Keith Phipps

Casting two English actors as the hero and villain of this otherwise very American movie gives North by Northwest a weird energy. Grant plays everything Yanks like about Brits while Mason gets to play the opposite. There’s something rotten beneath those impeccable manners and literate airs. He might be impossibly handsome and clever, but, here and elsewhere, Grant seems approachable. Mason plays Vandamm as a man who looks at almost everyone else like something he scraped off his shoe. That he’s betraying and trying to escape the uncultured United States of America makes a lot of sense for the character.

I know I did but I doubt I'm the only one.

If you aren’t following The Reveal (and, if you can, paying for it), you should start now. Then catch up on all of these Sight and Sound 100 Best conversations. I am always excited when the notification shows up for a new one!

Without reading the nest post I thought you were talking about Vin Diesel.

Dalton points

The moment in Alex Ross Perry’s VIDEOHEAVEN when narrator Maya Hawke talks about a clip from STRANGER THINGS in which she appears.

that's a very good idea for a project

#45 (tie): ‘North by Northwest’: The Reveal discusses all 100 of Sight & Sound’s Greatest Films of All Time Cary Grant is a man wrongfully accused in the first of four Hitchcock films to make the list. Is it one of Hitch's masterpieces or just frothy entertainment? We'll try to figure it out.

Today at The Reveal: @scotttobias.bsky.social continue to watch every movie in Sight and Sound's 100 best list. We're at #45 which is also somehow the first Hitchcock on the list. It's a good one, too:

All this plus apologize for letting ICE use Target stores as a staging area and make it policy to refuse them in the future.

Catalog Club: Ramones' "Ramones" (1976) Our new series starts with an iconic album that came out 50 years ago this spring

This month's Catalog Club series on the Ramones begins today with the self-titled debut, which turns 50 this spring. My challenge: Can a music critic in 2026 actually say something original about this band?
tinyurl.com/54vhnfu6

So we’re just supposed to try to go about our lives today.

what if we did 2003 again but with even stupider people in charge of everything

Hard to find? That works, right?

Hard-to-see great film alert: ALL THAT JAZZ is on TCM Sunday night.

ICYMI

In Review: ‘Scream 7,’ ‘Dreams’ New in theaters this week: Ghostface kills again while another film asks: Is social inequality the real villain?

Today at The Reveal: You can read me on the not-so-hot SCREAM 7 and @scotttobias.bsky.social on DREAMS:

In Review: ‘Scream 7,’ ‘Dreams’ New in theaters this week: Ghostface kills again while another film asks: Is social inequality the real villain?

Today at The Reveal: You can read me on the not-so-hot SCREAM 7 and @scotttobias.bsky.social on DREAMS:

Headline: Nude Olympics? It's Possible.

Same.

Family sitting in front of TV. Dad has camera. Caption: "you can shoot your own home movies and see them on your tv set almost instantaneously."

Big if true.

the party that wants to require ID to vote abruptly invalidating a thousand people’s IDs overnight seems like a pretty giant flashing red light

Will let you know! (In the form of a review.)

Just a heads up for readers of The Reveal: No reviews today. They'll run tomorrow. SCREAM 7 was not screened for critics in Chicago so we're seeing it tonight.

We have had so many notable deaths lately that The Reveal hasn't had a chance to pay our respects to everyone. Scott's piece nicely sums up both what made Noonan a unique screen presence and a compelling filmmaker.

For the night people. (It’s better than the SOTU, I promise.)

ICYMI

Let’s Watch the 1996 MTV Movie Awards! The now seemingly defunct MTV Movie Awards once tried to be the awards show for a generation too cool for awards shows. 30 years ago, it mostly succeeded.

2026 is troubling. Why not escape into the past for two hours? Today at The Reveal: Let's Watch the 1996 MTV Movie Awards!

37:17 Speaking of time changing the way things look, Kevin Spacey gets the Best Villain trophy, which he claims from Gabriel Byrne and Natalie Portman after taking the stage wearing sunglasses and a Kangol cap. After the commercial break, Kiss appears in full make-up to hand out the award for Best Kiss. Why Kiss (apart from the name)? 1996 marked the end of the band’s “unmasked” era as the original line-up reunited for a high-profile tour and donned the costumes and greasepaint that helped make them ’70s stars. Generational nostalgia had made Kiss hip again. Or, perhaps more accurately, “hip.” (It was a confusing time. Kids, ask your parents if you can borrow their Ultra-Lounge compilation CDs and If I Were a Carpenter tribute album to better understand the cultural climate of the mid-’90s.) The big winners: Natasha Henstridge and Anthony Guidera for their fatal kiss in Species.

Let’s Watch the 1996 MTV Movie Awards! The now seemingly defunct MTV Movie Awards once tried to be the awards show for a generation too cool for awards shows. 30 years ago, it mostly succeeded.

2026 is troubling. Why not escape into the past for two hours? Today at The Reveal: Let's Watch the 1996 MTV Movie Awards!

Is FOR ALL MANKIND morphing into a stealth prequel to THE EXPANSE?

These are good. Very much in the spirit of the classic cartoons while still feeling fresh.

Keith. I go by my middle name. My real first name is Randall. I’m sure it’s a fine name for others, but I never liked it and dropped it when I was young. My dad jokingly called me “Randall Keith.” My mom said it had to be on or the other. I made a choice.