Kenna Wong Ghaill
Film Programmer at the Art Theatre of Long Beach, with a monthly film column in The Ardent magazine (columns go online 90 days after print publication).

Film Review: "Cape Fear" (1991)
The first film that rightfully earned Scorsese his bad reputation with women.
The first film that rightfully earned Scorsese his bad reputation with women.

Film Review: "Clayface"
While it certainly is another promising entry into the burgeoning anti-MCU. This all thrills, no chills comic book romp comes up short.
While it certainly is another promising entry into the burgeoning anti-MCU. This all thrills, no chills comic book romp comes up short.

Off to the Races
Will Inde Navarette campaign as Lead or Supporting Actress? Is The Odyssey DOA? Does Tom Cruise want this too badly to be “win competitive”? Can Sumerian get close to Oscar
Will Inde Navarette campaign as Lead or Supporting Actress? Is The Odyssey DOA? Does Tom Cruise want this too badly to be “win competitive”? Can Sumerian get close to Oscar gold on their first time out with Josephine? Will Project Hail Mary earn Ryan Gosling a Best Actor nod if

He Wants to Believe
Aliens exist. At least, they do for Steven Spielberg. This has remained constant across a career defined by restless movement. Spielberg has spent 60 years making films about different subjects,
Aliens exist. At least, they do for Steven Spielberg. This has remained constant across a career defined by restless movement. Spielberg has spent 60 years making films about different subjects, and just as long returning to the same questions. This fascination reaches back to 1964 in Phoenix, Arizona, when Firelight,

Gaysploitation Forever!
Do not let factoids, TikToks, Instagram reels, or neatly packaged retrospectives fool you: gay people have not always been represented in Hollywood, not in any legible way. They were present,
Do not let factoids, TikToks, Instagram reels, or neatly packaged retrospectives fool you: gay people have not always been represented in Hollywood, not in any legible way. They were present, of course, most commonly behind the camera. But on screen they flickered in and out like phantoms: suggested and coded,

Projecting Power
“I think it would be fun to run a newspaper,” Hollywood’s boy wonder, Orson Welles, casually quips in Citizen Kane. He is about to discover that controlling information means controlling
“I think it would be fun to run a newspaper,” Hollywood’s boy wonder, Orson Welles, casually quips in Citizen Kane. He is about to discover that controlling information means controlling reality, and he will wield it like an infinity stone. He will not report the news—he will author it. Manufacturing

Metropolis Divided
They spoke the same language but could not understand each other. Featured [in the Art Theatre of Long Beach and City Fabrick's Designing Resistance film week] alongside films about protest,
They spoke the same language but could not understand each other. Featured [in the Art Theatre of Long Beach and City Fabrick's Designing Resistance film week] alongside films about protest, architecture, and the ways artists confront authoritarian power, Metropolis occupies a strange place in this conversation. Few films have rendered

It Is Happening Again
It is happening again. It is happening again. The now iconic phrase first uttered on a Thursday night in 1990. Now repeated ad nauseam through Lynch-coded memes on social media,
It is happening again. It is happening again. The now iconic phrase first uttered on a Thursday night in 1990. Now repeated ad nauseam through Lynch-coded memes on social media, it first represented the return of a great darkness. A cry for help buried deep inside of David Lynch’s magnum

Sundance Review: “Ha-Chan, Shake Your Booty!”
Since the first entertainers emerged with their sketches and tableaus, comedy has been meant for an audience, not an individual. The high of a laugh, a gasp, a scream shared
Since the first entertainers emerged with their sketches and tableaus, comedy has been meant for an audience, not an individual. The high of a laugh, a gasp, a scream shared with strangers cannot be compared to one indulged in isolation. And a film so clearly designed for the cinema cannot

Three Conversations with the Gimp
A summary of three post-screening Q&As with writer and comedian Stephen Hibbert at the Art Theatre of Long Beach for the fortieth anniversary of Pulp Fiction. Stephen was, and still
A summary of three post-screening Q&As with writer and comedian Stephen Hibbert at the Art Theatre of Long Beach for the fortieth anniversary of Pulp Fiction. Stephen was, and still is, a friend of Quentin Tarantino. When Tarantino was searching for an actor to play the wordless but crucial role