The Insider is evidence that Mann’s cinema is marked by a formal and cultural ‘tense’ linked to his historical heritage. In the watershed article ‘La politique des auteurs’, Bazin writes: “Jacques Rivette has said that an auteur speaks in the first person. It’s a good definition; let’s adopt it.”[iii] Mann’s film language speaks in the ‘past tense’ about Mann’s biography.

“Guns Akimbo” is now irrevocably the film that’s both about and embroiled in a painful online saga with offline consequences.

I can't fathom a world that "The Beach Bum" exists where it wasn't some instant cult classic.