Tag: newyorkfilmfestival
New York 2024 Review: WHO BY FIRE (COMME LE FEU), Bad Times at the Cabin in the Woods
Does anything good ever come out of vacationing in the woods? In genre cinema, going away for a weekend to a remote location is a recipe for all kinds of unpleasantness to happen. In festival dramas – eh, it usually...
New York 2024 Interview: Paul Schrader on Realizing Russell Banks' OH, CANADA
In Paul Schrader’s Oh, Canada, adapted from Russell Banks’ Foregone, a renowned documentary filmmaker named Leonard Fife subjects himself to a filmed interview while battling the throes of death. This final interview, to be captured by a former pupil turned...
New York 2024 Review: THE DAMNED (IL DANNATI), Neorealist Anti-Western About the Senselessness of War
Roberto Minervini’s new film, which premiered earlier this year at the Cannes Film Festival, is the second feature in this festival round to be titled The Damned. Another movie with the same English-language title, directed by Thordur Palsson and featured...
New York 2024 Review: PAVEMENTS Has Great Fun Selling Out
In the romanticizing of 90s indie music, it's oft said that no band better epitomized the rock & roll slacker ethos of rebelling against establishment/commercialism/‘whatever else ya got’/etc. than Pavement. If true enough, then how exactly do you make a...
New York 2024 Review: LITTLE, BIG, AND FAR Conjures Up Celestial Music
Jem Cohen makes a gentle inquiry to human connections while presenting it within the bigger picture; in this case, the universe.
New York 2024 Review: CAUGHT BY THE TIDES, Time Passing, Observed Silently
Jia finally makes a silent movie star out of Zhao Tao.
New York 2024 Review: STRANGER EYES, Sex, Lies, and Videotape
When a little girl vanishes straight from the playground, her parents Junyang (Wu Chien-ho) and Peiying (Anicca Panna) start a search that doesn’t provide any leads. That is, until they start getting DVDs with the footage of the family doing...
New York 2024 Review: THE SEED OF THE SACRED FIG, Striking Tale of Violence and Moral Compromises
Iman (Misagh Zare) has just gotten the much-desired promotion, but asks his family to keep quiet about his new job: he is now an investigating judge in the Revolutionary Court in Tehran. So, while the very real protests against the...
New York 2024 Review: NO OTHER LAND Chronicles Living Under Occupation
The suffering of people in this film is staggering, but so is their resilience.
New York 2024 Review: A TRAVELER'S NEEDS, Living Life Truthfully
The second collaboration of Hong Sangsoo and Isabelle Huppert is a delight.
New York 2024 Review: SCENARIOS, Adieu Cinema, Adieu Godard
End of Godard, End of Cinema
New York 2023 Review: PICTURES OF GHOSTS, Ephemeral Nature of Our Lives
Brazilian director Mendonça Filho serves as our expert guide to his beloved city of Recife, combining his own experience and his love of cinema.
New York 2023 Review: THE BEAST, Hefty Ideas Swirl Around, Stylized to Perfection
Léa Seydoux and George Mackay star in director Bertrand Bonello's new film, my frontrunner for the best film of 2023.
New York 2023 Review: TRAILER OF A FILM THAT WILL NEVER EXIST: PHONY WARS, Adieu Godard
The short film offers a rare glance into Jean-Luc Godard's process in constructing his essay films.
New York 2022 Review: Hong Sang-soo's THE NOVELIST'S FILM, Compulsion and Stagnation
Prolific as ever, Hong is not stagnating for sure. But I guess with the pandemic it crossed his mind. I hope his compulsion never stops.
New York 2021 Review: MEMORIA, Body Memories in Visual/Sonic Masterpiece
Tilda Swinton stars in a new film by Apichatpong Weerasethakul. As with the Thai auteur's other films, watching it is like sleepwalking through unfamiliar territory.
New York 2021 Review: PETITE MAMAN, Like Mother, Like Daughter
Joséphine Sanz, Gabrielle Sanz, and Nina Meurisse star in a fairytale without fringes, directed by Céline Sciamma. It's one of the most touching films of the year.
New York 2021 Review: NEPTUNE FROST, Afrofuturist's Vision of Our Connected World
Cheryl Isheja, Bertrand Ninteretse, and Eliane Umuhire star in a spiritual, joyful lo-fi cousin of 'The Matrix' and 'Bacurau,' directed by Anisia Uzeyman and Saul Williams.The film's message might be the same here, but with more music and dancing. And it still manages to look like a badass cyberpunk film.
New York 2021 Review: IN FRONT OF YOUR FACE, Emotionally Resonant, Horny Dramedy
Directed by Hong Sang-soo, the film may lack his narrative and structural inventiveness but it has a nasty hook that gets you at the end, defying the conventional romance narrative. It's wickedly funny, too.
New York 2021 Review: DRIVE MY CAR, Surviver's Guilt, Loneliness and Human Connection
Based on a short story by famed Japanese author Murakami HarukI, from the collections Men Without Women, the film is a skillfully adapted and directed tale of human connection and redemption.
