Category Archives: Commentary

LENS ME YOUR EARS — Episode 05: “Tech Will Destroy Us”

April 29, 2015 flawintheiris

With Avengers: Age of Ultron opening in cinemas later this week, and Ex Machina arriving May 8 (by most recent reports), Stephen Cooke and I thought it was worth going back to look at movies about our fear of technology. We talk Westworld, Jurassic Park, this summer's forthcoming Jurassic World (when I can remember the…Read More

Flaw In The Iris Rebooted

April 26, 2015 flawintheiris

Hello faithful film lover, Recently you may have noticed the new menu on this blog— the one just below the title banner. With the help of the kind people who keep Halifax Bloggers running smoothly behind the scenes, I've spent the past couple of weeks populating the menu with the past five years of posts,…Read More

Lens Me Your Ears — Episode 4 CAR MOVIES

April 14, 2015 flawintheiris

Episode four of the podcast Lens Me Your Ears is on iTunes now! Film expert Stephen Cooke and I check under the hood of Furious 7 take a spin in #1-6, and kick the tires of CAR MOVIES of the past. Come for a ride with us here. Read More

Save the Nova Scotia Film Tax Credit!

April 3, 2015 flawintheiris

Why am I not surprised? Every time the government looks to make some cuts, benefits to the creative community are the first things on the chopping block. The idea of these cuts is usually suggested by a finance minister who doesn't really understand how the funding works in the first place. Halifaxbloggers.ca head cheese Brenden Sommerhalder…Read More

Lens Me Your Ears: Episode 002 — New York Movies!

March 17, 2015 flawintheiris

What is a New York movie? What qualifies? Stephen Cooke, arts reporter for the Halifax Chronicle Herald, and I dive into the ways The Big Apple has inspired filmmakers, especially those who made the classic crime thrillers of the 1970s—from Serpico to Q: The Winged Serpent to The Warriors— but we don't stop there. Go here…Read More

Lens Me Your Ears is here — Stephen Cooke and Carsten Knox talk movies!

March 11, 2015 flawintheiris

The banner of this blog claims it's "a conversation about movies and storytelling," which I hope has been true in the 4.5 years I've been at it. I'm taking the conversation to a new platform. Stephen Cooke, award-winning arts reporter with The Chronicle Herald, and I love talking about movies. Now we have a podcast,…Read More

Academy Awards 2015 Reaction and Controversies

February 24, 2015 flawintheiris

I enjoyed the 87th Annual Academy Awards. As usual, they were too long, and here in Atlantic Canada started too late. (Why did it start 30 minutes later than last year? To give more red carpet time? That's a really bad idea. But I'll have more to say about the preshow in a bit.) Overall…Read More

Second Screenings — and more on Birdman

February 1, 2015 flawintheiris

A couple days ago there was an interesting piece in the Guardian about whether critics should see movies more than once, and whether that was fair to viewers who, for the most part, are likely to only see a movie one time. You can go here to read it. I think of myself primarily as…Read More

Jurassic World: Fan Fiction and Going To The Well Once Too Often

November 28, 2014 flawintheiris

We're living in the age of sequels and reboots. People have called it The Age of Fan Fiction, and many applaud that notion. My feelings about this are complicated. What I find is that, too frequently, beloved fantasy material of the past gets reinterpreted by other, less maverick creators for the sake of box office…Read More

Outlier Podcast: The Creeping Garden

November 19, 2014 flawintheiris

As I mentioned last week, The Outlier Film Festival is on the horizon, bringing the most unusual horror, cult, science fiction, and documentary films to Halifax on November 27-29. Matt Charlton, one of the festival organizers, invited me to be part of a podcast at Village Sound, talking about a few of the documentaries playing…Read More