

There is a moment—easy to miss if you blink—when the infant, swaddled tighter than a papoose in a dust storm, peers straight into the camera and grins with the unalloyed malice of a pagan god. That grin detonates the fourth wall. Suddenly the tenement is no longer a set on the Christie lot; it is your own cramped apar...

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Comparing the cinematic DNA and archive impact of two defining moments in cult history.

Al Christie

Al Christie
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" There is a moment—easy to miss if you blink—when the infant, swaddled tighter than a papoose in a dust storm, peers straight into the camera and grins with the unalloyed malice of a pagan god. That grin detonates the fourth wall. Suddenly the tenement is no longer a set on the Christie lot; it is your own cramped apartment, your own rent overdue, your own neighbors pounding on the pipes for quiet. Bobby's Baby may traffic in the prim vocabulary of 1923 slapstick, but beneath the flicker lies a ..."

