Chris Barsanti's Blog, page 7
January 12, 2025
Writer’s Desk: Write Like You Read
The only advice, indeed, that one person can give another about reading is to take no advice.
January 7, 2025
Screening Room: ‘Alfred Hitchcock: The Iconic Collection’
Yep, every one of those films in fully remastered 4K Ultra HD. Plus extras. And a cool bookshelf case. My review of Alfred Hitchcock: The Iconic Collection is at PopMatters: Far from lazy, Alfred Hitchcock: The Iconic Film Collection delivers a delectable sampling of the director in the late bloom of his career. These six films—Rear Window (1954), To …
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January 5, 2025
Writer’s Desk: Umberto Eco’s Rules
Umberto Eco was the kind of writer many aspire to become. Witty, pugnacious, ridiculously well-read, and generally up for anything, whether it was an ornately detailed conspiracy theory, heavily researched mystery novel, or punchy political essay. Given that, he had a lot to tell other writers about their craft, even if he failed to follow …
December 30, 2024
Screening Room: Best Movies of 2024
My year-end movie review was published at Eyes Wide Open: The weirdest aspect to moviegoing in 2024 was just how weird it wasn’t. That doesn’t mean COVID and streaming haven’t reshaped the industry, likely forever. But with a few standouts, things have settled into a familiar pattern. Audiences flocked to cinematic comfort fare that gave …
December 29, 2024
Writer’s Desk: Bridge the Divide
A Rhodes Scholar who left Oxford to join the Marines in 1968, Karl Marlantes served one tour of duty in the Vietnam War before returning home and spending the next few decades trying to understand what happened over there and how to communicate it to anybody else. In “Why I Write,” Marlantes described being surrounded …
December 22, 2024
Writer’s Corner: Learn and Share
The late Nikki Giovanni (1943-2024) was a poet who did a lot of things most people don’t expect poets to do. She started her own publishing company. She recorded an album with a gospel choir. She even interviewed James Baldwin on television. She also gave good advice to those willing to listen: I know some …
December 20, 2024
Best Books of 2024
The year-end best books of 2024 feature just launched from PopMatters. I contributed the introduction and a few selections of my own: Industry consolidation or not, publishers of all sizes and tastes kept publishing more fascinating books than anybody could come close to reading in a year. However, the indomitable critics here at PopMatters did our level …
December 15, 2024
Writer’s Desk: Start Cutting
Sometimes when stuck for inspiration, or just as a way of jump-starting things, William S. Burroughs liked to use something he and his friend, painter Brion Gysin, developed called the “cut-up method.” It’s not difficult, per Burroughs: Take any poet or writer you fancy. Heresay, or poems you have read over many times. The words …
December 14, 2024
Screening Room: Best Movies of 2014 – ‘Guardians of the Galaxy’
James Gunn’s scruffy and un-spandex’d band of reluctant heroes mirrored the good-hearted rogues and raggedy charm of space westerns like 'Firefly.'
December 11, 2024
Reader’s Corner: PW’s 2024 Graphic Novel Critics Poll
Myself and a number of other (far more estimable) writers were asked to vote on the best graphic novels of the year for Publishers Weekly. The results are in! For the second year in a row, the top spot on PW’s annual graphic novel critics poll is shared by two titles. The debut graphic memoir Feeding Ghosts by …
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