Review

By Ali Moosavi. A story with global appeal but one that will especially resonate with those who have reached the pensioner age.” Italy has a rich tradition in producing comedies which have had global appeal, made by some of the best comedy directors that cinema has known. Examples include Mario […]

By Rod Lott. If “fun” sounds like an odd word to apply to a Belgium-lensed beaut this art-minded, this patient, the slow burner eventually catches enough fire to earn the distinction.” Prematurely celebrating its 50th anniversary with a new 4K restoration courtesy of Blue Underground is 1971’s Daughters of Darkness. […]

By Jeremy Carr. Lingering apprehension goes on and on like some unyielding, if seemingly uneventful dream, which befits the film’s surreal and otherworldly constitution.” Colin and Mary (Rupert Everett and Natasha Richardson) are two English tourists on holiday in Venice, and they’re hungry. The hotel concierge directs them to a […]

By Elias Savada. No doubt the film is somewhat stifled by its technical faults (at least in my online viewing). The Family Tree offers up a spiritual dish in a different setting, probably outside your comfort zone.” Panamanian indie filmmaker Jorge Ameer’s name (and initials) is all over the place […]

Identifying Features By Gary M. Kramer. The austere approach of Identifying Features contributes to the film’s haunting quality,,,,, (while) No Man’s Land‘s bluntness is why it is ineffective.” Two films that deal with characters crossing the U.S.-Mexican border are being released January 22. Identifying Features is a potent drama, but […]

The Ghost Train (1941) A Book Review by Tony Williams. Meticulously researched, accessible to all readers, and full of Anthony Slide’s usual discerning comments, it is an important study of one of Britain’s most misunderstood popular entertainers. For American and U.K. counterparts interested in the British past and watching Talking […]

By Elias Savada. A lackluster affair, sporting cardboard characters and gag-worthy clichés.” Just a few months ago Liam Neeson was fumbling around the generic wasteland of his usual escapist entertainment with Honest Thief. Easily forgotten stuff. He’s back in the same doldrums with a new film, in a new year […]

A Book Review by Thomas Puhr. This powerful anthology illustrates how the archives are so much more than mere outtakes; they comprise an essential body of historical material, one which must continue to survive for posterity.” With its ten-hour runtime and near universal praise, Claude Lanzmann’s Shoah (1985) is often […]

Once a Thief (1989) A Book Review by Tony Williams. The second edition of the Historical Dictionary of Hong Kong Cinema, by Lisa Odham Stokes and Rachel Braaten, surpasses an earlier 2007 edition edited by one of the key Western scholars in Hong Kong cinema, that contained contributions by Jean […]

American Dream (1990) A Book Review by Kate Elora Rogers. The Films of Barbara Kopple offers a thorough dissection of this formative figure in documentary filmmaking, while assessing Kopple’s embrace of other genres and storytelling modes.” The prolific career of filmmaker Barbara Kopple spans the last 45 years and still […]