When Batman arrived in theaters in 1989, it presented Gotham City not as a brightly colored playground but as a shadowy urban nightmare. Tim Burton’s film helped demonstrate that a comic-book adaptation could function simultaneously as fantasy, crime drama, gothic spectacle and major Hollywood event. Michael Keaton stars as Bruce Wayne, a wealthy and emotionally […]
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In Ghostbusters, discovering that ghosts exist does not lead to a philosophical crisis. It leads to a business plan. That comic premise helps explain why the 1984 film remains so distinctive. Ghostbusters combines supernatural horror, science fiction, workplace comedy and New York attitude without allowing any single genre to overwhelm the others. The ghosts may
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The Color Purple begins in a world where Celie has almost no control over her own life. Over the course of the film, she discovers that endurance is not the same as surrender—and that finding one’s voice can become an act of liberation. Set in the American South during the first half of the 20th
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Most Westerns introduce a hero riding into town with unfinished business. The Shootist begins with a legendary gunfighter arriving at the end of his road. John Wayne stars as John Bernard “J.B.” Books, an aging gunman who travels to Carson City, Nevada, in 1901. Books has survived shootouts, enemies and a lifetime built around his
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