The Torch
“He literally parts the sea.” Late in The Torch, a documentary profile of blues guitarist Buddy Guy, talking head Carlos Santana describes an all-star concert where Guy took the stage after B. B. King...
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Rediscover: The Signifyin’ Works of Marlon Riggs
The beauty of the Criterion Collection is the company’s commitment to keeping important films from sliding away. And while maybe it’s a bit of a course correction, the time is ripe for The Signifyin’...
View ArticleWood and Water
The title of Wood and Water reflects the apparent desire of its writer and director, Jonas Bak, to tell a story through the tactile settings that surround its protagonist. She is a woman living on the...
View ArticleBlack Crab
Swedish dystopian action thriller Black Crab spends its first 90 minutes giving us a lone, thinly sketched character to root for only to then pull the rug out from under her seemingly heroic acts....
View ArticleCriminally Underrated: Zathura: A Space Adventure
In 1995, Sony Pictures released Jumanji, starring Robin Williams, Bonnie Hunt and Kristen Dunst. Directed by Joe Johnston (Honey, I Shrunk the Kids, The Rocketeer), the film was based on the Caldecott...
View ArticleYou Are Not My Mother
For some viewers, the most enjoyable part of a good horror film may well be the dread atmosphere and deathly aesthetics of autumn. Think low, gray skies, trees becoming barren as they dump piles of...
View ArticleSo Cold the River
Last year, author Michael Koryta’s novel Those Who Wish Me Dead made its way to big screens (and streaming) as an A-lister-stacked thriller and unabashed throwback to ‘90s genre films. His latest...
View ArticleMothering Sunday
There’s nothing quite like seeing family during the holidays; the experience can provide a lifetime’s worth of deep trauma. Director Eva Husson’s Mothering Sunday does just this, following wealthy...
View ArticleStunt Rock
All you need to know about this 1978 Australia/US/Netherlands co-production Stunt Rock is in its name. You like stunts? You like rock? C’mere, kid, meet director Brian Trenchard-Smith behind the school...
View ArticleRevisit: Departures
Many people have never seen a dead body. Exclude those who have only seen an embalmed corpse in a funereal setting and it’s an overwhelming majority. When we contemplate death, it’s usually in the...
View ArticleKing Otto
If the job of a documentary is to enlighten, then it seems director Christopher André Marks has labored quite hard to do precisely the opposite with King Otto. A document of the winning 2004 season for...
View ArticleFrom the Vaults of Streaming Hell: Prey
It’s hard to imagine now, but for a short time it seemed like the much-cherished straight-to-video movie, which had been the true heir to the low-budget B-movie/second feature/grindhouse cinema of the...
View ArticleNitram
Justin Kurzel has had an interesting career so far, debuting as a feature-length director with the grueling, disturbing true crime drama The Snowtown Murders in 2011, before helming considerably more...
View ArticleOeuvre: Claire Denis: Chocolat
Claire Denis (b. 1948 Paris, France) began her filmmaking career as assistant to several important and influential directors. She has worked with everyone from Jacques Rivette (Out 1 (1971)), to...
View ArticleThe Contractor
From the small-screen gunfights of Strike Back to recent films like Without Remorse and One Shot, tactical action has been in vogue for a good decade or so. What might have once seemed like a layer of...
View ArticleYou Won’t Be Alone
You will see three words appear in most advance press of Goran Stolevski’s debut film, You Won’t Be Alone: “Malick” and “The Witch.” And that really is the best way to classify the Australian...
View ArticleEverything Everywhere All at Once
Mediocrity defines the first Evelyn. Her business is on the cusp of failure – she faces an IRS audit – and her personal relationships do not fare much better. Constant nitpicking is her coping...
View ArticleBarbarians
At first, it seems that Barbarians is going to be one of those dramas about the fragile bonds of family and friendships, featuring four characters who are just prickly and human enough to have a lot of...
View ArticleGagarine
Gagarine, from writer-directors Fanny Liatard and Jérémy Trouilh, is an indie drama and a bit of science fiction escapism which follows Youri (Alseni Bathily), a Black teenager in the living in a...
View ArticleDakota
If you were the chief of a volunteer fire department and got an emergency text about “Smokey in a tree,” one might assume some dire arboreal flame. But screenwriter John Harrington, pouring a weak...
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