Martin Scorsese and Bob Dylan Make Believe in ‘Rolling Thunder Revue’
“Not everyone, and not even every Dylan fan, will go along with the tall tales, but amidst the japes are several of the most riveting live performances of Dylan’s career.”
Sergio Caballero’s ‘Je te tiens’: The Many Machinations of a Movie
“‘Je te tiens’ connotes a representation of the conversation that exists between the inner contextual world of a film and the overarching art of filmmaking itself.”
La Quinzaine des Réalisateurs Review: Ariane Labed’s ‘Olla’
“Through sharp sound design and awkward moments of situational comedy, ‘Olla’ highlights the inner fire of a young woman; a charismatic vagabond. Like her frequent collaborator Yorgos Lanthimos, Labed uses tonally offbeat situations to hilariously explore perceptions of logical and illogical behavior.”
Jahnu Barua’s ‘Bhoga Khirikee’ Peeks Into An Insurgent Assam
“There is seething, justified anger that underscores the plot of ‘Bhoga Khirikee’; an anger that could be used to create extremely radical female characters who pull the plot forward instead of becoming cardboard stand-ins for the filmmaker’s radical politics.”
Fight Like a Man: ‘Rocky IV’
“Looking back at a film like ‘Rocky IV,’ we can’t just say ‘wow, look how dumb we were back then’ because the simple truth is that we haven’t earned the right. We are still making the same mistakes, still falling for the same macho con.”
Sundance London Review: Daniel Scheinert’s ‘The Death of Dick Long’
“At least, ‘The Death of Dick Long’ is a homecoming for the Alabamian Scheinert that uses his warped view of the place to create a glowing nostalgia and a strong vision for American Indie cinema.”
Cannes Film Festival Review: Pippa Bianco’s ‘Share’
“When everything aligns, ‘Share’ works brilliantly and feels like a true indie hit. Unfortunately, such moments are fleeting, and it ultimately feels like a glorified student film.”
Why We Look Up: Traveling Space and Time in ‘Apollo 11’ and ‘Minding the Gap’
“Through film, people can step outside the bounds of space and time to revisit the past, to see something old from a new vantage point.”
Looking Forward While Looking Back: The Recent Films of Francis Ford Coppola
“Coppola’s recent work is not a ‘return to form,’ whatever that means, but rather part of an ongoing exploration of what the form can do, showing an artist increasingly interested in only trying things he hasn’t done before.”
Review: Joe Talbot’s ‘The Last Black Man in San Francisco’
“‘The Last Black Man in San Francisco’ soars, stretching gull wings as a poetic lament articulating longing and loss recognizable and accessible to all.”
The Western Enters the 70s – Part 1: Sam Peckinpah’s Lonely Cowboy
“With his concern for the outsider, and his reorienting of the West’s perception in the American mind, Peckinpah helped to birth the Acid Western.”
Shattering Orientalism Through Noir: Samuel Fuller’s ‘House of Bamboo’
“The gritty and hard-nosed film noir genre is rife with actors and directors that helped to not only change conversations about American cinema, but also the nation’s consciousness.”
The Monsters Are Loose: Grief and Regret in A.T. White’s ‘Starfish’
“Many ‘Starfish’ reviews pick up on the film’s unmistakable exploration of grief, but just as many neglect to mention the other half of White’s semi-autobiographical work and its reckoning with guilt and regret.”
Sundance London Review: Patrick Brice’s ‘Corporate Animals’
“Brice and company get too tied up in the character comedy for ‘Corporate Animals’ to work as a satire, and the televisual filmmaking isn’t helped by a plotline that could have been a single episode of ‘The Office.'”
Sundance London Review: Jennifer Kent’s ‘The Nightingale’
“‘The Nightingale’ is a rich and vivid work from a director whose bold vision accounts for its brutality.”
Eat Meat / Man, Woman: Bhaskar Hazarika’s ‘Aamis’
“Hazarika’s is a voice that comes from outside of the Bollywood canon and reverberates sharp and hard throughout the cinemascape of the country. May it grow only louder.”
La Semaine de la Critique Review: Valentina Maurel’s ‘Lucia en el limbo’
“Maurel allows Arenas’ body language to speak for her, rather than relying upon cliché teenage dialogue found in many Hollywood films.”
Forty Years of Facehugging and Chestbursting: ‘Memory: The Origins of Alien’
“‘Alien’ is a gift that keeps on giving, and ‘Memory: The Origins of Alien’ unwraps so many colorfully wrapped boxes of various shapes and sizes.”
Once Upon a Time in Tarantinoland: ‘Kill Bill’ Is a Visually Explosive Love Letter to Cinema
“All in all, ‘the 4th film by Quentin Tarantino’ is a wild, eclectic action movie with visual flair, great performances and personality up the wazoo.”
La Semaine de la Critique Review: Moin Hussain’s ‘Naptha’
“Moin Hussain’s ‘Naptha’ is a classic, compact portrait of a strained father-son relationship that addresses the angst of aging and the pain that familial relationships can bring.”