Email Author KARINA LONGWORTH

Awards

• 2011 - Southern California Journalism Awards/LA Press Club

  Film reviews

• 2011 - Southern California Journalism Awards/LA Press Club, published February 5, 2010

  "Sundance's Rebel Yell"

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2012 Stories by KARINA LONGWORTH

• The Top 10 Films of 2012

  published December 27, 2012

  More than ever, boiling this concluding year down to the 10 "best" movies feels both arbitrary and reductive. Ideally, I'd have 25 unnumbered... More >>

• 

  COVER STORY

  Quentin Tarantino's Unchained Malady

  published December 20, 2012

  Quentin Tarantino has been Googling himself, and it's starting to become a problem. The filmmaker, whose eighth feature, Django... More >>

• Brad Pitt: Making a Killing in Obama's America

  published November 29, 2012

  An adaptation of George V. Higgins' 1974 novel, Cogan's Trade, Andrew Dominik's Killing Them Softly anatomizes a... More >>

• 'Hitchcock': Hollywood's 'Psycho' Moment

  published November 21, 2012

  Early in Hitchcock, Alfred Hitchcock (played by Sir Anthony Hopkins with a sack of fat connecting chin to neck) walks the red carpet... More >>

• The Outlook Is Mostly Cloudy in 'Silver Linings Playbook'

  published November 15, 2012

  Silver Linings Playbook, which stars Bradley Cooper as a manic-depressive man-child attempting to get his life back together after a... More >>

• 'Skyfall' Deals With 007's Mommy Issues

  published November 8, 2012

  If Hollywood's rut du jour is the origin story as bid for franchise immortality, you can't say that Skyfall—the 23rd "official"... More >>

• 'The Bay' Aspires to YouTube

  published November 1, 2012

  Found-footage eco-horror cheapie The Bay—in which a previously harmless waterborne parasite mutates into an unstoppable... More >>

• Sean Baker's Puppets and Starlets

  published November 1, 2012

  Sean Baker's Starlet stars Dree Hemingway (Ernest's great-granddaughter) as Jane, a 21-year-old "girl next door" porn performer whose... More >>

• Finally, a Treat: 'Fun Size'

  published October 25, 2012

  Gossip Girl and The O.C., the two teen TV shows created in the past decade by 36-year-old Josh Schwartz, are sly bait and... More >>

• 'The Loneliest Planet': Or, Where Guides Don't Go

  published October 25, 2012

  The Loneliest Planet begins with close-up trained on the body of a beautiful woman, naked and trembling. It's not what it... More >>

• Getting Someplace In 'Middle of Nowhere'

  published October 11, 2012

  When Ruby (played by the stunning Emayatzy Corinealdi) tells the new man in her life she likes "indie" movies, it's both a declaration of... More >>

• 'Argo' Brings Back Hearts and Minds

  published October 11, 2012

  Perhaps more than any other male American star of his generation, Ben Affleck understands the narrative advantage of having Hollywood on your... More >>

• Meet the Monsters

  published September 13, 2012

  A critic's report from a film festival such as the one in Toronto, at which something like 300 features were unveiled from Sept. 6 through 16,... More >>

• 'Detropia': City of the Dead

  published September 6, 2012

  When it comes to cost-cutting, downsizing, and philosophical and practical compromise, how low is it possible to go before there's nothing left... More >>

• 'The Master': From the Window to the Wall

  published September 6, 2012

  There's something startlingly noncommittal about many of the initial reviews of The Master that leaked out following the impromptu... More >>

• The Horror, the Horror of 'The Ambassador'

  published August 30, 2012

  The blitzkrieg of award season is right around the corner, and with it, we can expect an onslaught of stunt performances, designed to wow... More >>

• 'Sleepwalk With Me,' or This American Zombie

  published August 23, 2012

  It's pretty Pollyanna-ish to complain when companies that are in the business of making money on movies make certain movies solely to make... More >>

• 'Cosmopolis': Twilight of a God

  published August 16, 2012

  Boyishly lean, with a brooding angularity that suggests both high maintenance and nefarious vacancy, Robert Pattinson has managed to fill the... More >>

• Is 'Compliance' an Exploitation Film

  published August 16, 2012

  Like antidepressants, artificial sugars, Botox and other miracle inventions of the past century, corporate culture became an omnipresent fact... More >>

• Julie Delpy Rocks 'New York'

  published August 16, 2012

  "My son is sick right now, covered in zits. It's not contagious—I mean, it's contagious, but don't worry: Grown-ups don't catch it. It's... More >>

• Meet the Politicians in 'The Campaign'

  published August 9, 2012

  The Campaign begins with an onscreen quote attributed to Ross Perot: "War has rules. Mud-wrestling has rules. Politics has no... More >>

• Exes With Benefits in 'Celeste and Jesse Forever'

  published August 2, 2012

  In Celeste and Jesse Forever, the titular, newly separated female protagonist's unflamboyant queer co-worker (Elijah Wood) tells her,... More >>

• Ai Weiwei: Raise a Finger

  published July 26, 2012

  Chinese artist, activist and antagonist Ai Weiwei became a worldwide cause celebre last April when he was arrested by authorities at the... More >>

• The Nouveau Crash of 'The Queen of Versailles'

  published July 19, 2012

  "I don't want to give you lessons in self-denial and social responsibility," an art dealer tells her billionaire-boy client in Don DeLillo's... More >>

• 'Shut Up and Play the Hits': This Has Happened

  published July 19, 2012

  "When we started the band, suddenly we were, like, New York famous. We could get into anyplace, but you know—I was never recognized on a... More >>