Artificial Bodies, Artificial Lives: Introducing Robby the Robot
by Tessa Swehla, Staff Writer
Created by such members of the MGM prop department as Arnold Gillespie and Robert Kinoshita, Robby is another leap forward in android design.
100 Years of Dracula on Film Part 2: Exploring 6 more portrayals of our most famous vampire
by Tessa Swehla, Staff Writer
I have returned this SpookyJawn with a second installment examining six more portrayals of the dark prince over his hundred years of gracing the screen.
No fate but what we make: Are humans and machines destined for war?
by Tessa Swehla, Staff Writer
With a very few exceptions, many of these filmmakers seem to agree with Javik from Mass Effect 3 that conflict between humans and synthetics is inevitable, at least in a world where AI is self-aware and intelligent enough to make its own choices.
THE POD GENERATION uses a sci-fi allegory look at bodies, productivity, and wellness
by Tessa Swehla, Staff Writer
The Pod Generation isn’t perhaps the most subtle sci-fi film, but considering the timeliness of its subject matter, maybe it doesn’t need to be.
Flop and Fizzle #5: ANNIHILATION looks at evolution through a cancerous prism
by Tessa Swehla, Staff Writer
In Annihilation, cancer is just another mutation, a lifeform on its own evolutionary journey.
Flop and Fizzle #19: ONLY LOVERS LEFT ALIVE reinvents Gothic literature for the 21st Century
by Tessa Swehla, Staff Writer
“I mainly blame Shelley and Byron and some of those French assholes he used to hang around with.”
Artificial Bodies, Artificial Lives: THE DAY THE EARTH STOOD STILL
by Tessa Swehla, Staff Writer
Science fiction provided many filmmakers and writers in the early '50s a chance to peel back the veneer of those "classic" American values, to examine the rotten underbelly of paranoia, conformity, and hatred.
Artificial Bodies, Artificial Lives: THE PERFECT WOMAN and a Barbie
by Tessa Swehla, Staff Writer
This month, I returned to films with gynoids–androids with femme appearances–to continue the ongoing conversation about gender and sexuality introduced in Metropolis (1927).
Artificial Bodies, Artificial Lives: A Woodsman and A Wind-up Army
by Tessa Swehla, Staff Writer
The Tin Man isn’t the first cinematic android that comes to mind for most people, but he has become a sort of proto-example of an android trying to find a way to become more human.
MARLOWE recreates the formula, but not the meaning, of noir
by Tessa Swehla, Staff Writer
Marlowe ultimately falls short of both its intended goal as a period genre homage and its continuation of this legacy character’s story, despite its top-tier cast, writer, and director.
Romance Week: TITANIC, tropes, and romance aboard the “ship of dreams”
by Ryan Silberstein, Managing Editor, and Tessa Swehla, Staff Writer
Everyone loves a good old-fashioned forbidden upstairs-downstairs (or in this case, first class-steerage) romance.
Artificial Bodies, Artificial Lives: The Monster and His Bride
by Tessa Swehla, Staff Writer
Frankenstein (1931) is the first adaptation of Shelley’s novel and the most influential version when it comes to film.
Artificial Bodies, Artificial Lives: METROPOLIS
by Tessa Swehla, Staff Writer
The impact that Fritz Lang’s Metropolis (1927) has had on popular culture is difficult to calculate.
Artificial Bodies, Artificial Lives: The Dummy and THE GOLEM
by Tessa Swehla, Staff Writer
The history of posthuman lives in cinema goes back to the silent era.
MovieJawn Sound and Vision Poll: Tessa Swehla's Ballot
by Tessa Swehla, Staff Writer
Welcome to MovieJawn’s first ever Sound & Vision Poll, where our writers share why they love their 10 favorite movies of all time!
100 Years of Dracula on Film: Exploring 6 portrayals of our most famous vampire
by Tessa Swehla, Staff Writer
The cinematic potential of the gothic prince has captured the imagination of filmmakers and audiences over the past century.