Scott Tobias
Scott Tobias is the film editor of The A.V. Club, the arts and entertainment section of The Onion, where he's worked as a staff writer for over a decade. His reviews have also appeared in Time Out New York, City Pages, The Village Voice, The Nashville Scene, and The Hollywood Reporter. Along with other members of the A.V. Club staff, he co-authored the 2002 interview anthology The Tenacity Of the Cockroach and the new book Inventory, a collection of pop-culture lists.
Though Tobias received a formal education at the University Of Georgia and the University Of Miami, his film education was mostly extracurricular. As a child, he would draw pictures on strips of construction paper and run them through the slats on the saloon doors separating the dining room from the kitchen. As an undergraduate, he would rearrange his class schedule in order to spend long afternoons watching classic films on the 7th floor of the UGA library. He cut his teeth writing review for student newspapers (first review: a pan of the Burt Reynolds comedy Cop and a Half) and started freelancing for the A.V. Club in early 1999.
Tobias currently resides in Chicago, where he shares a too-small apartment with his wife, his daughter, two warring cats and the pug who agitates them.
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Filmed over the course of 12 years, Ian Palmer's documentary looks at the bare-knuckle boxing tradition of Ireland's Traveller minority, with particular attention to one longstanding family feud. -
Takeshi Kitano returns to the gangster genre with this elaborately plotted tale about a gruesome grudge match among rival clans. -
After a move to a new neighborhood, a short-haired 10-year-old decides on impulse to introduce herself as Michael — and thereby charts a surprising summer for herself and her new friends. (Recommended) -
Like a Francophone version of The West Wing — but centered on real-life figures — this Gallic drama tracks President Nicolas Sarkozy as he maneuvers and manipulates his way to the top. -
In a little-guys-get-theirs-back caper, Eddie Murphy's fast-talking crook recalls the rough-edged '80s performances that made him a star. -
A disenchanted priest takes a sabbatical, embarking on canoeing trip with an ex-heavy metal guitarist once engaged to his sister. They're joined by two young Asian women who call themselves Tom Sawyer and Huck Finn. And then things gets weird. -
A local homicide cop (Avatar's Sam Worthington) and his ex-New Yorker partner (Jeffrey Dean Morgan) track a killer in a moody thriller inspired by true events. With Chloe Grace Moretz and Jessica Chastain. -
Former members of the Kashmere High School Stage Band, known for embracing jazz and blues while their peers exhausted '40s big band, honor their eminent 92-year-old music teacher, Conrad O. Johnson, as the man who gave their lives rhythm and soul.