Reflections of a Broken Memory
Somewhere deep within the nearly two-hour slog of this would-be suspense-thriller is a borderline watchable 15-minute short film. Languid pacing—punctuated by incessant flashbacks, shifting identities...
View ArticleTroll
Aside from the anomaly that was Tomb Raider, director Roar Uthaug’s filmography has been a diverse and sturdy array. Whether The Wave’s fjord disaster, Cold Prey’s Jotunheimen lodge slasher or Escape’s...
View ArticleHoly Hell! Orange County Turns 20
Twenty years out, it can be so easy to overlook films of the 2000s teen comedy renaissance for their repetitive misogyny and one-dimensional horniness. Luckily, occasionally you happen upon a little...
View ArticleOeuvre: Scorsese: Kundun
There’s a story of cowardice and aggression at the heart of Martin Scorsese’s lush masterwork Kundun (1997), but it isn’t the story on screen. Rather, the ugliest conflicts wrapped up in this film are...
View ArticleSpoiler Alert
One of the most indescribable yet specific human emotions is anticipatory nostalgia – that feeling of dread that occurs when we might be enjoying time with loved ones, or indulging in a fleeting moment...
View ArticleEmpire of Light
Sam Mendes, the director of films like American Beauty and Skyfall, is not known as a screenwriter. In fact, he had not written a screenplay until 1917, his World War 1 epic, and even then he...
View ArticleThe Whale
At this year’s Venice Film Festival, Brendan Fraser received a lengthy standing ovation. His new film, The Whale, just premiered, and the festival crowd simply would not let him sit down. Their gesture...
View ArticleChristmas Bloody Christmas
With five features across nine years, director Joe Begos has very clearly carved out a niche: grungy low-budget odes to ‘80s genre films – Xtro, Scanners, Assault on Precinct 13, etc. – drenched in...
View ArticleEmancipation
Emancipation moves inexorably from one sequence of hopelessness and suffering to another. This may be expected from a film that tells the story of the slavery experience during the two-and-a-half-year...
View ArticleI Am DB Cooper
The story of DB Cooper is so familiar it’s boring. Back in 1971, on a flight from Portland to Seattle, someone who called himself Cooper hijacked a plane, stole $200,000 and parachuted away. He has...
View ArticleTo the End
With To the End, director Rachel Lears highlights the crucial difference between the importance of a documentary and what makes that documentary worthwhile. The subject here is of urgent importance –...
View ArticleRevisit: The Bling Ring
A 2009 Guess campaign featuring Paris Hilton in a bejeweled baseball tee that reads, “Can you afford me?” is precisely the kind of imagery that explains the height of celebrity culture during the dawn...
View ArticleThe Almond and the Seahorse
There are many, many films about older people with dementia or Alzheimer’s. In Away from Her, we get the impression that the disease is harder on the spouse, who essentially has to mourn their loved...
View ArticleMindcage
Murder mysteries are usually a good time. Even if the plot feels underdeveloped or the characters seem a little thin, there remains the impulse to find out the Truth. When murders are revealed to be...
View ArticleFrom the Vaults of Streaming Hell: Tyfelstei: An Alpine Horror Tale
This low-budget Swiss horror movie, the brainchild of young director-writer-actor Chris Bucher, is a good example of the strengths and weaknesses of the form. And it illustrates the extent to which an...
View ArticleChildren of the Mist
There is a gentle, almost casual flow to Ha Le Diem’s remarkable documentary Children of the Mist, a naturalistic rhythm that seems to settle the film in place. The audience is carried along with it...
View ArticleThe Apology
Making her feature debut as writer and director, Alison Star Locke establishes a firm sense of claustrophobia within the premise and setting of The Apology. Nearly the entirety of the film’s action...
View ArticleOeuvre: Scorsese: My Voyage to Italy
All things considered, Martin Scorsese may be the world’s most famous cinephile. Even among a crop of directors once dubbed the “Movie Brats,” his passion and breadth of knowledge has stood apart,...
View ArticleNelly & Nadine
Sylvie Bianchi is, ostensibly, a fairly ordinary woman. She lives in Belgium, in a nice, ordinary countryside home with a nice, ordinary husband. They wear ordinary clothes and eat ordinary food....
View ArticleAvatar: The Way of Water
In an industry where Marvel releases a new film or television series nearly every month, one where theater-to-home-screen turnaround times are now often infinitesimal, the decade-plus wait for an...
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