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The Perfect Neighbor (2025): America’s Fractured Mirror

In 2005, the state of Florida passed the “Stand Your Ground” law — legislation now in effect in several U.S. states — which allows a person to use force (even lethal force) in self-defense without any obligation to retreat first if they believe their life or physical integrity is in danger. Unlike other self-defense laws, this one does not require the threatened individual to attempt to flee or avoid confrontation before using force.

The Shadow Strays: The Indonesian New Wave

Posted on November 15, 2024 by Hugo Pagan Soto

Long before superheroes took over the screens. There were flesh-and-blood action heroes before Marvel and DC sought the niche of action cinema with their characters. Nostalgia always gets the better of me and I can’t resist returning to those action movies and characters from the 80s and 90s that paved my way to the movies. Stallone, Van Damme, Schwarzenegger, Bruce Willis, Steven Seagal, Bruce Lee… these legends and many others dominated the big screen with their epic adventures from which they always emerged victorious.

The Dilemma of The Killer

Posted on November 17, 2023 by Hugo Pagan Soto

I come to David Fincher’s The Killer with eagerness. I am driven by a longing to find the Fincher from Se7en (1995) or perhaps the one from Zodiac (2007). My search does not seek comparisons but to come across the visual style and the unique staging that have made the North American director a reference in the film industry. I am inclined to specifically mention those two films from his filmography because The Killer invites us into a world that beats the rhythm of murderers and emotionally complex characters. In the end, I leave this meeting recognizing the work of an experienced director, who knows the job and demonstrates it but who does not leave his mark with the impetus with which he did before.

SLY: The Man, The Myth, The Legend

Posted on October 16, 2023 by Hugo Pagan Soto

I remember when I started writing about cinema. One of those first articles was about my action movie heroes. SLY (2023), the documentary that covers Sylvester Stallone’s film career, made me return to that moment and the motivation that generated that crude writing. Those celluloid heroes that Hollywood spawned were my favorite refuge for years and there I always ran into that Stallone. It is impossible to imagine the history of cinema without Rocky, without Rambo, without Cobra, without Tango, without John Spartan…

All Quiet on the Western Front (2022)

Posted on February 16, 2023 by Hugo Pagan Soto

Why don’t you ever tell us that you are poor devils like us, that your mothers are as anxious as ours, and that we have the same fear of death, the same end, and the same agony?
Erich Maria Remarque

Perhaps Erich Maria Remarque would have wished he had never had the experiences that inspired his transcendental novel. All Quiet on the Western Front marked a turning point in the world of literature and its adaptation for the cinema in 1930 by Lewis Milestone paved the way for anti-war films. Director Delbert Mann also adapted Remarque’s play into a television movie in 1972. Now it’s Edward Berger’s turn, almost a hundred years after the first adaptation hit the big screen.