By Jude Warne. The Shooting and Ride in the Whirlwind (both 1966), recently released as a joint Blu-ray set via The Criterion Collection, are two Monte Hellman Westerns that are as nondescript as their titles suggest them to be. And, much like the title of Hellman’s road picture, the Criterion-released […]
The Weird World of Aimy in a Cage
By Elias Savada. It’s not just that the always quirky Crispin Glover is featured in Aimy in a Cage that makes it weird. Of course, for the actor who gained everyone’s attention as George McFly in Back to the Future (1985) and was the eponymous sociopathic rat wrangler in the […]
From Dust to Glory: Speed Sisters
November 13, 2015
By Elias Savada. I’m not sure NASCAR saw this coming. I sure didn’t. Speed Sisters, which has been racing about the documentary film circuit since it’s world premiere at the Doha Film Institute’s Ajyal Youth Film Festival last December (the film bears a 2015 copyright notice, so I suspect it wasn’t […]
Gut(s) and Glory: Lucha Mexico
By Elias Savada. The smog hangs lightly over the partly cloudy skies of Mexico City as this story begins. A guitar with a Latin beat grabs the soundtrack. Trumpets blare. People walk the streets munching on tacos. The camera catches a sidewalk display with garish magazine covers adorned with body […]
A Long, Strange Trip: Sam Klemke’s Time Machine
November 9, 2015
By Elias Savada. Australian director-writer Matthew Bate (responsible for the fly-on-the-wall 2011 documentary Shut Up Little Man: An Audio Misadventure) took an interest in his latest film’s central character after watching a video by him on YouTube that year. More on that later. Sam Klemke’s Time Machine, a work compiled […]
The Visual Desolation of Denis Villeneuve’s Sicario
November 9, 2015
By Kyle Huffman. “Cinema is a matter of what’s in the frame and what’s out of the frame.” This seemingly direct estimation of the art form by legendary filmmaker Martin Scorsese defines movies as utilizing first and foremost one sense: the visual. The portrait design of the silver screen traditionally […]
Falling Apart Badly: Miss You Already
November 6, 2015
By Elias Savada. I suspect the issues I have with the new Drew Barrymore-Toni Collette BFF “dramedy” Miss You Already (including a 112-minute, too-long running time) is how overwrought and familiar it seems. Despite the earnest approach from its two stars (who also serve, with Christopher Smith, as producers), there isn’t […]
Dread in the Family: Luciferous
October 31, 2015
By Elias Savada. An escalating madness is the center of the disturbing world of Luciferous, a slow boil screamer presented at this year’s Spookyfest. The normalcy of city life for young, intelligent professionals Alex and Mahsa, and their vibrant 7-year-old daughter Mina is stretched to the limits of sanity, as […]
Reviewing the narratively challenged Masaan
By Devapriya Sanyal. To me Masaan (2015) didn’t give the feeling of eternal life flowing by, in its depiction its multifarious stories, set beside the silently flowing Ganges. The river is witness to a love blooming between two young people as also the death of one, it is also the […]
Beyond the Resolution: On the Series Witnesses (Les Témoins, 2015)
October 13, 2015
By Paul Risker. From the hustle and bustle of Paris, the stage for Spiral (Engrenages, (2005-)) and Braquo (2009-2014), the new French crime series Witnesses (Les Témoins, (2015)) retreats to the small coastal town of Lille to offer us a change of scenery for the latest serving of Gallic crime […]