Nathaniel Missildine, Author at Bright Wall/Dark Room

Perhaps I can trace my steps backward and forward, anticipating and restoring the nostalgia, with a little less trepidation thanks to my early time spent with The Big Chill. By the time I reached my own cold fronts, I had the reminder that others had passed this way before.

The Circus Sands

Nathaniel Missildine·

Issue 117: On The Road

In Fellini's La Strada, we enter another plane by grace of Gelsomina. Gelsomina (Giulietta Masina) is the Spirit, the Soul. She will play the trumpet.

Never Just a Movie

Nathaniel Missildine·

Issue 113: Recovery

On Chris Rock's Top Five and how difficult it can be to know exactly where the show ends and the reality begins.

Most Wonderful

Nathaniel Missildine·

Issue 108: Melodrama

L.A. Story is romantic, hopelessly. Our four lovestruck main characters fall in and out of their spells. The tone gets mushy. The freeway sign is embraced. The paradise could be believed.

Place Cliché

Nathaniel Missildine·

Issue 103: Best of 2021

The illusions of The French Dispatch are wondrous and sweet, and possibly vanishing. This singular setting and this singular filmmaker bolster one another, though, an inevitable convergence of two finely cultivated worlds—the outsider dream of France, and the extended universe of Wes Anderson.

Seasoned

Nathaniel Missildine·

Issue 101: Generations

It took a movie, not for the first or last time, to hoist my attention to broader ideas. At an evening showing of Nobody’s Fool, it occurred to me that I could become an old man.

The Way It Turns

Nathaniel Missildine·

Issue 96: Best Laid Plans

With human activity suspended in 2020, nature re-emerged.

The Elephant Man (1980) | art by Tony Stella

Staring All Over Again

Nathaniel Missildine·

Extras

A tremor of vulnerability renewed itself as I sat down to watch The Elephant Man again. I wasn’t sure I could handle it. Am I resilient enough for this now? Am I finally old enough to see it?

So Different From This Hell

Nathaniel Missildine·

Issue 88: Justice

French director Ladj Ly picks up Victor Hugo’s matters of poverty, injustice, and revolt and runs with them—far enough away to reclaim Les Misérables for a 21st century country.