By Alexandra Heller-Nicholas. The film that resulted from this production context is very good, even if we may never truly know the truth about the filming environment” At first glance, to call Ilya Khrzhanovskiy and Jekaterina Oertel’s DAU. Natasha ‘epic’ is an understatement: intoxicating performances drive a series of suffocatingly […]
No Sparks: Michael Almereyda’s Tesla
By Elias Savada. Ethan Hawke elevates the role as the lead actor in Tesla, but he never really gets to show much range….” When I last commented on filmmaker Michael Almereyda, it was about the favorable impression I had watching Marjorie Prime (2017), his sci-fi-without-being-science-fictiony examination of artificial intelligence. Boy, […]
Exposé or Diatribe? Eric Merola’s The Andorra Hustle
By Thomas Puhr. The Andorra Hustle exists in a precarious position, torn between being an insightful think-piece and a grating political rant.” Events with far-reaching geopolitical ramifications can originate from the unlikeliest of places, as illustrated in Eric Merola’s The Andorra Hustle (2020). If you have no idea that the […]
“Somebody has to do Something!”: Mainline Protestant Moral Ambiguity in Paul Schrader’s First Reformed (2017)
By Richmond B. Adams. Schrader presents an alarming cultural fragmentation in which American enemies are no longer German Nazis, Soviet bureaucrats, foreign terrorists…. Americans have come to view perhaps even their next door neighbors as adversaries to the death….” Upon the release of Paul’s Schrader’s First Reformed during the early […]
Kindred Spirits – Werner Herzog’s Nomad: In the Footsteps of Bruce Chatwin
Jeremy Carr
September 2, 2020
By Jeremy Carr. Like the best of Herzog’s work, the result is a contagious survey with no pretense or condescension.” There seem to be two prevailing views of Werner Herzog today; one being the unusual actor with a strange vocal delivery and a fondness for Baby Yoda, and one being […]
Stuntwork over CGI: Filmmaker Brian Skiba on Directing The 2nd
By Ali Moosavi. Politics is a dirty game, no matter which side of the table you’re on.” –Brian Skiba There is a certain genre of film which, perhaps unkindly, can be called “Budget Action”. These are not the big budget action movies starring Keanu Reeves or Tom Cruise; or even […]
Tradition Thriving on the “Bloody” Frontier: The Pale Door
By Matthew Sorrento. Co-writer/director Aaron B. Koontz’s perceptiveness for the Western genre makes The Pale Door into a worthy hybrid horror.” It must be an assignment in a screenwriting course somewhere, or maybe a guidebook: “From Dusk to Dawn It” – begin your script as road movie, and bring your […]
Dickens, With Added Wit: Armando Ianucci’s Recipe for The Personal History of David Copperfield
By Elias Savada. Bold, delightful, and eternally optimistic, The Personal History of David Copperfield is very clever indeed, without a hint of Victorian stuffiness.” It’s been filmed, telefeatured, and serialized for tv more than a dozen times, but the new version of the Charles Dickens classic from director Armando Ianucci gives it […]
Hey Guys, Where Have You Been? Bill & Ted Face the Music
By Elias Savada. Here’s an inane and silly tonic, one that might lift people’s souls in these sad times. Like Santa Claus coming down the chimney at Christmas, Bill & Ted Face the Music offers a crazed, intoxicating gift” It’s been nearly three decades since Keanu Reeves and Alex Winter […]
What We Already Know, Too Well – Unfit: The Psychology of Donald Trump
By Michael Sandlin. Dan Partland’s well-intended but flawed documentary has at least done its democratic duty and created a forum for these previously silenced psychiatrists to outline just how much of a deranged wingnut Donald Trump really is.” In some ways, it seems almost unfair to single out Donald Trump […]