McQueen

From the humble street corners to the grand hotels, from the bridges over the Amstel canal to the tram stops near the Rijksmuseum, wherever you go in Amsterdam there is a story from the city’s years of Nazi occupation. This spot is where the first “No Jews Allowed” sign was posted. Over there is where the RAF mistakenly dropped a bomb. And here’s where the attack on the civil registry office was plotted.“It’s a lot of stories,” agrees historian and film-maker Bianca Stigter, as we walk the streets, together with her…

Not many animated athletes manage to reach icon status, but it seems safe to say that Lightning McQueen has managed just that. The character first debuted in 2006’s Cars, a flick that soon spawned a franchise. A franchise that entirely follows anthropomorphized vehicles, which all by itself is a tall task. Add to that the long delay between each of its releases — five years between the first and second, and six between second and third — and the way its branching offerings compounded in the time between flicks, and the…

Nothing screams “style” quite like a proper pair of Crocs, am I right? Mix in a dash of Lightning McQueen and you might find yourself receiving an invitation to the next MET Gala ⏤ that’s the We Got This Covered wish, anyway. Now, as Karl Lagerfeld rolls in his grave, let’s get down to business: Every now and then, Cars becomes everyone’s favorite topic all over again, and the sporadic trendiness of Lightning McQueen remains a mystery to many. From cars mirroring our beloved red racer to statistical analyses of the film,…

The Cars franchise just keeps paying dividends for Pixar, thanks to the way that it scratches that “vehicles with faces attached to the front of them” itch that excites kids, and gets serial killers pulled over. The series features a deeply detailed, well thought-out world. Gas stations are the cars’ restaurants. Headlights are their swimsuit areas. Auto parts stores are, presumably, their unholy Frankensteinian dens of body horror madness. And, if the logic carries through, Motor Trend is their, I don’t know, men’s…

Harry Belafonte was a hero of mine. He meant everything to me. I met him around the release of 12 Years a Slave, and he became a mentor. I received a best director award at the New York Film Critics Circle awards and Harry gave an amazing speech: he talked about seeing Johnny Weissmuller as Tarzan at the cinema as a child and how the depiction of people of African descent made him feel being ashamed to be Black.Look what he did – his first album sold more than 1m records. He was Martin Luther King’s closest confidant and…

Get our free weekly email for all the latest cinematic news from our film critic Clarisse LoughreyGet our The Life Cinematic email for freeSteve McQueen has warned that people may be “disturbed” by his new film, Grenfell, which will be shown at London’s Serpentine Gallery next month.The 12 Years a Slave director made the 24-minute film six months after the June 2017 fire at Grenfell Tower in North Kensington, in which 72 people died.After garnering the support of the bereaved, survivors and other locals, McQueen took off…

Get our free weekly email for all the latest cinematic news from our film critic Clarisse LoughreyGet our The Life Cinematic email for freeSteve McQueen has shared his belief that his Oscar-winning film 12 Years a Slave would never have been made if Barack Obama wasn’t the president.The filmmaker and artist directed the 2013 Best Picture winner, based on the true account of Solomon Northup, a Black man who was born free but was captured and sold into slavery in Louisiana in 1841. He was released 12 years later.For its…

Get our free weekly email for all the latest cinematic news from our film critic Clarisse LoughreyGet our The Life Cinematic email for freeBradley Cooper may be taking on one of Steve McQueen’s most famous roles in a new Steven Spielberg film.The actor and director will reportedly play San Francisco cop Frank Bullitt in a movie based on the 1968 classic.According to Deadline, McQueen’s son, Chad, and granddaughter, Molly, will executive produce alongside Spielberg.Bullitt gave McQueen one of his most memorable characters,…

Steve McQueen. Photograph: Chris Pizzello/Invision‘The cinema had mice but it felt like being at the ringside’Steve McQueenScorsese is so good at introduction scenes. I love the one in Mean Streets, where De Niro comes into the bar for the first time. Harvey Keitel is watching him, it’s all in slo-mo, Jumping Jack Flash on the soundtrack. It’s one of the most perfect introductions to a character I’ve ever seen: a beautiful piece of music and imagery and choreography. I also love De Niro waiting for Joe Pesci in the desert…

Image: Disney/PixarFor almost three decades, computer animation studio Pixar has captivated audiences all over the world with an abundance of original stories, unforgettable characters, unique settings, and complex emotions. Pixar makes films that aren’t just great animated films, but great films period. So ranking them is damn near impossible. But we’ve gone and done it anyway.What follows is a ranking of the 26 current Pixar movies. This list was originally published in 2017 around the release of Coco, the 19th film,…