It’s March again and arguably it’s never stopped being March. Malkovich, Malkovich, Malkovich. Ever since the global COVID-19 pandemic hit the U.S. and then basically forced most of the country to shut down and self-isolate in March 2020, the idea of existential despair has been on our brains both consciously and unconsciously. First, of course, it was panic—see stores running out of food and toilet paper—and some were able to channel that anxious energy into a kind of manic hypercreativity or hysterical productivity in the first few months of uncertainty (Steven Soderbergh famously wrote three full screenplays in about the first two months of the pandemic, challenging the nervous energy of not knowing what to do with himself with so much “downtime”).

Continue reading Existential Despair: Essential Movies For When March Never Ends at The Playlist.

After screening to solid reviews at this past Sundance, the documentary about exiled Polish filmmaker, “Roman Polanski: Wanted and Desired,” was quietly rolled out in one New York theater without any press screenings or notification.

Continue reading Stuff That Happened While We Were Sleeping: Polankski, Cruise, Heston, Antonioni, Ebert at The Playlist.