Character Studies: Toros in Anora
Isle McElroy
Mar 3 2025
Urgency is fairly easy to manufacture in a film—which is, after all, an art form that has historically been partial to time bombs and threats of intergalactic invasion, love ...
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Character Studies
Character Studies
Isle McElroy
A novelist dissects the major and minor performances of the 2025 Oscar nominees
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Character Studies: Elisabeth Sparkle in The Substance
Isle McElroy
Feb 25 2025
There are few experiences as disorienting as disliking a movie you believed you would love. No, not just love—a movie you thought might have been cooked up in a lab ...
Character Studies: Pete Seeger in A Complete Unknown
Isle McElroy
Feb 18 2025
I normally hate watching biopics. There is something inherently homework-y about the genre. The worst kind of homework, in fact—the kind that pretends to entertain as it ...
Character Studies: László Tóth in The Brutalist
Isle McElroy
Feb 6 2025
In the months leading up to the release of The Brutalist, I avoided learning anything about the movie. This was not an attempt to guard against spoilers: I simply had no ...
Character Studies: Cardinal Lawrence in Conclave
Isle McElroy
Jan 29 2025
Perhaps it should come as no surprise that one of the most common problems a novelist faces when creating fictional characters is the problem every person must face: the ...
