In a small town called Eureka Springs, nestled in the Ozark Mountains of rural Arkansas, a miracle takes place nearly every day: People with wildly different beliefs and values manage to peacefully co-exist.
“Pacific Rim: Uprising” is smart filmmaking, and smart filmmaking is all the more important when the material is so pulpy.
Jinn, which premiered at the 2018 SXSW Film Festival, is many things. It is an African-American story. It is a Muslim story. It is a mother-daughter story. It is a universal story. In many ways, though, this complex and excellent film comes down to a simple question: What’s wrong with pepperoni pizza?
Randal Hendricks is in trouble. Within the first few minutes of “Number 37,” a South African film which premiered at the 2018 SXSW Festival, we learn that Randal owes thousands of dollars to a dangerous loan shark. What ensues in this tense and gripping thriller is both familiar, with obvious shades of “Rear Window,” and utterly original.
The clerical collar carries with it significant weight. Its presence instantly changes the timbre of a conversation, even if that conversation is with an Oscar-winning actor.
“Summer in the Forest” is at once a loving portrayal and a revolution. It is a declaration of a truth we bear witness to; whispered through the beauty of nature, noticed in the least of these, and championed by those who would “waste their time” with those the world has no patience for.
Set in the world of contemporary art dealing, “The Price of Everything” tells a tale by turns amusing and chilling. What happens when art moves from an object of appreciation to a commodity fetish, when people with more money than sense swoop in and insure that great works will never see the light of day, and remain trapped on the wall of a New York penthouse?
“Black Panther” is about a good a movie as Marvel has produced, but it saddens me to see Coogler’s bravura drenched in Disney/Marvel sauce.
One hundred years ago, the town of Bisbee, Arizona – a major copper mining site – experienced a worker strike, but the mine owners, aided by the sheriff, rounded up over a thousand strikers, stuck them on a train, and deported them to the middle of the New Mexican desert. In this documentary, the current citizens of Bisbee recreate the horrifying events of July 12, 1917.
What would you do if a work of art you had poured your heart, time, and money into just disappeared?
The short film categories at each year’s Academy Awards are consistently home to some of the best filmmaking represented in the entire program.
“I wouldn’t believe it if it weren’t my story.” Interview subjects in “Three Identical Strangers” keep sounding this refrain, and with good reason.
“Annihilation” isn’t very forthcoming, and your enjoyment of it will likely depend on how comfortable you are with its curious combination of dreadful aura and jump scares.
“The Task” will inevitably divide audiences. As it stands, it’s near the top of my ranking of this year’s True/False lineup, but many people walked out of the screening I attended, and I heard a lot of muttering on the way out afterward among those who stayed. This division is appropriate for a film designed to provoke both its subjects and its audience.
To watch these monks in their life is to exclaim with the poet W.H. Auden: “How beautiful it is,/that eye-on-the-object look.” These men, with their focused vision, radiate that beauty.
“Black Panther” engages in a kind of unabashed truth-telling that is less about being prophetic or preachy than it is about being honest. Through Ryan Coogler’s deft directing and writing, the story makes a brilliant move to set the film’s primary conflict within Wakanda itself. The film comments on racism, representation, and black power by its mere existence, and refuses to apologize.
“Una Mujer Fantástica” interweaves human grief and sexuality in ways I haven’t seen on screen, while managing to dynamically portray the strength and bravery of the trans community.
Often a documentary can be used to create awareness and focus the conversation in the midst of what seems like a tide of status−quo maintaining market forces. “The Devil We Know” seeks to take on one of these large issues, and the task is quite daunting indeed.
“A Boy, A Girl, A Dream” is so much more than a single shot. It is a portrait of hope, despair, and of hard-won love all set against the backdrop of election night 2016.
Director Marina Zenovich looks to use the traditional biopic format to do two things: on the one hand shed some light on the tragedy and reveal a little bit more of who Robin Williams really was, and on the other, to celebrate the life and work of such an amazing performer.
Through spoken word, beatboxing, dance, and imaginative indie set design that would make David Lynch jealous, the film provides a complex glimpse of a young black woman, her interests, and her opinions.