Whites are thought not to have an ethnicity as a part of their "White privilege." Killough breaks the omertà of his misunderstood Northeastern establishment roots to discuss the realities Anglo-American Yankee culture....
A portrait by Athol Shmith from 1957 establishes a personal connection with Helmut Newton's "mysterious" years in Melbourne. ...
A gay man crushes on some of "the most beautiful women in the world" in an era before sexual fluidity....
James Killough's life was shattered by the Taliban over thirty years ago. What is happening now at Kabul Airport brings it all back vividly....
Ramin Bahrani's taut, confident feature 'The White Tiger', explores structural social injustices the way no other mainstream film has....
As a man of Scottish descent, James Killough feels thoroughly represented after finally watching 'Outlander'. Why can't HBO's 'Watchmen' do the same?...
A photograph of Cookie Mueller by Nan Goldin on HBO's "The Deuce" brings back to the roaring downtown scene of the mid-80s and the AIDS epidemic....
It seems essential for many fictional detectives to have insurmountable personal issues and challenges. But why?...
I’m mentoring a young friend through the process of writing and directing his first feature, which he’ll shoot in a year; he’s still in development tweaking the script before it goes out to cast. His executive producer, the former president of a major studio, said to him the other day, “Your cinematographer is the most important person on set after you.” I couldn’t agree more.
There’s nothing like working with a great DP, it makes all the difference in the world to the outcome of your film on many levels. The most important level for me is the personal, the experience of making a film. I don’t get to direct often, so when I do I want to enjoy it, to be carried away by, yes, the quasi-spiritual experience of creating something worthy in harmony with my crew, as cheesy as that might sound.
During my early years in India, back in the late 80s, when I was writing the first feature film of mine that would go into production, I was invited to dinner at the home of a charming socialite in the Juhu area of what was then called Bombay. Some people say Juhu is the Malibu of Mumbai, but that isn’t being fair to either California or India. The only things that make the comparison viable are the location on the beach, the presence of film folk, and the insane real-estate prices. To be honest, the strongest shared quality is that the two names rhyme.