By Paul Risker. Earth: a world of sound within a vacuum, despite the best efforts of science fiction to convince us otherwise. Then there is the metaphysical question of a tree falling in a forest that confronts the very ontology of sound. In my own contemplation of music there are two […]
Guardians of the Galaxy (2014)
August 1, 2014
By James Teitelbaum. The coolest thing about Joss Whedon’s film The Avengers (2012) is that it exists. The notion that four major Marvel Comics heroes (The Incredible Hulk, Thor, Iron Man, and Captain America) could each appear in their own individual movies, and then be brought together in a team-up […]
The Films of Joanna Hogg
July 31, 2014
By Gary M. Kramer. With the release of Joanna Hogg’s three features, Unrelated (2007), Archipelago (2010), and Exhibition (2013), it is imperative for cinephiles to discover her brilliance as a filmmaker. Hogg’s films are remarkable for their perspicacity. The filmmaker captures the intimacies between family members and their environments in […]
What’s at Stake in the Work of Art: John Cassavetes’ The Killing of a Chinese Bookie
July 28, 2014
By Brandon Konecny. Apart from Faces (1968) and A Woman Under the Influence (1974), none of Cassavetes’ films were successful, both commercially and critically. They were seen as chaotic, technically inept, haphazardly improvised—they were, in short, a chore to watch. But none of them, not even Husbands (1970), incurred the […]
The Time of His Life: Richard Linklater’s Boyhood
By Matthew Sorrento. I honestly hope the “sublime” trend ends soon, with the recent output of Terrence Malick, his bombastic, excessive Tree of Life and To the Wonder, and gaseous muck like Cloud Atlas, cramming together years of history and a speculative look to the future, to signify nothing. Thankfully, […]
Picnic at Hanging Rock (1975)
July 24, 2014
By Jeremy Carr. Even if we weren’t told at the start that Picnic at Hanging Rock was about a group of girls who disappeared Saturday, Feb. 14, 1900 and were never seen again, it would become apparent almost immediately that this 1975 film was not going to end happily, or […]
Hide Your Smiling Faces (2013)
July 22, 2014
By Jude Warne. In his 1854 book Walden, Henry David Thoreau sets forth a crucial instruction: “Resign yourself to the influence of the earth.” This, perhaps, is the overarching message of Daniel Patrick Carbone’s first feature film Hide Your Smiling Faces. In the proverbial end (or, for the sake of […]
Forsaken Son: Richie Mehta’s Siddharth
July 19, 2014
By Paul Risker. If film is a visual medium, then Richie Mehta’s Siddharth (2013) places as much emphasis on what is seen as not seen. “Siddharth” is a quest; a father’s search for his missing son whom he suspects has been abducted by child-traffickers. Of this twelve year old child […]
Borgman (2013)
July 18, 2014
By James Teitelbaum. The pivotal moment in Alex van Warmerdam’s Borgman comes at the end of the first act, when the titular Camiel Borgman (Jan Bijvoet) strides into a forest surrounding the modernist estate inhabited by Marina (Hadewych Minis) and her husband Richard (Jeroen Perceval). After taunting the violent Richard […]
The Epic of Everest: Closing the Gap Between Man and the Impossibly Distant
July 16, 2014
By Axel Andersson. An epic of Everest? The heroics of nature? John Noel’s remarkable 1924 documentary, expertly restored by the BFI with a new evocative score by Simon Fisher Turner, encapsulates the most paradoxical of Romantic tropes. The mountain, Everest, is for sure present—a forbidding thing to be conquered. But it […]