AFCA Members
Our roster of critics.
Below is the list of members of the Austin Film Critics Association as of September 2023.
Leadership
Elizabeth Stoddard, President
Elizabeth Stoddard is a native Texan who has lived in Austin most of her life. A past contributor to Slackerwood and Austinist, she currently reviews for Cinapse. She regularly attends local film festivals and has served as a grant reviewer for Austin Film Society. She loves classic film, discovering Texas ties in older movies, and championing work by women filmmakers.
Jon Partridge, Vice-President
Originally hailing from the British Isles, Jon came over to the great state of Texas back in 2007 after graduating from the University of Sheffield. In addition to providing him employment (at the University of Texas), Austin has served as the perfect place to further deepen his love of film. A regular at SXSW and Fantastic Fest, and member of the Online Film Critics Society, he has been writing for the Austin-based site Cinapse since its launch in early 2013. In short, his passions are cinema, science, craft beer and writing about himself in the third person.
Members
Aurora Amidon
Aurora is an East Coaster turned Texan. She is a regular contributor at Paste Magazine, Film School Rejects, Consequence, Screen Slate, and Looper. Her work can also be found in The Wrap, UCLA’s Slavic and East/European Journal, and The Final Girl. She has covered the SXSW film festival twice now.
Marjorie Baumgarten
Marjorie Baumgarten is a freelance writer and film critic whose reviews appear regularly in The Austin Chronicle, where she served in many capacities since the paper’s founding in 1981. She was the Chronicle‘s Film Reviews editor from 1987 to 2016. Baumgarten has served on past film juries at the Seattle, Slamdance, SXSW, and Dallas International Film Festivals, as well as Screen International’s TIFF critics’ jury and Film Comment’s Critics’ Choice.
Andrew Campbell is a weekly contributor to the daily movie podcast One Movie Punch.
Frank Calvillo
A South Texas native, Frank holds a BA in English/Communications from UT-Pan American as well as an MA in Film & Visual Media from The University of London during which time he interned at Sight & Sound Magazine. Frank started blogging about film shortly after arriving in Austin back in 2013 when he began writing for Slackerwood. Since 2015 he has been writing for Cinapse and has recently become a contributor for Oneofus.net.
Laurie Coker
Laurie, a full time English teacher at Westwood High School, began writing film reviews for the Williamson County Sun in Georgetown, Texas in 1999 and moved to the Hill Country News in Cedar Park, Texas two years later. In 2008, she started a website, True View Reviews, offering reviews, coverage of local and movie news and offering free passes to screenings. Additionally, Laurie writes reviews for We Live Film, a national website based out of Philadelphia Laurie, an Austin resident for almost 30 years, holds two bachelors and one master degree from The University of Texas at Austin.
Chris Cox
Chris began being a critic on a local cable access TV show called The Reel Deal mixing comedy and critique. After developing a solid chemistry, eventually a group coalesced out of that eight years of local television and into the website Spill.com, mixing their brand of humor with animation and ‘everyday guy’ reviews. Eventually, that came to an end and he wasted no time starting a new website of his own, Oneofus.net where he reviews both theatrical films and home releases of movies and tv shows with his cast of thousands.
Cole Dabney
Cole Dabney is the founder of the Austin Film Critics Association. He started a film review website, Cole and Bobby…at the Movies!!, with his former sidekick Bobby McCurdy while attending Austin’s Bowie High School, and later became the chief film critic and movies editor at INsite Magazine and Study Breaks Magazine, as well as the film critic for Austin’s Fox affiliate, KTBC (Fox 7 News).
Rob Dean. Originally from Massachusetts but now based out of Austin, TX, Rob writes some things for the Internet: sometimes film reviews, sometimes funny stuff, but all embedded with secret Masonic messages. He is a film reviewer for Bullz-Eye, Features Editor and contributor for Daily Grindhouse, and his dream is to one day have his musical based on The Goonies debut on stage. Yes, that last part is real.
