Crime

On the Insatiable American Dreamers of Pain and Gain

In Michael Bay's Pain and Gain a nightmarish, sun-baked idea of the American Dream emerges, marred by crime, violence and madness. However, despite what many have said, Bay's film is not so much a moral critique of a specific lifestyle or belief system. Instead, it conveys a more intriguing truth. The American Dream is ultimately a…Read more On the Insatiable American Dreamers of Pain and Gain

Film Review: Scarlet Street (1945)

Once an archetypal cinematic gangster, the diminutive Edward G. Robinson did a bold about-face in Fritz Lang's excellent noir, Scarlet Street. In Lang's studio shot, oppressively claustrophobic film, the man who once was Little Caesar is reduced to puddy in the claws of femme-fatale Kitty March (played with great bombast by Joan Bennett). Lang, always…Read more Film Review: Scarlet Street (1945)