Posts by author
Nicholas Rombes
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Spooky Action at a Distance: David Lynch, Split Edit Realism, and Other Mysteries
There is a moment in David Lynch’s Wild at Heart (1990) that cuts from Lula’s (Laura Dern’s) feet stomping in excitement on a bed to those same feet stomping in dance mode in a bar to the sound of the…
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Julia Kristeva’s Face
In the winter of 1989 I had finished my first semester of graduate studies in English at Penn State University and received, in my campus mailbox, the comments from my professors for the “Introduction to Graduate Studies” class.
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There Is a Head Rolling Over the Platform: The Strange Case of George Lippard’s The Quaker City
On July 12, 1849, a man appeared at the offices, in Philadelphia, of the Quaker City, a newspaper. He was despondent and wearing only one shoe, and was seeking the editor and writer George Lippard. When he found him he…
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The Dark Mystery of Emily Dickinson’s “Master” Letters
One of the enduring mysteries of American literature is a series of three letters drafted by Emily Dickinson to someone she called “Master.” There is no evidence that he letters—written between 1858 and 1862 and discovered shortly after Dickinson’s death…
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Nicholas Rombes’s Art Film Roundup #6
Beyond the Black Rainbow (Panos Cosmatos, 2011) has the feel of a slow march through a black swamp. There is a majesty and a tar-pit trap power in the wordless matching of moving images and music. I am obliged to…
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10/40/70 #36: I Shot Andy Warhol
This ongoing experiment in film writing freezes a film at 10, 40, and 70 minutes, and keeps the commentary as close to those frames as possible. This week, I examine I Shot Andy Warhol, directed by Mary Harron (1996):
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10/40/70 Contest
This coming Wednesday, March 30, a new 10/40/70 experimental film column will be published here at The Rumpus. In the spirit of the absurd beauty of spring, if you can identify the film I’ll be writing about from this single…
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Nicholas Rombes’s Art Film Roundup #5
Not usually a fan of these mash-ups, but this one—the great museum sequence from Brian De Palma’s Dressed to Kill (1980) set to Brian Eno’s song “Third Uncle”—works just fine. Oh Angie! (The music kicks in at around 40 seconds.):
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10/40/70 #34: Alien
This ongoing experiment in film writing freezes a film at 10, 40, and 70 minutes, and keeps the commentary as close to those frames as possible. This week, I examine Alien, directed by Ridley Scott (1979):
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Nicholas Rombes’ Art Film Roundup
In at least two of his novels, Thomas Pynchon mentions a Porky Pig cartoon from the 1930s. Here is the reference from The Crying of Lot 49 (1965), as Oedipa Maas listens to an old man named Thoth, whose grandfather…
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Nicholas Rombes’ Art Film Roundup
Before the fiasco of the “rock musical” Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark, Julie Taymor worked in smaller savageries, especially Titus (1999), her adaptation of Shakespeare’s Titus Andronicus. The movie was a bit of an easy target. It was released after…
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Nicholas Rombes’ Art Film Roundup
Speaking of Egypt. The Yacobean Building (2006), directed by Marwan Hamed. The film shifts stunningly and beautifully between hard-core melodrama, sadness, and comedy. There are, eerily, some scenes that seem to predict the uprising against Mubarek.