Kneedeep in research on 1980s cinematic styles and color palettes, I took a sick day. Sometimes you just have to. Camped out in bed, halfheartedly read some articles, and fired up Hulu for a background soundtrack of related—but not too related—films to get me through the day.

Criterion was featuring several Jim Jarmusch films, so I took the opportunity to dig through his back catalog.

As you read this, there are a lot of words being written and posted to the internet about Quentin Tarantino’s Django Unchained. A new Tarantino is an occasion, a dumping ground for all kinds of opinions, a hanger for our hang-ups. Out there, right now, someone is comparing this one to his last one, or the ones before that; someone is charting the synergies and differences between Unchained and its obvious predecessor, 1966′s Django, or its other obvious predecessor, 1976′s Drum, or probably a host of other, less obvious predecessors.

Me? I’m thinking about Moby-Dick.

Those naked women got me thinking not about their film counterparts’ inevitable deaths, but rather about their inevitable sex acts. I thrill equally when Craig’s Bond gets the wife of the small-time criminal alone on the floor of his hotel villa, or the adamant but eventually swayed retrieval agent naked in their 5-star shared suite. It’s similar to how I feel when Connery’s Bond presents his Russian double agent with a trousseau of sexy nightgowns in their private train cabin, or even when Brosnan’s Bond finally charms his way past the proper exterior of his MI6 assigned psychologist.

I really like it when Bond gets the girl.

What is in our psychology that is so fragile it breaks down? What are the elements that begin and sustain an unraveling? Sometimes a cause can be pinpointed but more often not. And even an obvious experience, like war, provides a multitude of individual responses. Apocalypse Now provides great examples of how war can unravel an individual’s moral sensibility.

When you shoot a million feet of film, you can probably edit any movie you’d like from it. I’m certain there’s a way that, with the proper voiceover, Captain Ben Willard’s harrowing journey could have been recut as the story of a family man fighting his way for home.

Josh breaks down the character of Max Cherry, as re-imagined from the novel by Elmore Leonard for the screen by director/writer Quentin Tarantino.

Josh breaks down the character of Max Cherry, as re-imagined from the novel by Elmore Leonard for the screen by director/writer Quentin Tarantino.

Tarantino’s Mind is a 2006 short film from a directing duo known as 300ml. The short co-stars Seu Jorge (best known for his soundtrack work on Wes Anderson’s The Life Aquatic) as the unassuming target for his friends many conspiracy theories related to the Tarantino catalog. In short order, the various entanglements of Reservoir Dogs, True Romance, Natural Born Killers, Curdled, From Dusk Til Dawn and Kill Bill are ironed out.

When dealing with a name like Quentin Tarantino and a film like Jackie Brown, it’s important to give the film context. Prior to it’s 1997 release, Tarantino had only directed two films, Reservoir Dogs and Pulp Fiction. Yet, in this 1994 documentary from the BBC’s Omnibus series, directors like Monte Hellman and Terry Gilliam were practically falling out of their seats in heaping praise on the young director. He could essentially do no wrong… that is of course until he directed Jackie Brown.

These sources may be used as the basis for this months articles on Quentin Tarantino’s Jackie Brown. Sources will continue to be cited directly when applicable. This article may be updated as the month progresses.

Just a quick wrap-up in which Josh discusses the impact Bring Me the Head of Alfredo Garcia has had on filmmaking over the last three decades.

Just a quick wrap-up in which Josh discusses the impact Bring Me the Head of Alfredo Garcia has had on filmmaking over the last three decades.