By Thomas Puhr. Wicker Man retreads can be a lot of fun…. but Bousman lacks the compositional sophistication of an Ari Aster or the confrontational gender politics of a LaBute.” A husband and wife vacationing in Thailand wake up bruised, muddied, and lacking any memory of how they got back […]
A Rom-Com About Disconnecting…and an Alien Invasion: Alex Fischer and Eleanor Wilson’s Save Yourselves!
By Elias Savada. Well-crafted even for its seemingly lowish budget, the movie is a doozy of a down-to-earth apocalypse farce.” For American filmmaker Alex H. Fischer, the road from avant-garde short films to arthouse feature stretches but four years, although his commercial and music video work dates back at least […]
Virtual Discoveries: NYFF 2020
Stump the Guesser (Guy Maddin, 2020) By Gary M. Kramer. There were some interesting discoveries, documentaries, and revivals screening at this year’s New York Film Festival. Here are a handful of notable titles that played at this year’s virtual fest. One of the highlights is the pairing two playful and […]
From Playground to Labor: An Interview with Kodi Smit-McPhee on 2067
By Zoe Kurland. I felt a strange sense of identification as I watched 2067’s opening scene – my planet was burning, too, and I was powerless to stop it.” The film 2067 begins in the deep dark of space. As Earth spins slowly into view, fires erupt across its surface. […]
Oppression Descends: João Paulo Miranda Maria on Memory House (TIFF 2020)
By Gary M. Kramer. What I needed from Pitanga was the history of the cinema in his body and his eyes. I needed to bring to the screen the ‘blood in his eyes.’” João Paulo Miranda Maria makes an auspicious feature film debut with Memory House, which had its World […]
When Asylum’s Regained: Eva Mulvad’s Love Child (TIFF 2020)
By Ali Moosavi. Love Child is not so much a story about refugees and asylum seekers…. This is a film about love triumphing above all adversaries.” The subject of asylum seekers has come to the fore in recent years with refugees from war torn countries fleeing to the west and […]
No Escape from the “Rooms”: An Interview with Director Will Wernick
By Ali Moosavi. You don’t have to be a seasoned movie fan to predict the entire course of the film very early on in the proceedings.” Before watching No Escape (Will Wernick, 2020), I was not aware of the entities called escape rooms, which apparently are very popular all over […]
“Anything but this project, I would have been wary”: An Interview with Daniel Kraus on George A. Romero and Writing The Living Dead
By Tony Williams. I had no intention of sending off Romero in anything less than grand style.” As discussed in my review essay, novelist Daniel Kraus began conceiving The Living Dead (New York: Tor Books, 2020) with Romero at a time when creative frustration with the film industry began to […]
Beyond the Grave – The Living Dead by George A. Romero and Daniel Kraus
Romero on the set of Land of the Dead (2005) By Tony Williams. Recognizing industry obstructions that became increasingly difficult for him to express the full dimensions of his creative talent he decided to work on a novel that, like his original literary work elsewhere, would have been ideal film […]
Everything’s Gone Green: Carnival Dystopia in Michel Franco’s New Order (TIFF 2020)
By Alexandra Heller-Nicholas. Franco is aggressively focused on a contemporary moment of social upheaval where a literal class war is rendered even more nightmarish….” Michel Franco’s New Order bursts on the screen with a series of almost breath-takingly bold images. A naked woman covered in green, slime-like paint. A hospital’s […]