Serge Bozon's idiosyncratic WWI musical comedy La France impressed me when I watched it some years ago. In it, he demystified war heroics and masculinity with his deadpan humor. In Mrs. Hyde, in his peculiar way, Bozon takes jabs at...
I think Claire Denis has been hanging out with Hong Sang-soo a little too much because I never expected her to do a wordy romantic comedy! And the result is delightful! It boasts the best rolling end credit of any...
Recently, I've been sampling a few non-English series from the past year or so that are available on Netflix. Are any sufficiently intriguing to justify the time investment to binge-watch them in their entirety? Have you seen any less-heralded shows...
If you were to draft up a list of qualities of typically 'Belgian' films, you likely would end up with the description of something an entire world away from Adil El Arbi and Bilal Fallah's international breakout hit Black, which...
A while ago, a judge in the UK proposed to make it harder for people to get married, and easier for them to get divorced. The logic being, that too many people get married without properly thinking it through; love...
Everyone dances while the world goes to hell. Although it doesn't spring forth as an immediately binge-worthy series, Generation B very quickly develops into a worthy, perhaps essential experience. Laced with absurdist comedy and cogent social commentary, it's also quite...
With Nocturama, Bonello might be reflecting the bottled up anger and blowing off steam of young people in the chaotic world which they inherited. But I wish it is that simple. Because we all know that the world we are living in now is much darker and much more sinister place, unfortunately.
The latest collaboration between Dominique Abel and Fiona Gordon is a delicate, breezy and entirely endearing comic tale of love and kinship. Herewith I will admit to my shameful, total ignorance of the couple's previous features, L'iceberg (2005), Rumba (2008)...
A distinctive -- and very witty -- sense of humor is abundantly on display in a new trailer for Lost in Paris (aka Paris pieds nus). Sure, the quiet, knockabout physical comedy is apparent, but it's presented with grace and...
Quillévéré understands those connections and implies in Heal the Living in a cinematic way. Every movement in the film has to do with being alive. Every stillness implies death. She understands that death is part of life. We lose somebody close and feel like time is standing still- the camera movement becomes static. But we go on living again- and the camera moves again.
"I just knew she'd be right. And when we were talking, she said she had grown up with listening to the disc of Julie Harris reading her poetry. She knew her poetry and more importantly, she could read poetry as well. I just knew she was right. It's as vague as that. And god bless her! She stayed there for four and a half years. I don't know what I would have done if she said no. I'd have no idea who to cast."
It's hard to maintain one's identity when university begins; or perhaps more to the point, find your identity under enormous pressure to do well in school, adapt to life without constant parental supervision, not to mentions the pressures of the...
Human emotions can be fragile, unpredictable things. However, they can sometimes also be pretty damned predictable. Show someone a kitten and they'll feel an emotional pang. Show a human going through the stages of life from youth to life's logical...
Over the past few years Belgium has very quietly put together a run of impressive crime thrillers that stand with the very best in the world and it would appear that the latest entry in that streak of excellence may...
Paul Verhoeven is one of the more unique directors in cinema history. As perhaps the most famous Dutch auteur, he's gone from ribald little European films to the biggest of Hollywood bangs, incorporating his unique wit, visual sense and narrative...
While its central conceit is decidedly sensational in nature, The Unknown Girl (La fille inconnue) unfolds at a mundanely methodical trot that has come to be expected of the Dardenne brothers. Their latest film revolves around a confident and talented...
The English-language title of a new animated film from Belgium is a play on words that is only accurate in the most literal terms possible. Gentle and good-hearted as it is, The Wild Life is clearly targeted at patient young...
One of the standout films at the 2016 Cannes Film Festival was Julia Ducaurnau's French campus, coming of age cannibal flick, Raw. The assured and unflinching debut had viewers scrambling for the exits to go off and write good things about...
It doesn’t take long, when you’re talking to Jaco van Dormael, to get a sense that he is a director or artist who sees the world in a pretty interesting and eccentric way. Full of gentle, innocuous humour and amusing...
[Updated with English subtitled version.] Though it arrived at the Toronto International Film Festival with little fanfare, Belgian director Robin Pront's striking debut feature The Ardennes left as a major favorite for many of those lucky enough to catch it...
