If there's one thing Hollywood loves, it's films about Hollywood (or the process of filmmaking in general). It's part of the reason the industry fawned all over films like The Artist and Birdman, lavishing Academy Award nominations on them. Hollywood loves to see just how brilliant they are, preferably projected fifty feet tall. The Day of the Locust is a very different, very seventies version of some of the seedier aspects of Hollywood history. It is a sleazy film, but one that is beautifully shot. This is a post-Watergate view of classic Hollywood, dispensing with the rose-tinted glasses and instead showing it in all of its venomousness. The film has its flaws (and includes a lot of weird, off-kilter vignettes), but those can be overlooked in favour of its ambition as well as its myriad strong performances and tempestuous finale.