Edinburgh Film Festival Review: Phuttiphong Aroonpheng’s ‘Manta Ray’
“Featuring powerful lead performances, ‘Manta Ray’ is like a perfectly wrapped present that needs to be opened with care.”
Review: Nisha Ganatra’s ‘Late Night’
“‘Late Night’ struggles to define almost all the characters in the ensemble beyond providing the majority with a single, instantly recognizable trait.”
Edinburgh Film Festival Review: Agnès Varda’s ‘Varda by Agnès’
“Playing almost like a self-eulogy, ‘Varda by Agnès’ resonates as both a manifesto to untamed creativity and a testament to future generations of artists.”
BAMCinemaFest Review: Diana Peralta’s ‘De Lo Mio’
“While moments of grace and levity abound, Peralta remains clear-eyed about the difficulty of maintaining relationships – to people, to places, to the past – and rarely backs off from her stance.”
‘Batman’ at 30: An Iconic Adventure Film That Reinvigorated the Superhero Genre
“Christopher Nolan’s ‘Dark Knight’ trilogy has become THE Batman interpretation, heralded for its gritty realism. But in my book, ‘Batman’ is the better comicbook movie.”
The Western Enters the 70s – Part 2: Kicking Down the Doors
“With the Acid Western, the genre had once again proven itself capable of assimilating new grievances and anxieties.”
Edinburgh Film Festival Review: Jessie Jeffrey Dunn Rovinelli’s ‘So Pretty’
“Tip-toeing on the smudged edges between fiction and documentary, ‘So Pretty’ is an experiment in means of representation and ultimately a tender ode to an unjustly forgotten author.”
BAMCinemaFest Review: Tayarisha Poe’s ‘Selah and The Spades’
“Poe’s direction creates a heightened but never unrealistic frame in which her characters can maneuver. Her singular, assured vision avoids stilted dialogue or absurd scenes.”
Review: Nahnatchka Khan’s ‘Always Be My Maybe’
“The rom-com isn’t dead. It was simply evolving into something more interesting, more modern and more accepting.”
Once Upon a Time in Tarantinoland: ‘Death Proof’ Is a Fun Grindhouse Detour But a Lesser Tarantino Film
“‘Death Proof’ is too singularly grindhouse, but it works as a fun, trashy flick, and a cool female empowerment story.”
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.”