“Roughly $24 billion of Paramount’s takeover financing is coming from the Middle East, including Saudi Arabia. [The] journalist-killing kingdom is poised to become a part-owner of one of the world’s most influential news organizations.”
HE NEVER MISSES
Look, I'm not saying that I'm excited. But an exercise in Saturday morning cartoon plotting and wall-to-wall creature design also feels like a perfectly legitimate direction for a Star Wars flick (y'know, a *children's* series) to take?
It is simply not true that LLMs are "black boxes." Not knowing everything about something doesn't make it a black box. The architecture was developed prior to their invention. They are iterated via intentional design. This is not a black box. www.newyorker.com/magazine/202...
Thread
When you're a pet owner (especially of two), there are days when it is more glaringly apparent that you're sharing your home with two animals. Today has been one of those days...
Underrated
No one mourns the "Wicked."
Ehrlich's videos are always joyful tributes to cinema in all its genres, modes, and national and industrial permutations. A great lunch break watch!
Criticisms are warranted, but Kennedy endured viciously misogynistic attacks from "fans" over the course of her tenure at Lucasfilm. An important cornerstone of the so-called culture wars
Worth remembering that despite many missteps, Kathleen Kennedy also shepherded one of the best big-budget studio films of the 2010s (The Last Jedi, a franchise best) and perhaps the single best television series to debut so far this decade (Andor)
variety.com/2026/film/ne...
This has a long history, from "safe zones" during the when cropping and pan-and-scan was common for TV broadcasts and home video to the 50s widescreen boom when projection equipment and screen dimensions varied wildly.
Once more, the material conditions of exhibition matter!
And right after a film dealing with the historical trauma of a dictatorship won International and got played off!
The Golden Globes are a fun time because you have celebrities taking up airtime with unfunny comedic bits and cutaways to Polymarket ads while Jafar Panahi is sitting there about to be arrested by his government for making films
GSO is planning a new webinar series—and we want your input.
Current topic ideas include:
Academic Freedom
Research Methods
Job and Career Pathways
We welcome additional suggestions and feedback. Please share your ideas using this form:
forms.gle/GtyCF5ZtEq6a...
The deadline to sign up for the #SCMS26 mentorship program (as either mentee or mentor) is next Friday!
The GSO is also looking to connect first-time attendees with more experienced grad students. A reminder email was sent out this morning with more info and sign-up links
No, be productive with your time: JRPGs!!
Ideal headspace to word vomit some truly galaxy brain ideas to return to and refine later in a better state of mind!
Let's get to work 👏
I had Fleischer too from watching all the old Superman shorts over the summer
Happy birthday! Make sure to celebrate with some good cinema 🎉
Unfortunately I was not enamored by the new film, which I found to be a clumsy retread of the same action beats and visual spectacle that Cameron already knocked out of the park in the previous two outings: boxd.it/c77vX7
Avatar: Fire and Ash is now in theaters, so it's as good a time as any to re-plug my article on high frame rate projection
GSO Spotlight Program
We’re thrilled to introduce a new initiative! If you’ve recently been published, completed your dissertation, received an award, or have other exciting news to share, we want to highlight you.
Submissions can be made here:
forms.gle/dpyQDLCoNKtL...
This. I just saw a 3:30 screening of Hamnet, got home by 6:30, and I feel like it's 9.
Mostly just Cary Grant
Seven straight Warner Bros. pictures earned over $40 million on their opening weekends. Warner Bros. led the Golden Globes noms. It's having one of the best years critically and financially in its history.
Why is it auctioning itself off?
The answer explains a lot about the modern economy.
Greatly enjoyed reading Ramzi Fawaz's essay on Andor in the new issue of Film Quarterly, where he shrewdly argues that the series "sits resolutely within the history of global revolutionary media." doi.org/10.1525/fq.2...
