2015-06-02 12:57
Good and Faithful Readers of Ye Olde Banana Tree:I have a new professional website: theandydavidson.com.Soon, I'll be auto-redirecting traffic there, but for now, I'd like to let this space… Read More
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The Banana Tree Of Jean Louis Blog
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A blog about movies, media, and life. Hosted by a monkey.
2015-01-13 18:16
There's a beautiful simplicity at work in the narrative of Boyhood, a mature, confident sense of storytelling, though the story being told is hardly simple. The narrative moves thr… Read More
2014-09-21 12:30
Some movies hit at just the right moment. Tim Burton's Batman came along the summer I turned eleven. That's the age, I'd argue, for girls or boys, when the heart's a-yearning for a grand fan… Read More
2014-06-15 04:43
In addition to being terribly written at almost every turn, Maleficent is an ill-conceived project. Re-imaginings don't have free reign to violate the ground rules established by the source… Read More
2014-03-23 12:50
Lars Von Trier's last two movies have been humorless affairs, but in Nymphomaniac he seems to have discovered a more playful side of himself, a way to grapple with Serious Ideas while, occas… Read More
2014-03-17 12:44
Despite what 99% of fans may think, Veronica Mars (2004-2007) had the perfect ending. Thomas crafted a nice noir finish by having Veronica walk away in the rain, having cast her vote for a c… Read More
2014-02-09 22:35
Every now and then, a movie comes along that critics and the American movie-going public seem to agree upon. Everyone likes it, everyone thinks it's swell, and no one's too quick to offer mu… Read More
2014-01-27 16:21
It's not uncommon these days for a series to be extended past eight seasons, but The Office, despite its longevity and its British roots, is, in fact, an uncommon series. My initial dislike… Read More
2014-01-12 01:40
Great American comedies are hard to come by, and now, after this and The Wolf of Wall Street, I've seen two in a row. Very different, these two, which I guess goes without saying, but maybe… Read More
2013-12-30 15:04
The Wolf of Wall Street is a black comedy of the highest order. Scorsese hasn't made a movie this mean since After Hours. Of course, Paul Hackett is the kind of character you can root for, a… Read More
2013-12-30 14:49
Desolation of Smaug is faster and leaner, in many ways, than its predecessor. But its headlong rush to the finish − or, at least, the finish of this installment − feels… Read More
2013-10-15 15:30
The best idea in Room 237, which is 90% lazy half-argument, moronic supposition, and pseudo-intellectual gibberish, is represented by the image above. A couple of guys arrange an experimenta… Read More
2013-10-14 20:22
With Doctor Sleep holding at number one on the bestseller lists, there's been a great deal of talk in book presses and blogs lately about Stephen King's take on Stanley Kubrick's 1980 adapta… Read More
2013-10-14 16:16
The Shining is one of those novels that begets endless conversation all along the spectrum of its readers, from ardent King fans to academics to detractors and detesters of Stanley Kubrick's… Read More
2013-10-14 16:01
If The Phantom Carriage feels familiar, it's partly because it's basically a weird holiday companion to Dickens' Christmas Carol. A selfish man is briefly shown, upon entering the spirit wor… Read More
2013-10-14 15:42
I remarked on Frank Darabont's The Mist when it came out six years ago, and my opinion hasn't really changed since then. The ending, daring though it may be, simply isn't supported by the ch… Read More
2013-10-14 15:27
Curse of the Cat People, as a sequel, is a weird thing. If you hadn't seen the first one, you'd have little to no information about who the Cat People even are. Also very little exposition a… Read More
2013-10-14 15:12
We kick off October and the Val Lewton set I've never gotten fully round to (a shame, I know) with Cat People, a strange and creepy movie about, well, a woman that turns into a cat and mauls… Read More
2013-07-21 01:20
Harmony Korine's tone poem of a movie fits snugly into a genre I'm calling post-noir: darkly and lyrically self-aware crime stories set against a modern American landscape of greed, excess… Read More
2013-07-18 14:56
In case you're wondering, I like what this guy says about Man of Steel (warning: here there be spoylers). Personally, from a storytelling perspective, I'm more irritated with that darn… Read More
2013-07-17 15:08
Pretty in Pink is troublesome. I like John Hughes, and I recognize his contribution to American movies, not only to movies of the 80s but to movies of ever-since-there-were-American-movies… Read More
2013-07-17 14:33
As comedies in the summer go, you could do worse, but things settle uneasily sometimes, and here it's the odd racism of a screenplay that thinks it's being, well, not racist. Also, is it ver… Read More
2013-07-17 14:16
Design for Living is a film both of and beyond its time, a comedy for the ages, and a movie I fear, were Ben Hecht shopping it today, might never get made. After all, it approaches its subje… Read More
2013-07-17 13:54
Repo Man is among the greatest of the apocalyptic LA films I've seen, if only because it considers the city on the periphery, the parts of town the tourists won't ever go, and it elevates ce… Read More
2013-07-17 13:19
World War Z is probably not as good a thing as the novel, based on what I've read and heard, but it's not a bad movie. I was pleasantly surprised that a troubled production can still, these… Read More
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