‘Whiskey Tango Foxtrot’: Empty Empowerment
“It’s not a bad movie, but no matter how long it spends in the war zone, it still feels like a tourist.”
Review: Grímur Hákonarson’s ‘Rams’
“A great director can make us a care for characters wildly outside our realm of understanding, and Grímur Hákonarson may have proven himself such a director with his latest film, Rams.”
Review: Luca Guadagnino’s ‘A Bigger Splash’
“A vivid and lavish feast for the eyes, A Bigger Splash takes an assemblage of indescribably talented actors and puts them in a pressure cooker of sex and vice.”
Glasgow Film Festival Review: Joachim Trier’s ‘Louder Than Bombs’
“Louder Than Bombs may be the first foray into (fully) English-language features for Norwegian director Joachim Trier and his regular screenwriting partner Eskil Vogt, but it absolutely feels like a logical progression of their impressive prior collaboration, the sombre Oslo, August 31st.”
Glasgow Film Festival Review: John Carney’s ‘Sing Street’
“As the saying goes, if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.”
Review: John Hillcoat’s ‘Triple 9’
“Triple 9 probably won’t go down as one of the great heist films on par with Die Hard or The Italian Job, but it might.”
Glasgow Film Festival Review: Stephen Ringer’s ‘Weepah Way for Now’
“It’s a touching depiction of a bond between sisters, but it doesn’t really create such a bond with viewers.”
Berlinale 2016 Review: Sara Jordenö’s ‘Kiki’
“Kiki is not the documentary that will prompt mass change or acceptance of fringe LGBTQ culture, but it doesn’t have to be.”
Review: Robert Eggers’ ‘The Witch’
“The Witch does for the woods what Jaws did for the ocean. They’re ruined for you.”
Berlinale 2016 Review: Robert Greene’s ‘Kate Plays Christine’
“Kate Plays Christine finds itself at the at intersection of reality and performance art, but no matter how fabricated the precursor, the emotional core remains intact and exceptionally powerful.”
Berlinale 2016 Review: The Terrifying Future of War – Alex Gibney’s ‘Zero Days’
“Like a drunken boxer shoving people outside of a nightclub, Gibney’s loud mouth is supported by his ability to knock you out.”
Berlinale 2016 Review: Rama Thiaw’s ‘The Revolution Won’t Be Televised’
“Thiaw’s control of frenetic, vibrant energy dictates every frame of The Revolution Won’t Be Televised.”
Berlinale 2016: ‘Alone in Berlin’ – A Lifeless Tale of White Heroism
“An overlong melodramatic exercise in aridity, Alone in Berlin fails as a testament to the efforts of the Quangels and fails to tell a cohesive, engaging story.”
Berlinale 2016 Review: Gianfranco Rosi’s ‘Fuocommare’
“Though separated by less than 100 miles of water, the lives of those lucky citizens of Lampedusa and those living in war-torn Africa are worlds apart.”
Berlinale 2016 Review: Kiyoshi Kurosawa’s ‘Creepy’
“Kurosawa possesses an almost supernatural ability to control his audience. “
Berlinale 2016: ‘Hail, Caesar!’ – A Serious Investigation of Film
“Like the films it contains, Hail, Caesar! mystifies its audience via otherworldly charm and magnificent grandeur — it is not a love letter to anything, it is a hymnal to the divine spirit of film.”
Review: Burr Steers’ ‘Pride and Prejudice and Zombies’
“The morality and plot of the film, despite the hand-holding, are impossible to follow, as wars, balls, tea parties, schemes, and bizarrely combative discussions between sisters all feel as equally light and dreary as the next, like equal servings of spoiled plain yogurt.”
Review: Doron and Yoav Paz’s ‘JeruZalem’
“Like something completely lost in translation, JeruZalem is more Troll 2 than Cloverfield and contains all the ironic hallmarks of a future cult phenomenon.”
Review: Jafar Panahi’s ‘Taxi’
“A cry against governmental indifference and a cruel restriction from a chosen means of expression, Taxi is a unique work of art that defies boundaries and convention.”
Review: Alessandro Carloni and Jennifer Yuh’s ‘Kung Fu Panda 3’
“The divine spirit of fools run deep within a film too relatively light and inconsequential to have too much staying power, but as an artistically rich Saturday morning puff piece, you could do far worse.”