More from Robyn Bahr
10 Eerie Documentaries About the Wonders of Planet Earth
This story is part of The Hollywood Reporter’s 2023 Sustainability Issue (click here to read more). We’re currently living in a golden age of panic-inducing eco-documentaries gushing facts and statistics at us about how humans are killing the planet. These didactic films are vital for grounding us in the sobering truths of climate change and […]
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‘Another Body’ Review: Intriguing Deepfake Porn Doc Is Not as Deep as You’d Think
This documentary chronicles what happens when a college student discovers that her face has been digitally planted over the bodies of porn stars.
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The Hollywood Reporter Critics Pick the 15 Best Films of Sundance 2023
A deliciously juicy psychological thriller starring Thomasin McKenzie and Anne Hathaway, an Olympian’s stunning directorial debut and a spirited documentary portrait of Little Richard are among faves from the fest.
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Mental Health Visibility Only Goes So Far at the Oscars
Disability is usually the last identity category most people think of when we talk collectively about bolstering diversity, equity and inclusion across institutions — yet disabled people comprise the most diverse minoritized population in the world. After all, anyone can become disabled at any time. Disability is also often invisible: Think of how many people […]
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‘It’s Only Life After All’ Review: The Indigo Girls Look Back in a Heartfelt Doc
Alexandria Bombach's documentary allows Amy Ray and Emily Saliers of the Atlanta alt-folk duo to speak for themselves.
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A Pinch of Irony, a Splash of Derision: How Supporting Performances Brought Extra Flavor to Their Respective Films
Some of this year’s best supporting performances in film didn’t arise from your classic scenery-chewing powerhouse monologues or even a de rigueur prolonged cameo by a stalwart veteran — the kinds of smaller dramatic roles that net major industry awards. For every heartrending speech in Women Talking, The Whale and The Fabelmans, there are still […]
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For This Season’s Oscar Contenders, Abandonment Is Survival
Awards season is notorious for bolstering films that feature the most abject suffering possible, but, remarkably, many of this year’s top dramas instead collectively showcase a more complex type of pain: the bittersweet relief of escaping from your dependents. The Oscars have often favored films that emotionally align their audiences with the neglected and abandoned […]
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Playing Sexy on TV Is No Small Feat
One of the year’s most stomach-clenching TV moments was a scene in a hotel bathroom in which a woman is searching for sunscreen. In the season two opener of HBO’s The White Lotus, Aubrey Plaza’s clamped-shut lawyer Harper decidedly does not want to be on a couple’s trip in Sicily with her husband’s finance-bro college […]
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Dave Chappelle’s Emmy Noms Show the TV Academy Isn’t Swayed by Social Media
In his incendiary Emmy-nominated Netflix comedy special The Closer, Dave Chappelle reminds his audience that Twitter may be an influential force, but it often reflects a distorted version of real life. Throughout the special, in which everything from the pandemic to police shootings is fair game, he jokes about the blowback he received from the […]
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This Year’s Award for Wacky Emmy Category Goes to… TV Movie
As more and more media conglomerates shift their business models to subscription streaming platforms, the borderlines between “film” and “television” continue to dissolve. Methods of distribution are no longer concretely disparate as studio-made feature-length films now often debut exclusively on streaming sites and many TV creators describe their shows as “10-hour-long movies.” These newly permeable […]
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Amber Ruffin, Ziwe, Desus and Mero and the New Vanguard of Late Night
I knew Ziwe Fumudoh had truly made it when she was both parodied and saluted on the latest season of Succession, an au courant satire ostensibly about the ouroboros that is media itself. The acid-tongued cringe comedian, who found an audience through YouTube and Instagram commenting on privilege politics before eventually landing a newsy late […]
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How TV Is Embracing Late-in-Life Coming-of-Age Stories
For as fecund as Peak TV has been during the past decade, the glut hasn’t exactly yielded boundless perfection. In between all the flavorless revivals, franchise extenders, true-scandal dramas and star-studded gimmicks, this season I found myself grasping for simple shows that radiated unaffected warmth and vulnerability. I wanted sincerity. I wanted quietness. I wanted […]
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