Vague Visages Is FilmStruck: Stanley Kubrick’s ‘Fear and Desire’
“‘Fear and Desire’ is more than just a curio for the Kubrick completist. It is indeed a genuinely revealing work.”
The Subversive Power of ‘Elle’
“‘Elle’ is a demented Rorschach test of the highest degree.”
A Portraiture of Grief in ‘Manchester by the Sea’ and ‘Personal Shopper’
“Whereas Lonergan interrogates the realities of grief with sober restraint, ‘Personal Shopper’ director Olivier Assayas plunges viewers right into his protagonist’s bereaved headspace.”
As American as Apple Pie: The Contemporary Applicability of Jacques Tourneur’s ‘Cat People’
“In regards to modern day politics, ‘Cat People’ captures the anti-immigration fervor of the 2016 American presidential campaign and election.”
The Bewitching Terror of Nicolas Winding Refn’s ‘The Neon Demon’
“Refn provides a movie with universal appeal, displaying how pathetic and desperate human beings can be in their moments of weakness, insecurity and greed.”
CIFF Review: Asghar Farhadi’s ‘The Salesman’
“Farhadi’s films have sometimes been tricky for me as a Western viewer, as it’s difficult to know what’s considered conventional social perception and what’s considered political commentary. “
London Film Festival Review: Olivier Assayas’ ‘Personal Shopper’
“To say that ‘Personal Shopper’ unveils Stewart giving the best performance so far in her career is scarcely a hyperbolic claim.”
Of Love and Other Demons: ‘Cat People’ (Paul Schrader, 1982)
A Weekly Column on Love and Erotica in Cinema by Justine A. Smith
Review: Joshua Marston’s ‘Complete Unknown’
“‘Complete Unknown’ seems to have its finger on the pulse of something characteristic of our FOMO culture.”
Of Love and Other Demons: ‘Hardcore’ (Paul Schrader, 1979)
A Weekly Column on Love and Erotica in Cinema by Justine A. Smith
Review: Johnnie To’s ‘Three’
“To missteps when ‘Three’ hews too close to action clichés.”
Of Love and Other Demons: Sam Peckinpah and Sex – ‘The Getaway’
“Of all Sam Peckinpah’s films, the violence in ‘The Getaway’ often strikes me as the most senseless.”
VOD Review: Lone Scherfig’s ‘The Riot Club’
“A somewhat uneven protest of English nobility and a denouncement of nepotic privilege, The Riot Club’s message is a redundant one: unchecked, inherited wealth leads to problems.”
Case for Criterion: William Friedkin’s ‘Bug’
“‘Bug’ closes in on you in a curiously suffocating way. It’s disorienting in the best way possible.”
Chasing Chabrol: ‘Violette’
“Youth is central to ‘Violette,’ and Isabelle Huppert’s petite frame and almost childlike features lend the film a skewed point of view that is colored neither by experience or shame.”
Review: Riley Stearns’ ‘Faults’
“Surprisingly, director Stearns spends little time navigating the physical world of ‘Faults’; he takes a minimalist approach and produces a game of psychological chess.”
The Moreau Files: ‘Elevator to the Gallows’
“A feeling of powerlessness is no doubt at the heart of Moreau’s possessed performance in ‘Elevator to the Gallows.'”
Fargo Film Festival Review: David Robert Mitchell’s ‘It Follows’
“By excluding grown ups from the narrative, ‘It Follows’ highlights the perseverance of young adults and their reliance on each other for a shared vision.”
Review: Chasing Kristina Buožytė’s ‘Vanishing Waves’
“‘Vanishing Waves’ boasts a touch of Andrei Tarkovsky, but I found many similarities to the psychosexual thrillers of French director Alain Robbe-Grillet, most notably ‘Eden and After’ (1970) and ‘Successive Slidings of Pleasure’ (1974).”