Books

Director Krzysztof Kieślowski died of cancer at 54, just as his international cinema reputation was peaking. This book examines the cornerstone of Kieslowski’s career -- the landmark Polish TV series The Dekalog and the four films that existed in the same “moral universe,” tied together by a single piece of mysterious music. Employing the...

The fifth in my series of Scene by Scene books about important and influential films. This one covers Andrei Tarkovsky’s 1975 masterpiece “Mirror,” widely regarded as one of the greatest films in history. Tarkovsky said “Mirror” is not a puzzle to be solved, but a film to be felt. I dwell in the numerous mysteries of the film, the connections to...

The fourth in my series of scene-by-scene examinations of influential and important movies. This one cover Charlotte Wells’ 2022 debut film “Aftersun.”

Book 6 in the Movies Scene-By-Scene series cover Wong Kar-wai’s 2000 film “In the Mood for Love,” focusing on the ways the film seduces the audience into believing in a love story before it begins -- and that never quite arrives.

The third of Dan Conley’s Scene-By-Scene series analyzing significant films. The book examines Edward Yang’s 2000 movie “Yi Yi” across 31 chapters, which matches the chapter breaks in the Criterion Blu-Ray of the film.

All of Michel de Montaigne’s 107 essays are examined in detail, providing a first-ever subject-by-subject tour of Montaigne’s body of work that is both a literary and philosophical examination of the essays, and a contemporary mini biography of author Dan Conley.

A scene by scene analysis of the 2021 Ryusuke Hamaguchi directed film “Drive My Car,” which won the Academy Award in 2022 for Best International Film and was nominated for both Best Picture and Best Director. The book examines how Hamaguchi adapted various Murakami short stories while weaving in material from Anton Chekhov’s “Uncle Vanya” to...

A scene-by-scene examination of the 2020 Charlie Kaufman film “I’m Thinking of Ending Things.”