By Jonathan Monovich. When you’re making a film, you’re showing characters’ lives and if it’s important, you have to actually show it. You shouldn’t be afraid that you’re going to be boring.” (At the 59th Chicago International Film Festival) For the last thirty years, Trần Anh Hùng has been writing […]
Lost, but Not Dead: London After Midnight
By Gary D. Rhodes. I’ve solved this mystery. You’re at the bottom of it.” – Hibbs (Conrad Nagel), London after Midnight, 1927 Tod Browning’s London after Midnight, released by MGM in 1927, represents America’s first supernatural vampire feature film. Except that it isn’t. It does not depict a supernatural vampire, […]
The Father of the Iranian New Wave: Dariush Mehrjui, 1939-2023
By Ali Moosavi. The discovery of the groundbreaking filmmaker’s body with that of his wife in their home, both stabbed, on Saturday, 14 October (found by their daughter), has sent a shockwave throughout the film community at a troubling time…. The news item was brief: the bodies of the Iranian […]
Falling in Love with Myself: Signe Baume’s My Love Affair with Marriage (2022)
By Jenny Paola Ortega Castillo. The film uses animation to delve deep into the complex tapestry of women’s roles in marriage and the harrowing loss of identity that often accompanies this timeless practice.” I felt like an inflated balloon trying to fit into a shoe box that couldn’t accommodate its […]
Take Your Medicine: Baatar Batsukh’s Aberrance (2022)
By Thomas M. Puhr. Unfortunately, this historical importance, as “the first Mongolian horror feature to be released theatrically in the U.S., is attached to a messy – albeit occasionally inspired – thriller that collapses under one (or two, or three) too many outlandish twists.” Baatar Batsukh’s Aberrance (2022) arrives with […]
She Has Overcome: Joan Baez I Am a Noise
By Elias Savada. A lovely curtain call, offering time for Joan to frame how she ultimately crushed her life-long demons. It’s a heartbreaking journey into the horrifying past and a heartwarming walk into a future of forgiveness.” I always envisioned this legendary folk musician and activist as the Baby Boomer […]
New Voices During Labor Unrest: Selections from the 48th Toronto International Film Festival
By M. Sellers Johnson. The presence of exceptional domestic screenings surely attests to the saliency of the Canadian film industry – a reminder of the importance of local creatives, amidst the large collection of international filmmakers and audiences.” In the early weeks of September, Toronto found itself once more engulfed […]
Life in Plastic, Not Fantastic: Micheal Bafaro’s Don’t Look Away (2023)
By Thomas M. Puhr. If the synopsis sounds familiar, then you’ve probably seen It Follows (2014). Don’t Look Away acknowledges this indebtedness… but this grating self-awareness relies far too heavily on its influences.” A haunted mannequin stalks a group of dimwitted twentysomethings in Micheal Bafaro’s Don’t Look Away (2023). Once […]
The Creator: Something Rotten in the State of AI
By Elias Savada. With all the talk of artificial intelligence taking over our lives, this technically proficient film may be timely, but its futuristic concept – mankind vs. an enemy of its own making – flails about as a misguided, muddled search for (non-)human salvation.” I can’t accept the overblown […]
Never Getting Over This: Miles Joris-Peyrafitte on The Good Mother
By Ali Moosavi. [Hilary Swank’s character] is not a person who’s grieving the way that we think she should when we meet her…. It’s very easy for us to think that’s not how she should be feeling and grieving. I think in a movie about grief that was a compelling […]