George McCartney

Latest by George McCartney in Chronicles

• Columns

  September 2020

  The Revolution, Televised

  8 min

  Mr. Jones disturbingly renders the Holodomor with Ukrainian peasants driven to extremes of hunger under Stalin's man-created famine. James Norton plays the eponymous Welsh journalist who exposes the horrible truth.

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• Columns

  August 2020

  Alien Intuitions

  8 min

  George McCartney with commentary on The Vast of Night (2019), Shirley (2020), and Shadow of a Doubt (1943).

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• Columns

  July 2020

  Aiming Aimlessly

  7 ¾ min

  Chronicles Film Editor George McCartney reviews The Hunt (2020) and reflects on The Most Dangerous Game (1932) and The Candidate (1972).

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• Reviews

  June 2020

  What the Editors Are Reading

  4 ¼ min

  Robert Louis Stevenson’s novella of split personality, the Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (1886), and The Rise and Fall of the Great Powers (1987) by Paul Kennedy

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• Columns

  June 2020

  Hankering Hereafter

  8 min

  The Invisible Man (2020) • Seven Stages to Achieve Eternal Bliss (2018) • Panic in the Streets (1950)

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• Columns

  April/May 2020

  Family Finances

  7 ¾ min

  Parasite may be both the most amusing and the most horrifying movie of the year. That is, if you can get past its inept attempt at making a political statement.

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• Columns

  March 2020

  The World's Values

  7 ¾ min

  1917 • La Grande Illusion (1937) • Paths of Glory (1957) • Uncut Gems

  Sam Mendes’ new film, 1917, is a rigorous examination of what it was like to be a low-ranking officer in the Great War. The film follows—literally, with a camera just over their shoulders—two young lance corporals, mere boys, as they attempt to follow mission orders that may well prove fatal.

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• Columns

  February 2020

  The Perils of Revisionism

  7 ¾ min

  The Irishman • Raging Bull • Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker •

  Martin Scorsese’s The Irishman has been hailed in many quarters as a triumph, a return to the early movies of his career that made his reputation as the preeminent director of mob cinema. I wonder, is this a desirable accolade? Speaking for myself, I’ve had quite enough mafia-inflected entertainment.

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• Columns

  January 2020

  Racing for Dominance

  8 min

  Jojo Rabbit • Ford v Ferrari • A Simple Plan

  Jojo Rabbit, written, directed, and produced by Taika Waititi, is a strange movie. It breaks the 74-year-old rule that Hitler must never be portrayed as playful, prankish, or in any other way amusing. Yet that’s precisely what Waititi has done. What’s more, he’s taken on the acting challenge of portraying the monster.

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• Columns

  December 2019

  Grim Foolishness

  8 min

  I’ve seen only two-and-a-half Quentin Tarantino films, which seems to me one more than enough. They’re silly, trashy, and singularly devoid of amusement. Why would I see another? But when his latest, Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, received enthusiastic notices elsewhere, I thought I should try it. Could I have misjudged his work? I can confidently report that my original judgment was correct.

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• Columns

  November 2019

  Mayhem and Civility

  8 min

  Joker, Downton Abbey, and The Conversation • There must be other films as ghastly as director Todd Phillips’ Joker, but I can’t think of any that come close to its sickness. I don’t say that lightly. This is a thoroughly immoral film, and a profoundly unpleasant one, unless, of course, you hanker for gruesome scenes.

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• Columns

  October 2019

  Hiding in Delusion

  7 ½ min

  Although Where’d You Go, Bernadette stars the incomparable Cate Blanchett along with a strong cast that includes Billy Crudup and Kristen Wiig, the film is a serious disappointment. I shouldn’t have been surprised, given it was released in mid-August, which is when studios dump films they suspect will be losers.

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• Columns

  September 2019

  Hazardous Do-Overs

  7 ¾ min

  America was founded on the idea of the second chance. People unhappy with their lives in Europe sailed to the New World, where they hoped they could escape oppression and failure. This gave rise to the peculiarly American idea that it is possible to overcome the weight of the past and reinvent oneself to one’s own specifications. It doesn’t always work out, but hope is a virtue that springs eternal. If your new self disappoints, you could always pick up stakes and move farther west in search of regions more hospitable to your dreams.

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• Columns

  August 2019

  The Naked and The Veiled

  7 ¾ min

  German director Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck’s new film, Never Look Away, now available for online streaming, considers the Nazi and communist twin ideologies that strove to perfect the human species via sterilization, euthanasia, and mass killing. Chernobyl details the events of April 26, 1986, when one of the four nuclear reactors at Chernobyl blew up. High Life proves that with the right kind of reputation a director is insulated from negative reviews.

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• Reviews

  August 2019

  What the Editors Are Reading

  4 min

  Dostoevsky’s great 1866 novel Crime and Punishment and Aldous Huxley’s 1939 novel After Many a Summer Dies the Swan.

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• Columns

  July 2019

  Of Infants and Geezers

  8 ½ min

  Unplanned is a remarkable piece of cinematic propaganda that seeks to tell the truth about abortion and Planned Parenthood. It’s based on a memoir of the same title written by Abby Johnson, who is played in the film by Ashley Bratcher.

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• Columns

  June 2019

  Tethered and Beleaguered

  7 min

  Jordan Peele is the executive producer of the revived Twilight Zone series now streaming on CBS All Access. The original series fascinated him when he was a boy and he was determined to revive it.

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• Columns

  May 2019

  Monarchs and Pretenders

  9 ¼ min

  The story of Mary Queen of Scots makes you wonder why anyone would aspire to be a monarch. Mary was an accomplished woman. She had mastered five languages, English being the third; was schooled in the classics; had traveled extensively in Europe and had been married to the French dauphin, Francis II, for a time before his death.

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• Columns

  March 2019

  Power and Betrayal

  8 ½ min

  In Vice, director Adam McKay takes a hatchet to Dick Cheney, joining a long line of detractors of our 46th Vice President. This is too bad. Not because Cheney deserves better.

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• Columns

  February 2019

  Mortal Remains

  8 ¾ min

  Near the end of The Ballad of Buster Scruggs, the Coen brothers’ latest cinematic whimsy being shown on Netflix, Brendan Gleeson sings a ditty (a British ballad called “The Unfortunate Lad,” on which “The Streets of Laredo” was based) that includes a verse about a man dying of syphilis.

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