Michael Phillips

Terribly sad news: Longtime Washington Post film critic and full-time beautiful, illuminating human Ann Hornaday has died. Always the one you wanted to see at a film festival, so insightful and easy-breathing as a stylist. A fine WaPo obit here, paywalled. www.washingtonpost.com/obituaries/2...

www.wsj.com/world/russia... For Ukraine, this is the equivalent of the Hitler-Stalin Pact.

WASHINGTON (AP) — Trump, after bipartisan backlash, says Pentagon won't livestream firing squad execution of Fort Hood shooter.

The proposed federal film production tax credit program, created to make overseas advantages less glaring, has bipartisan pals in Congress. U.S. Rep. Laura Friedman's a key driver of the bill. Ron Falzone's an expert on the history of Hollywood's crises. Hear their wisdom on the new “Movie Racket."

Well, we were all young once. Some oncer than others. You’re all-pro, my man.

And bigger thanks to you, Marya!

'Tis autumn! Also, it's ep 9 of "The Movie Racket"-- @aduralde.bsky.social and I get into Vincente Minnelli's "hundred or more hidden things" that make a film linger a while, be it Minnelli or Orson Welles or Barry Jenkins or Jane Schoenbrun's "Camp Miasma." www.filmspotting.net/episodes-arc...

the literal position of the trump administration is that any school that has any more than a smattering of black students is engaged in illegal racial discrimination against whites www.nytimes.com/2026/09/03/b...

Much obliged, Ross!

Thanks so much to @812filmreviews.com for joining this week's ep of "The Movie Racket." Message movies! Call Western Union! www.filmspotting.net/episodes-arc...

So many are likely to be killed.

A statement from AAP President Dr. Andrew Racine on today’s executive order on U.S. childhood vaccines: www.aap.org/en/news-room...

Thanks to @thehighsign.bsky.social for classing up “The Movie Racket” in general, and the subject of Columbia Pictures mogul Harry Cohn’s ass in particular. www.filmspotting.net/episodes-arc...

who’s the PR strategist on this, Ross Douthat?

Is it that simple? A good movie=3 good scenes, and no bad ones? Give a listen to ep 3 of the new #filmspotting podcast interloper #TheMovieRacket, hosted by #me, joined by veteran story analyst Billy Mernit. And Walter Brennan gets the last hippity-hop with the exit music. omny.fm/shows/filmsp...

Bedroom>living room! Dog>landscape? In the new ep of "The Movie Racket"-- #Filmspotting- produced, me-hosted -- @theamynicholson (a pip!) and I get into 11 Rules for Box Office Appeal, the (likely alcohol-fueled) memo Preston Sturges wrote circa 1941. We're in the #Filmspottting feed, friend.

A brand new something to download, first thing Monday: “The Movie Racket,” the latest @Filmspotting podcast. Host, me; Ep 1 guest, Michael Shannon. Show intro explains the idea, but I’ll tease it with: Nobody knows anything. There’s gold in them thar axioms!

Not just a blueprint for this moment, but THE blueprint. No going back.

Mom, still sharp and amazing at 93, breezed through this 2023 interview, and I'll always love the image of a gang of first-year Catholic college girls in the middle of Nebraska, dancing back to the dorm after seeing "An American in Paris." www.chicagotribune.com/2023/05/12/c...

Thoughts and prayers for the most heartless, brainless, headless presidential administration imaginable. It’s called PUBLIC HEALTH. www.nytimes.com/2026/05/07/h...

Saw Lester’s “Three Musketeers” for the first time since ‘74. Loved it at 13, current me didn’t. But amid this US political and moral nightmare the key line now belongs to Heston’s Cardinal Richelieu: “Vengeance? An expensive luxury. Statesmen cannot afford it.” #Richelieu2028

This is unconstitutional. Voting is a fundamental right for every American. Illinois will keep administering free and fair elections – and what Donald Trump puts on a piece of paper will not change that.

Every leader and every citizen, in fact

Of course he does. Is this a joke? He defended the guy who killed Good. He’s told multiple people that he thinks protesters should be attacked. He told people at a rally to rough someone up. He’s said nothing as ICE has hurt people for months. He doesn’t get to walk away from this now.

Thin on the page, but the all-pro duo of "Send Help" -- Rachel McAdams and dir. Sam Raimi -- rescues the movie from itself. It's "Cast Away" if Wilson the volleyball were a total a-hole. My review for the @sfchronicle: www.sfchronicle.com/entertainmen...

Excellent overview of America's imperiled touring artist visa situation by @sisario.bsky.social.

rare to see an american politician speak in these terms and it rocks

Try it. You’ll like it. Also, volunteer. Help out at a food bank. Talk to people. Listen to people. Remember why we’re all here. And a good 2026 to you, friends.

And start w Part 1. They’re numbered in order!

I learn a lot every year, but this year I got SO much from Alison, Adam and Josh every which way. Thanks to all, including Sam and Joe “House Call” DeCeault. Take a listen.

Yes, and Ted Sarandos has already indicated his displeasure in anything more than 2 weeks. So.

This is an American patriot.

Apparently the Netflix algorithm picked up on the phrase “you ran guns to Ethiopia” and boom: prequel

Right on.

NY-and-thereabouts friends: If you can swing by Astoria and the Museum of the Moving Image 4:30pm Sat. Nov. 1, I'll be here with these good people. movingimage.org/event/the-st...

They were already living in one of Chicago’s worst apartment buildings. Then came the ICE raid. Our story @chicagotribune.com breaks down the “mind-blowing violation of the Fourth Amendment” that occurred and the propaganda from the U.S. government. www.chicagotribune.com/2025/10/19/i...

Favorite sign at one of the many, many rallies across America today, this one in Albuquerque: "I like my democracy neat, no ICE." Clearly the work of domestic terrorists.

And yet five of the nine would probably get rid of the Voting Rights Act for free

Next on my reading list. It can, and has, happened anywhere.

What an absolute treasure Diane Keaton was. Her wit never tired, nor did her style.

Laying the groundwork for martial law, with the instigating provocation to be named later, exceeds the meaning of "unusual."

Thanks to the good people at rogerebert.com. It's a sadly beautiful re-watch right about now, in the age of "five Watergates a month."

Kimmel won. Winning matters, wins are how we’re going to prevent this autocratic slide.

“I’m emotionally shellshocked right now,” said one professor in the Texas Tech system. “What does it say about academic freedom? It says we don’t have it.” www.nytimes.com/2025/09/26/u...

I think there is a direct relationship between punishing people for mourning George Floyd and punishing people for not mourning Charlie Kirk.

Much obliged, Peter. Truly.

Working w the excellent @ninametz.bsky.social and our editor Doug George has made us all a little better, I hope. I'll be hanging around "Filmspotting" as needed, and inflicting my musical tastes weekly on Classical WFMT via "Soundtrack." To you all: Thanks for reading, and giving a damn. (3/3)

...I took the buyout. After 20 very good years here, straddling my two lifelong journalistic loves of theater (first four years, coming from the L.A. Times drama critic post to the Tribune's) and the movies, I feel nothing but gratitude for the chance to do this work in a great cultural city. (2/3)