It's really pretty, I like it a lot!

What's up folks.... been a while. Not much really to say. I learned to code and made a little hobby game with godot as a challenge to myself to learn and create something in a new medium. Was really fun even though the final product wasn't that good.

Haven’t been on here in a while. Things have been pretty bad lately. My dog passed away on Thursday. It’s been really hard to be without him. I keep seeing him when I close my eyes.

howdy folks. been a while. happy new year!

Peter Watkins' Long Journey Close Up: Peter Watkins

After a lengthy gap between posts, I returned to my substack to honor the life and legacy of Peter Watkins, one of the greatest filmmakers ever. It's a long biography of the man that argues his career represents an attempt to redefine our notions of auteurism.

open.substack.com/pub/closeupl...

Been messing around with unity lately in an attempt to pick up a non-film related hobby. it's fun!

This makes me feel way better about losing $132.6 million the other day.

recently saw Phantom of the Paradise for the first time. Really incredible movie. The theater I saw it in mixed it so loud that my ears were ringing during the climax, which felt perfect.

They’re all great but I think DQ5 is the best one so far, though DQ6 (the game I’m playing now) is giving it a serious run for its money)

Been playing through the dragon quest series. Some of the best rpg design of all time.

Awesome movie

oh man. the like two second audio clip they play of a pig oinking as the first guy convulses on the floor after being killed by leatherface... gets me every time

rewatching the texas chainsaw massacre. somehow it gets better and better every time. struck by the really sad moment of Franklin sitting and frowning as he hears his friends goofing off in the house. he just has the fucking worst day of all time.

Don’t really have a lot going on today. Saw the mastermind on Monday and really enjoyed it. Check that one out if you’re a fan of crime comedies that really go hard on realism. There’s a ten minute scene of a character fumbling around with a ladder that’s so funny.

let me know if we're mutuals from twitter and I haven't followed you back, I'm pretty bad about these things!

Can everyone do me a favor and follow me if I know you from Twitter and also recreate my exact same community of comics and politics people from over there

I'm watching the newest season of the morning show with my mom. This is the most unhinged show ever

guess i should start being more active on here.

Taking A Skeptical Look At A Film I Enjoyed Close Up: One Battle After Another

I liked, but didn't love One Battle After Another. To sort out my feelings, I took to the substack and wrote a slightly skeptical piece about the film, its style, its politics surrounding race, and how it also contains my fave sequence of the year:
open.substack.com/pub/closeupl...

The Life or Death Stakes of Making Anything Close Up: Godard's King Lear

This week on the substack, I went a little crazy writing about Godard's King Lear, his optimistic attitude about the potential of art, its relationship to real world injustice, Godard's opinion on Woody Allen, and the stakes of embarking on a creative project. open.substack.com/pub/closeupl...

A Television Pilot, Rendered Unfamiliar Close Up: Mark Z Danielewski's The Familiar

This week on the Substack, I wrote about one of my favorite book series, Mark Z Danielewski’s The Familiar. This series is so strange that it defies most of my casual/critical instincts as a reader; at its best, it’s like if Mulholland Drive was a book series:
open.substack.com/pub/closeupl...

I think it’s definitely up to interpretation but I see the conspiracy stuff as so intentionally murky that it’s hard to parse what it is other than a sort of monkey’s paw type wish fulfillment for Joe, who blamed antifa for his own behavior.

Three Blind Men and an Eddington Long Shot: Eddington, Anti-Oculus, May 2020

Howdy gang, just dropping back in to say that I wrote another article on the substack. This time I wrote about Ari Aster's latest film Eddington, a movie that I think captures the spirit of 2025 more than the spirit of 2020. open.substack.com/pub/closeupl...

With Watkins the politics are right there on the surface, he’s making the film to work through them and in a sense live them out irl. One of very few filmmakers who can claim to have developed a truly democratic cinema.

Been going through the films of Peter Watkins lately. What a filmmaker. Something I like about him is that he’s a filmmaker with left wing politics you can actually sort into a political tendency other than liberalism. Most of the time you kind of have to vaguely intuit a filmmaker’s politics

A Game That Accumulates And Delivers Close Up: Death Stranding 2

Howdy folks, it’s been a while. Just dropping in to say that I started a Substack! It’s totally free, and the first post is about the game design of Death Stranding 2! There are no story spoilers at all, if you’re worried about that. You can read it here: open.substack.com/pub/closeupl...

100%. I was appalled in the theater. I remember seeing an ad for it where Sean Baker did a free screening for sex workers and that has to be one of the most psychotic things I can imagine doing w/ this movie

I’ve been getting so many new follow notifs that I feel a little guilty for not posting on here

Going to be interviewed for a guy’s podcast he’s doing for a final project. It’s about the planet of the apes movies. Should be simple

hard to figure out what to post on here. do i just do the same posts again here? but i already got that thought out of my brain, i'm not putting it back in so i can take it out again...