Author Archives: Aaron

Remembering Tom Petty

Posted on October 8, 2017 by Aaron

“Rock & roll songs are just cheap shit – nothing deeper than that.” – Tom Petty As anybody reading this knows by now, Tom Petty died this week, on Monday, October 2. I’ve been a pretty big fan of Petty’s … Continue reading →

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Call For Papers

Posted on August 31, 2017 by Aaron

    Women and New Hollywood Maynooth University, Ireland 29-30 May 2018 Recent decades have witnessed no shortage of critical or academic writing on the industrial upheaval and creative innovations of New Hollywood (1967-80). But as scholarship has shaped the … Continue reading →

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Searching for Polly in the Bogdanovich Papers: Reflections

Posted on August 19, 2017 by Aaron

In July of this summer I spent two weeks at the Peter Bogdanovich collection at the Lilly Library at Indiana University. I went searching for material – particularly production-related material – on Polly Platt, who was married to Bogdanovich for … Continue reading →

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Video Essay: Pretty Baby: Faces

Posted on July 26, 2017 by Aaron

Pretty Baby (Paramount 1978) is a pretty drastic film. It’s beautifully shot, tragic, and incredibly difficult to watch because of its treatment of childhood sexuality. Part of what makes it work (if it does), is its total fascination with the … Continue reading →

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Searching for Polly in the Bogdanovich Archives: Week One

Posted on July 16, 2017 by Aaron

I’ve reached the halfway point of a two-week stint at the Peter Bogdanovich archives at Indiana University in Bloomington. I’m going to save the “big conclusions” for after the trip is complete because I still have a lot of material … Continue reading →

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Video Essay: Hal Ashby and the Long Shot

Posted on June 2, 2017 by Aaron

I’d been contemplating an audio-video essay on Hal Ashby and the long shot for ages. It should have been easy. I write about it in a section of my book, and I had ripped the clips I wanted to use … Continue reading →

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The Other Side of the Director:
Polly Platt and Orson Welles’s Last Movie

Posted on March 30, 2017 by Aaron

Recent film and media news has been filled with excitement at the announcement that Netflix has acquired the rights to Orson Welles’s final, unfinished film project, The Other Side of the Wind. And rightly so! Wind was a labor of … Continue reading →

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The Bad News Bears: Design by Polly Platt

Posted on March 16, 2017 by Aaron

The Bad News Bears (1976) is the second film Polly Platt designed after several years of working solely with Peter Bogdanovich. The film features Walter Matthau as Buttermaker, the coach of a ragtag bunch of foul-mouthed kids playing little league … Continue reading →

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The Thief Who Came to Dinner: Design by Polly Platt

Posted on March 7, 2017 by Aaron

I recently watched The Thief Who Came to Dinner for the first time. This 1973 film was written by the great Walter Hill (and it’s got the punchy script to show for it), directed by an unsung Bud Yorkin,* and … Continue reading →

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Buffy at 20 Live Tweet / #Buffy20 #BuffyLive

Posted on February 24, 2017 by Aaron

March 10 marks twenty years since television’s Buffy the Vampire Slayer premiered. A groundbreaking show that influenced the current era of “quality television” in too many ways to mention, Buffy was first broadcast on the WB on a Monday night … Continue reading →

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