musicals

Will Steven Spielberg’s West Side Story Reignite Love for Movie Musicals?

The musical genre has made a remarkable recovery in the 21st century. Once relegated to one of the “relics” of pop cultures past, and often put in the same neglected box as Westerns and biblical epics, genuine toe-tappers that were both original and based on Broadway shows surged to new popularity in the 2000s and 2010s. This began with the one-two punch of Baz Luhrmann’s decadent Moulin Rouge! (2001) and Rob Marshall’s more traditional Oscar winner Chicago (2002). Yet fans of the revived art-form should be watching how Steven Spielberg’s West Side Story is received this December very carefully. Judging…
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Edgar Wright on Ghosts, Musicals, and Last Night in Soho

Edgar Wright is trying to cure himself. That’s how the writer-director describes his latest movie Last Night in Soho: a cure for the nostalgia that’s followed him all his life, and which still causes him to daydream against his better judgment about 1960s London as if it were a golden age. “I have this recurring time travel fantasy about the idea of going back,” Wright says with the air of a confession. “But I think it’s always that thing, this nagging fear that it’s probably a really bad idea.” It’s a surprising admission for a filmmaker who has spent his…
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