Ella Taylor
Ella Taylor is a freelance film critic, book reviewer and feature writer living in Los Angeles.
Born in Israel and raised in London, Taylor taught media studies at the University of Washington in Seattle; her book Prime Time Families: Television Culture in Post-War America was published by the University of California Press.
Taylor has written for Village Voice Media, the LA Weekly, The New York Times, Elle magazine and other publications, and was a regular contributor to KPCC-Los Angeles' weekly film-review show FilmWeek.
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Kevin MacDonald's doc about the life and death of Whitney Houston contains no shattering revelations, but it artfully and compassionately places her extraordinary talent in a meaningful context. -
Filmmaker Tim Wardle reveals the fascinating story of three identical triplets who found one another by chance, and shows how the ensuing media circus, and long-buried secrets, took a toll on each. -
In this clear-eyed docudrama, filmmaker Fellipe Barbosa retraces the final days of his mercurial friend who died of exposure on Malawi's Mount Mulanje in 2009. -
Beloved children's show host Fred Rogers is the subject of this compassionate — but not blindly worshipful — documentary from the filmmaker behind 20 Feet from Stardom. -
In Spanish filmmaker Carla Simon's "intimately visual" autobiographical debut feature, a young girl from Barcelona is sent to live in the country after the death of her mother.
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A stellar cast, a faithful adaptation, and a director with a rhythmic sense of pacing ensure that this film version of Anton Chekhov's play takes flight. -
Director Jason Reitman re-teams with Juno scripter Diablo Cody for a film about an overburdened mother and her nanny that's "a little bit funny, a bigger bit cruel, and with it all, oddly moving." -
In this delightful French tale, Juilette Binoche plays an amorous, tart-tongued artist. Filmmaker Claire Denis seems to have created "a fresh sub-genre: the looking-for-love comedy procedural." -
This "smoothly crafted, satisfyingly earnest" film features many sports-movie clichés, but digs a bit deeper to find psychological affinities between the two very different athletes.
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Lynne Ramsay (We Need to Talk About Kevin) directs Joaquin Phoenix in this violent, strident and repetitive tale about a man who sets out to rescue a kidnapped girl.