Derek Deskins is a film critic for Edge Media Network. His previous work includes reviews and articles for Next Projection, WhatCulture, Starpulse, and Lonely Reviewer. He is also a member of the Online Film Critics Society and Boston Online Film Critics Association.
Charles Ealy
Charles Ealy is an assistant features editor at the Austin American-Statesman. Before coming to the Statesman in 2006, he worked at the Dallas Morning News for almost 20 years, where he helped start the paper’s weekly Movies section in the late 1990s. He regularly attends the Cannes Film Festival and has reported from festivals in Berlin and Toronto as well, for theDallas Morning News, the Statesman and National Public Radio’s “All Things Considered.”
Rebecca Elliot
Rebecca Elliott has been writing about movies in Austin, TX for over two decades, most recently with cinemascholars.com. In addition to film criticism, Elliott has also written, produced, and/or directed several short and feature films, including an official selection at the SXSW Film and TV Festival. When she’s not hiding in a dark theater, Elliott stays busy following her husband’s band and indoctrinating their son into her movie world.
Ziah Grace
Ziah is the Editor-in-chief of Hyperreal Film Club, and has written for various outlets including Looper, Comics Alliance, SVG, and more. Over the course of his career, he’s also worked as a fiction editor, a market researcher, an actor, an olive oil salesman, and more. He can usually be found cycling around Austin to catch a movie somewhere.
Julian Green
Julian Green grew up with a fervent love for film, but it turned into an obsession in 2015 when he saw the movie CREED. He couldn’t shut up about it! Friends *strongly* suggested he channel his passion into reviewing movies on a professional basis, and in 2019 he did just that.You can catch Julian Green’s unique perspective on films and pop culture on his growing youtube channel www.youtube.com/user/CobraStarGreen. Julian also reviews new release movies weekly on Double Toasted with Korey Coleman and Martin Thomas.
John Gholson
John Gholson writes for Fandango’s Movies.com and co-hosts Giant Size on ESN.fm. His previous work includes regular reviews, news, and more for Cinematical, Moviefone, Sci-Fi Squad, Horror Squad, Horror’s Not Dead, and Hollywood Elsewhere. As an illustrator, his work can be seen on Fandango, Pulp & Popcorn, and GQ. Sometimes he acts in things.
Justin Harrison
Originally from Allentown, Pennsylvania, Justin moved to Austin in 2014. He began writing film criticism regularly in 2016. In 2019, he joined The Spool, where he currently serves as an editor. He loves mysteries, action, and animation, and frequents the Hyperreal Film Club’s Monday Hotel Vegas screenings.
Matthew Jackson
Matthew Jackson is a native Texan freelance writer and critic who began reviewing films at The Huntsville Item in 2008. In 2011 he transitioned into full-time entertainment journalism as a contributor at Syfy Wire, where he still writes about film, television, and comics regularly. His reviews continue to appear at the Item, and he can also be read at Looper, Mental Floss, BookPage, Uproxx, and more. He’s lived in Austin since 2017, and when he’s not writing he’s counting the days until Christmas.
Kimberley Jones
A graduate of the Michener Center for Writers at the University of Texas, Kimberley Jones is the Editor of The Austin Chronicle, an award-winning print alternative weekly, and hosts a weekly news and culture program, The Austin Chronicle Show, on KOOP 91.7 FM. Her work has been recognized by the Association of Alternative Newsmedia and the Austin Alliance for Women in Media. She is a member of the Alliance of Women Film Journalists.
Jacob Knight is a Senior Contributor at Birth.Movies.Death and a feature writer for /Film. His work can also be found in the newly revived Fangoria Magazine.
Josh Kupecki
Josh Kupecki is a film critic and the Screens editor at The Austin Chronicle, which covers all manner of film, internet, and television culture. He has been with the Chronicle since 2012.
