“‘Yi Yi’ is a film for grown ups in the sense that the characters have lived long enough to understand how memories of people can stay with them over the course of their lives. Keeping your distance from people is not the same as giving up on them.”
“‘Ema’ is a challenge to the walls we build around ourselves, to the baggage we leave behind for our children and the folly of the damage we can do to each other.”
“‘Broken Bird’ may be only 10 minutes long, but the rhythms, characterizations and thematic interests make it feel like a richly detailed feature-length accomplishment.”
Alistair Ryder Interviews South African Filmmaker Oliver Hermanus About ‘Moffie’
“Haley Bennett’s central performance is career-best work.”
“Revolving around an encounter in a single Russian apartment, Kirill Sokolov’s ‘Why Don’t You Just Die?’ is an electrifyingly-kinetic black comedy with densely-packed homages to international action cinema and a satirical commentary about Russian society.”
“It is during the 70s that the disaster film’s most pure and admirable entries were made, bookended by two significantly different stories involving air travel fiascos.”
“Directed by Nora Fingscheidt, ‘System Crasher (Systemsprenger)’ features a tremendous central performance from Helena Zengel, along with superb use of editing and colour.”
“Abstract and disjointed, the narrative of ‘Mysterious Object at Noon’ is progressively piecemeal, and what occurs in ‘Limite’ is even more inconclusive.”
“As a chronicler of the justice system in a dozen or more films, Lumet is intimately concerned with the ways in which it represses individual thought and fails to live up to its supposedly defining principles.”
“In the cinema of Michael Mann, romance comes fast or not at all, often smothered by the anonymous network of mankind itself or maybe just your job.”
“Stories of older women emotionally manipulating younger acquaintances remain commonplace, but Nebbou’s film manages to find something genuinely human beneath tired hagsploitation tropes.”
“In these increasingly confusing times, taking solace anywhere we can is more important than ever, and it’s impressively weird, intelligent movies like ‘Sea Fever’ that offer such comfort.”
“In Australia, our cinematic art has been trying to shake us from apathy for 50 years.”
“Hittman’s third feature continues to demonstrate the talents, sensibilities and cinematic evolution of a first-rate writer-director…”
“‘The Lawyer’ doesn’t fully grapple with its weighty white saviour theme, and ends up becoming as simplified as what it was setting out to subvert.”
“The female gaze is strong in ‘The Other Lamb,’ lovingly capturing Cassidy’s delicate, open features particularly when they begin twisting into something resembling anger…”
“‘Dry Summer’ and ‘Law of the Border’ remain available as fascinating, engaging documents of a national cinema often forgotten.”
“In order to fully engage with horror films, it’s important to look at the monster and the world that’s being upended by that monster.”
“‘The Truth’ is best viewed as a watered down (but often quite enjoyable) riff on many of Assayas’ recurrent thematic obsessions.”