it a good time and not much else. The film won a special Academy Award for its special effects work, and was also nominated for its cinematography (shot in the 2.4:1 aspect ratio using the Todd-AO system by Hungarian-born cinematographer Ernest Laszlo, A.S.C.) and for its production design (by Dale Hennesy).
It’s no small feat for the film to have remained as much a part of the culture as it has for the last 50 years. It has been valuable as a reminder of how hedonism and youth culture can be weaponized by a faceless enemy that maintains a murderous status quo. In the end, the youngs meet Ustinov’s alter ego with naked awe. A big part of his character is that he is the product of heterosexual monogamy, something alien to this world. So it isn’t a stretch to think that he will, in time, indoctrinate the youth into traditional marriage.
The film, years before 1980 and the rise of Reaganism, seems to understand that the party is over. The youth will grow up at last, and most likely, that will mean doing a lot more work and having a lot less sex. A better film might have suggested a more radical re-imagining of their world to come, but the beauty of a film without a sequel or a remake is that you get to decide what comes next.
- New UK Trailer for Pedro Almodovar's Meta 'Bitter Christmas' Movie (June 18, 2026)
"You need to enjoy things more. Go out, live! Not everything is about writing and making films." But isn't it? Curzon Films in the UK has revealed their full official trailer for the film Bitter Christmas, the latest Pedro Almodóvar film from this year. It already opened in Spain back in March to mixed reviews. Then it premiered at the 2026 Cannes Film Festival also to mixed reviews. Now it has an August release date set for the UK but nothing confirmed for the US yet. During a long December holiday weekend, a woman, whose mother died recently, throws herself into more work as a form of escape. Her relentless pace is interrupted when a panic attack forces her to take a break. She travels to Lanzarote with her friend Patricia while her partner Bonifacio stays in Madrid. In 2026, a filmmaker turns her story into a screenplay, blurring the lines between reality, fiction, and the people closest to him. This stars Bárbara Lennie, Leonardo Sbaraglia, Aitana Sánchez-Gijón, Victoria Luengo (also in The Beloved), Patrick Criado, Milena Smit, Quim Gutiérrez, Rossy de Palma, Carmen Machi, & Gloria Muñoz. We also featured the original Spanish trailer for this earlier in the year. As nice as it is to always see a new Almodovar film, there doesn't seem to be much good buzz for this one at all. It's a meta story about Almodovar writing his scripts and it gets weird. // Continue Reading ›
- Fun New Cyclops Promo for Illumination's 'Minions & Monsters' Movie (June 18, 2026)
Beware of cyclops! Universal has unveiled a fun new promo trailer for this summer's next Minions movie titled officially Minions & Monsters hitting theaters in July this summer. This is also known as Minions 3, the 3rd in this spin-off franchise and 7th in the Despicable Me series. Now 10 years after their creation, Minions have become the iconic animated characters of their generation. In Minions & Monsters, co-creator & director Pierre Coffin sends them somewhere new: into Hollywood. This is the rambunctious, ridiculous, true story of how the Minions conquered Hollywood, became stars, lost everything, unleashed monsters onto the world and banded together to try and save the planet. In the 1920's, three Minions go to Hollywood to pursue their dreams of becoming filmmakers, but that changes when they discover a spellbook – they accidentally summon a monster. With the voice of director Pierre Coffin as the Minions, along with voices of Allison Janney, Christoph Waltz, Jeff Bridges, Jesse Eisenberg, Zoey Deutch, Trey Parker, Bobby Moynihan, Phil LaMarr. This promo is an obvious connection to The Odyssey, which Universal is also releasing this summer, playing up the classic Greek monster Cyclops who steps on a lego block in this footage. Along with that final trailer, this Minions sequel/prequel is looking like tons of old Hollywood fun. // Continue Reading ›
- Watch: Lovely Animated Short 'Nube' About Mom & Daughter Clouds (June 18, 2026)
After playing on the festival circuit for the last 3 years, this lovely animated short is now available online for everyone to enjoy. 🌩️ Nube is a wonderful 7-minute short film created by two Mexican filmmakers that is about a mother & daughter cloud. This first premiered at the Morelia Film Festival in Mexico where it won the Best Animated Short. "What would you do to stop your child from falling?" Nube is an Oscar-qualified 2D animated short film about motherhood, fear, and sacrifice. After witnessing an ancient storm cloud weep its final raindrops and dissolve into sorrow, Noma, a billowing big white cloud, senses with dread that her daughter Mixtli, a shadowy storm cloud, is in danger of raining too soon. Nube is a story of nurturing and the delicate cycles of life, capturing the balance between maternal protectiveness and the natural flow of change. Through rich, painterly animation, this tender short film takes viewers on a visual journey of loss, renewal, and the beauty inherent in each phase of life. Aside from Pixar's classic cloud short Partly Cloudy from 2009, this reminds me of so many other great animated shorts above parenting. Another must watch. // Continue Reading ›
- Chaotic Indie Comedy 'Sour Party' Trailer - Presented by Soderbergh (June 18, 2026)
"The universe brought you to me!" Starboard Entertainment has revealed a new official trailer for an indie comedy film titled Sour Party, made by "The Drextons" - Amanda Drexton & Michael A. Drexton, as their feature directorial debut. It originally premiered back in 2023 at a few small festivals, but is only getting a proper release now. Sour Party is the story of friends Gwen and James, two broke, flailing 30-somethings on a quest to scrounge money from a collection of low lives & failed artists in an attempt to arrive at Gwen's sister's baby shower with a proper gift. It's being presented by Steven Soderbergh, who's supporting this indie flick's release. He explains: "Sour Party is my favorite kind of indie film success story: a group of artists creating their own opportunity instead of waiting for one to present itself. That kind of indomitable spirit infuses every aspect of this movie, and I also believe the world needs more comedies!" The film stars Samantha Westervelt, Amanda Drexton, Corey Feldman, Douglas Bennett, and Reggie Watts. Looks like all kinds of wacky, weird, raucous fun! Like those stoner comedies we don't see anymore. Enjoy. // Continue Reading ›
- Official Trailer for 'The Welcome Table' Doc About Climate Migrants (June 18, 2026)
"These people's stories need to be told." HBO Max has revealed the first official trailer for the documentary film titled The Welcome Table, the latest optimistic and encouraging new climate change-related doc film from award-winning director Josh Fox. Another follow-up to Fox's other docs How to Let Go of the World: and Love All the Things Climate Can't Change and The Edge of Nature previously. We are on the verge of one of the largest mass migrations in human history, and for many, it has already begun. 1 out of every 3 people will lose their homes due to climate change, making climate displacement one of the defining crises of our time. This invigorating film tells the story of climate refugees across six continents, celebrating the voices and experiences of people living at the forefront of the climate crisis, displaced from their homes by climate disasters. "We are inviting climate displaced people from around the world to New Orleans to sit and celebrate with each other, to tell their stories, and heal. The table is a testament to mutual aid, the work we need to do as the effects of climate change become increasingly dire." The film features climate refugees, aid workers, community leaders & activists including Leo Farah, Chris Achilo, Nelton Yankur, Allie Stratta, Chris Obehi, and Pauleteh Araújo and live musical performances by John Boutté. I hope it makes an impact. // Continue Reading ›
