Indie Reviews
Oldenburg 2020 Review: BUCK ALAMO, The Strains of a Surreal Twilight Song
When your name comes up on Death's list, there's not really much you can do, except wait for him to collect you. Well, maybe not quite for Eli Cody; he might have gotten his fatal diagnosis, but he's not going...
Venice 2020 Review: THE BEST IS YET TO COME Hopes for a Better World in Uplifting Newsroom Drama
Jing Wang´s feature debut is a love letter to journalism and its potency to change million of lives for better.
Toronto 2020 Review: TRICKSTER, Mischief and Mayhem in the North
Being a teenager these days is not easy. But if you add to that being one in a rural community with few job prospects, in which you are an Indigenous person and therefore frequently treated like a second-class citizen (to...
Toronto 2020 Review: NIGHT OF THE KINGS, A Young Convict Fights For His Life In This Stunning Ode To Storytelling
In ninety-three spellbinding minutes, director Philippe Lacôte takes us through centuries of magical storytelling devices in Night of the Kings, as a young convict attempts to talk his way through the night in this magnificent take on One Thousand and One...
Review: RESIDUE, The Fading Light of Home & Identity
What is home? Is it the place you grew up? Where you parents reside? Just the general neighbourhood, or the whole town? What does it mean to move back again, and what differences in you as a person would make...
Toronto 2020 Review: THE DISCIPLE, A Piercing Character Study Within the World of Hindustani Music
Indian classical music, also known as Hindustani music, is a unique cultural artifact that defies simple categorization. The sitar and tabla laden raga has a history hundreds of years old and remains an important touchstone and identifier for Indians around...
Toronto 2020 Review: NOMADLAND, The Quiet Endurance of Traveling Workers
As likely many of you, this pandemic era has me rethinking my life, what my goals are, where I want to be a year, five, ten, twenty years from now. About what is possible for me to achieve, where I...
Review: RENT-A-PAL Thrives On Dual Performances From Wil Wheaton and Brian Landis Folkins
Jon Stevenson wrote and directed the horror-thriller, starring Wil Wheaton and Brian Landis Folkins as two people who form a costly friendship.
MotelX 2020 Review: THE HISTORY OF THE OCCULT, a Race Against The Clock to Unveil an Evil Union
60 Minutes to Midnight, an investigative journalism program on television in Argentina has been cancelled. Having made their share of enemies throughout their run the program runners are about to air its last episode and plan to go out with...
MotelX 2020 Review: An Adorable Hellion Hilariously Faces Off With Intergalactic Evil in PSYCHO GOREMAN
Sister and brother Mimi and Luke have unwittingly resurrected Psycho Goreman, PG for short, an ancient creature lying dormant in their backyard. Hellbent on continuing his quest of destroying everything in existence he is held back by one little thing....
L'Étrange 2020 Review: FANNY LYE DELIVER'D Delivers a Tepid Period Drama
It's the 16th century, after the English Civil War, and Fanny Lye (Maxine Peake, Black Mirror) lives a relatively bleak existence, married to a much older man, John, who basically bought her (Charles Dance, Alien III), on a remote farm,...
Imagine 2020 Review: SLEEPLESS BEAUTY Keeps You Awake
Lo and behold: despite the limitations brought about by the COVID-19 pandemic, the Amsterdam-based Imagine Film Festival managed to get itself two theatrical world premieres for its 2020 edition. One of them was Peet Gelderblom's poetic collage film When Forever...
Review: I'M THINKING OF ENDING THINGS By Charlie Kaufman
In director Spike Jonze’s Adaptation, screenwriter Charlie Kaufman is in the film as himself played by Nicolas Cage. That character puts his own spin on the book in that film when he is tasked with writing a screenplay for it....
L'Étrange 2020 Review: THE WITCH OF KING'S CROSS, The Soul of a Great Artist Laid Bare
When you are heavily involved in an art form, or maybe two, other art forms often slip under your radar, or you rely on friends' facebook posts to keep you informed, even with an artist you wish you knew about...
Review: THE ARGUMENT, Trifling Theatrical Experimentation
Robert Schwartzman (Dreamland, The Unicorn), part of film family royalty (brother is Jason Schwartzman, cousin is Sofia Coppola etc.) is relatively new to Hollywood's Indies. His third feature The Argument continues the trend of approachable genre experiments inherent in his...
Fantasia 2020 Review: FOR THE SAKE OF VICIOUS, Lean, Violent Storytelling
Romina returns home from a shift at the hospital to find a man, Alan, lying unconscious in her kitchen and another, Chris, in hiding. Chris has brought Alan here because he needs her to keep him alive. Chris needs a...
Imagine 2020 Review: WHEN FOREVER DIES
(Is it a drama? Is it a documentary? Is it a history lesson? It's...) When the current pandemic started showing its teeth in the Netherlands in March, it meant the end of the 2020 edition of the Imagine Film Festival...
Fantasia 2020 Review: SMALL GAUGE TRAUMA Shorts Program
[Still from Who Goes There.] Ever since I began attending Fantasia in 2005, I've looked forward to the Small Gauge Trauma shorts program. which is always filled with devious, cutting, creative, weird, quease-inducing, and shocking moments. Smash cut to 15 years...
Fantasia 2020 Review: COME TRUE, Nightmarish Terror Creeps Into Real Life
Sarah is finding it very difficult to get a good night’s sleep. She’s not staying at home, avoiding her mom as much as possible. Her friend will take her in whenever she can and some nights she’ll sleep in the...
Now Streaming: ONE DARK NIGHT, Meg Tilly and Telekinetic Terror
Meg Tilly stars in an 80s horror flick that's kind of awesome, directed by Tom McLoughlin, and now streaming on Shudder.