Alejandra Martinez
Alejandra Martinez was born and raised in Laredo, Texas, but has made Austin her second home since graduating from UT with two bachelor’s degrees in 2016 and an MSIS in 2019. She is a freelance film critic and writer whose work has been published in We Got This Covered, The Texas Observer, Pomegranate Magazine, and Hyperreal Film Club. When she’s not writing, she’s usually thinking about Possession (1981), the Magic Mike Cinematic Universe, or the films of David Lynch.
Neil Miller
Neil Miller is the publisher of Film School Rejects, a site he founded in early 2006, which is dedicated to airing strong, straightforward opinions to readers around the world. A child of Cleveland, Ohio, Neil was transplanted to Austin in early 2009, drawn to Central Texas by the food, the film culture, and the Alamo Drafthouse. He regularly attends and covers film festivals and events around the world, including the Sundance Film Festival, SXSW, Austin’s Fantastic Fest, The Los Angeles Film Festival and the San Diego Comic-Con, as well as film junkets and on-set visits. The number of times he has actually been rejected from film school is currently unknown, but estimates have placed the number somewhere in the high 30s.
Marisa Mirabal is a native Texan with a passion for film and business. She applies her love for local business and free press by working full-time as an account executive at The Austin Chronicle. She is also a Rotten Tomatoes-approved film critic who provides film festival coverage during Fantastic Fest, SXSW, Austin Film Festival, MondoCon, and Texas Frightmare Weekend. Marisa’s work has been published by Birth.Movies.Death., /Film, Collider, The Austin Chronicle, Eater Austin, and Fangoria. In 2019, she served on the Documentary Jury for the Austin Asian American Film Festival and became a board member for Women in Film and Television International’s Austin chapter. Marisa is also a co-host on Black Magic Coven, an all-female podcast that covers horror films, folklore, and true crime.
Matthew Monagle is a film critic and columnist Film School Rejects and the Austin Chronicle. He’s also the host of the film review podcast, After the Credits.
Jenny Nulf
Raised in Austin, Jenny fell in love with movies a little later in life. After creating a film club in high school as an excuse to go watch movies every weekend with her friends, she immediately realized talking about films was the only thing she was good at. At the University of North Texas she majored in Radio, Television, and Film and went on to write critically about films. She is currently a freelance film critic while working in educational film distribution at Tugg, Inc. and programs films for the Austin Asian American Film Festival in her free time.
Brian Salisbury has been involved in the Austin film criticism community for almost a decade. After writing moving to Austin specifically to be nearer to the Alamo Drafthouse, Brian wrote for outlets that included Film School Rejects, Movies.com, Fandango, and Hollywood.com. Brian is the co-founder and former managing editor of OneOfUs.net and currently cohosts the weekly cult film podcast Junkfood Cinema. Brian is very big in Cheboygan.
Mark Saldana is about to be a 10-year veteran of the Austin film critic community, having served as film critic at True View Reviews since 2009.
Kate Sánchez is a Chicana pop culture critic who was born and raised in San Antonio, but found a home in Austin since completing her BA and MA at the University of Texas at Austin. She is the Co-Founder and Editor-In-Chief of But Why Tho? A Geek Community, a pop culture website of writers and podcasters devoted to creating a diverse and inclusive space for marginalized voices in media criticism and fandom alike. Kate’s goal as a writer is to use her identity as a way to investigate film and highlight works of the genre often ignored in larger conversations. When she isn’t writing about film, she brings critique to the gaming, anime, and comic book spaces.
Trace Sauveur
Originally from San Antonio, Trace’s first venture into film criticism began by reviewing movies for his high school’s weekly announcement broadcast. He was extremely cool. Since then, his love for movies has only deepened as he works toward completing his degree in Digital Communications and continues to fine-tune his critical writing. He made his way to Austin with his wife Annie in 2020, where he now primarily contributes to the Austin Chronicle.
Matt Shiverdecker
Matt Shiverdecker has been writing about film and popular culture since 2010 when he joined the staff of Austinist.com. His work has been featured at Slackerwood, Paste Magazine and the Austin American-Statesman where he currently contributes a weekly feature and assists with local film festival coverage. While always a huge movie buff, he previously spent 12 years as an on-air host and music programmer at WOXY.com, an acclaimed indie rock internet radio station.
