Ed Rampell

Ed Rampell is an LA-based film historian and critic, author of "Progressive Hollywood: A People’s Film History of the United States," and co-author of "The Hawaii Movie and Television Book." He has written for Variety, Television Quarterly, Cineaste, New Times L.A., and other publications. Rampell lived in Tahiti, Samoa, Hawaii, and Micronesia, reporting on the nuclear-free and independent Pacific and Hawaiian Sovereignty movements.

LATEST ARTICLES BY Ed Rampell

Culture

‘I Am the Night’ and ‘Non-Fiction’ capsule reviews from AFI
November 27, 2018 By Ed Rampell
The American Film Institute’s annual film festival is arguably Los Angeles’s best and most comprehensive annual fete of feature, documentary, short, animated, domestic and foreign cinema.
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Culture

The opera ‘Hansel and Gretel’ bewitches the coven of the oven
November 21, 2018 By Ed Rampell
Hansel and Gretel may be the most enchanting, optically opulent opera ever seen at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion, with its stellar stagecraft, stagemanship and eye-popping, jaw-dropping scenery.
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Politics

Politicon 2018: Socialism without socialists, free speech for the few?
November 9, 2018 By Ed Rampell
Politicon is to politics what San Diego’s annual Comic-Con is to comic books and superheroes.
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Culture

‘Satyagraga’: Philip Glass’s colossal Gandhi epic is activist opera at its best
November 7, 2018 By Ed Rampell
With Satyagraha Philip Glass transports us to the higher realms of cosmic consciousness. It’s a lot more enlightening to ride in one of Krishna’s chariots than in a yellow cab.
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Culture

‘Johnny Got His Gun’ on stage: I resist, therefore I am
October 23, 2018 By Ed Rampell
Joe Bonham is an all-American doughboy horribly dismembered and disfigured by enemy artillery at the frontlines in France. As Joe evolves, his determination to live intensifies, and his thoughts turn to the nature of what cut...
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Culture

‘First Man’: The wrong stuff, from claustrophobia to the cosmos
October 11, 2018 By Ed Rampell
The image of a helmeted Gosling being used to advertise First Man walks that fine line between being a homage to or a rip-off of the far superior film 2001.
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Culture

‘Oppenheimer’: American Vishnu, the destroyer of worlds
October 9, 2018 By Ed Rampell
For those who love hard-hitting drama that has the guts to take on challenging subject matter illuminating the human condition, don’t dare miss this production.
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Arts

‘A Picture of Dorian Gray’ speaks of obsession with beauty and youth
October 2, 2018 By Ed Rampell
More adventurous ticket buyers who prefer their plays on the edgier, experimental side will more likely enjoy this drama.
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