David Bordwell, a film studies scholar whose immersive, accessible writing transcended the corridors of academia and illuminated the mechanics of moviemaking to a generation of cinephiles and filmmakers, died on Feb. 29 at his home in Madison, Wis. He was 76. The cause was interstitial pulmonary fibrosis, said his wife, Kristin Thompson, a prominent film … Read more
Clyde Taylor, a scholar who in the 1970s and ’80s played a leading role in identifying, defining and elevating Black cinema as an art form, died on Jan. 24 at his home in Los Angeles. He was 92. His daughter, Rahdi Taylor, a filmmaker, said the cause was chronic obstructive pulmonary disease. As a young … Read more
David J. Skal, a witty historian of horror entertainment who found in movies like “Dracula” and “Rosemary’s Baby” both a mirror of evolving societal fears and a pressure-release valve for those anxieties, died on Jan. 1 in a car accident in Los Angeles. He was 71. Mr. Skal was returning home after a movie and … Read more
Louisa May Alcott, the author of “Little Women,” may have written more works than readers were aware of, thanks to a scholar who made an interesting discovery. Max Chapnick, a postdoctoral teaching associate at Northeastern University in Boston, Massachusetts, believes he found roughly 20 stories and poems written by Louisa May Alcott under her own … Read more
Michelangelo secretly painted himself onto the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel, a scholar of Italian art has sensationally claimed. Adriano Marinazzo, a curator of special projects at William & Mary college’s Muscarelle Museum of Art, believes the Renaissance artist depicted himself as God in “The Creation of Adam” — the famous fresco painting that adorns … Read more