Robert Sims
A professional film critic since 1988, the London-born Robert Sims has contributed to the Austin American-Statesman, Hollywood.com, Miami New Times, The Palm Beach Daily News, Shock Till You Drop, Total Film Magazine, and What’s On in London. Robert currently hosts Lights Camera Austin, which airs 2–3 PM CST Thursdays on Austin’s own KOOP Radio 91.7 FM. The show features reviews, interviews with leading local and national filmmakers, festival organizers and industry leaders, and an events roundup. The Austin Chronicle named Lights Camera Austin the “Best Sound of Cinema” in its 2018 “Best of Austin” issue.
Julian Singleton is a critic for Cinapse, initially as a guest contributor beginning in 2014 before joining the team as a regular columnist and contributor in 2019.
Eddie Strait
Eddie is currently a freelancer for The Daily Dot and primarily covers streaming releases. He is a lifelong Austinite and a graduate Crockett High School and the University of Texas at Austin. Despite accusations of being a film snob, he has a weakness for dance movies and disaster flicks. He watches movies whenever his kids finally fall asleep.
Martin Thomas
Martin Thomas began his career as a film critic in 1997 on the Austin airwaves with the weekly TV show ‘The Reel Deal’. After a brief stint as a co-host on the WB’s weekly show ‘Behind the Screens’, Martin (along with the rest of the Reel Deal crew) took to the internet in 2004 where he continued to review movies as the cartoon character “Leon” for Spill.com. After Spill.com ended its run in 2013 Korey Coleman and Martin Thomas went on to form a new movie/entertainment website, DoubleToasted.com–which ironically bears a striking resemblance to The Reel Deal.
Drew Tinnin
Drew Tinnin is a Rondo Award nominated interviewer and critic who has worked at SiriusXM’s Fangoria Radio and Fangoria magazine in NYC, as well as the London-based Dazed Digital. He is currently a regular contributor and staff writer for the Dread Central Network.
Ed Travis
Ed Travis co-founded Cinapse after more than a decade of online film criticism. Cutting his teeth at Hollywood Jesus for years, Ed moved to Austin, TX in 2010 to start a career in film. After running ActionFest’s blog in 2011, and writing as “Terry Malloy” at Ain’t It Cool News and other sites like CHUD and ScreenCrush, Ed’s desire to try his hand at running his own film site took hold. Founded in early 2013, Cinapse is all about film discovery and discussion. Ed lives with his wife Kristina and daughter Abby. He is the Community Cinema Director at Mobile Loaves & Fishes, an organization that feeds the hungry and houses the homeless of Austin.
Jay Tyler
Jay Tyler is an Austin-native, an educator and film critic who writes for Cinapse. His interests include new releases of all stripes, as well as various odd relics of American popular culture. His tastes range from dark, cynical social commentary to upbeat populist entertainment. He lives with his wife, two children, a good dog, and a very bad dog.
Eric Vespe
Eric Vespe is a film critic and contributing editor for Ain’t It Cool News, where he has been writing under the pseudonym “Quint” since 1997. Also the chief interviewer for the site, Eric regularly covers major events such as the Sundance Film Festival and Comic Con while making on-set visits for major projects around the world. Although he’s not originally from Austin, Texas, Eric is one of three AFCA members to graduate from the jewel of Southwest Austin, Bowie High School.
Richard Whittaker
A staff writer with the Austin Chronicle, Richard Whittaker authors the weekly DVDanger column, and is a regular co-host on Digital Noise for Oneofus.net. Prior to this, Richard ran the Curmudgeon website, and was an editor and film reviewer for the Ad Hoc family of publications in Oxford, Cambridge, and Leeds. Richard is a graduate of the Universities of York, Stirling, and UT Austin, and has previously served as an award juror for Fantastic Fest.
