Parallel Mothers
Director Pedro Almodóvar’s Parallel Mothers is such an accessible marriage of glamorous actors and sumptuous set design that it’s easy to forget his raw beginnings. Back in the late 1970s, he had more in common with experimental talents like Andy Warhol and John Waters. His first full-length was an underground flick called Folle… folle… fólleme […]
Drive My Car
It’s a simple tale. A theater actor named Yūsuke Kafuku (Hidetoshi Nishijima) mourns the death of his wife, Oto Kafuku (Reika Kirishima). He’s directing a multi-lingual production of Chekhov’s Uncle Vanya in Hiroshima. The play features performers who speak Japanese, English, Korean, and even sign language. The international cast includes a hot-tempered star named Kôshi […]
The Worst Person in the World
Actress Renate Reinsve is Julie, a beautiful, witty, and capricious young woman. She is unsure of what she wants to do with her life. When we are first introduced, she is a medical student in Oslo. Then she chooses to pursue psychology. After looking at some photos she has taken with her cell phone, she […]
American Underdog
The Pride of the Yankees, Hoosiers, Miracle…in the genre of sports movies, they don’t get more inspirational than American Underdog. The biographical sports film is about National Football League quarterback Kurt Warner who became a superstar with the St. Louis Rams. How a decent, hardworking guy went from stocking shelves at a supermarket to becoming […]
Munich – The Edge of War
Munich: The Edge of War is an intimate period piece. OK sure we’re dealing with countries on the brink of World War II but at heart, it’s a human drama about individuals. As such, the portrait employs lots of tight close-ups and conversations framed by a constantly moving hand-held camera. The technique is ostensibly employed […]
The Tragedy of Macbeth
Bold, minimalist, and grim – Joel Coen’s adaptation of The Tragedy of Macbeth is a stark vision in black and white amidst the “shadows and fog.” Joel may be working sans brother Ethan for the first time, but he isn’t alone. Cinematographer Bruno Delbonnel and production designer Stefan Dechant support his vivid display of German […]
Flee
“What does the word home mean to you?” an inquisitor asks. “It’s someplace safe,” the subject responds. The interviewer is Danish filmmaker Jonas Poher Rasmussen. The man he’s talking with is 36-year-old Amin Nawabi, although that is an alias. A title card informs us “This is a true story.” However, “some names and locations have […]
Cyrano
I’ve always had a hard time understanding people who make the blanket proclamation, “I hate musicals.” How can someone write off an entire artistic discipline? It’s akin to dismissing all Westerns or horror movies. Their reasons inevitably vary, but it’s often based on the artificiality of it all and no enthusiasm for the songs. To […]
The Lost Daughter
Olivia Colman is simply one of our greatest actresses. She has been steadily working for two decades. Olivia began by appearing in a ton of British TV shows and came to prominence with the Channel 4 sitcom Peep Show in 2003. Her talent entered my radar with a recurring role on the TV series Fleabag […]
Nightmare Alley
“Film noir” is a term used to describe the genre of stylish crime dramas released between 1945 and 1960. Subsequently, “neo-noir” was a loosely defined term created to describe pictures that advanced the same sensibility but came after the classic period. Nightmare Alley is a novel by William Lindsay Gresham published in 1946 and subsequently […]