“Dostoyevsky Iranian style,” reads one positive review of Leila’s Brothers, the third feature film by Saeed Roustaee, and in a way that writer has a…
In This Issue: FEATURES: NEW DIRECTORS/NEW FILMS 2023: Leila’s Brothers (Saeed Roustaee) by Michael Sicinski // Maputo Nakuzandza (Ariadine Zampaulo) by Daniel Gorman // Tótem (Lila Avilés) by Esmé…
Argentinian filmmaker Melisa Liebenthal’s 2019 short film, Aquí y Allá (“Here and There”), utilized Google Earth, in-film, to pinpoint the exact location where it was…
Ariadine Zampaulo’s Maputo Nakuzandza begins with a distressingly bleak sequence: a group of boys approach an open car and peer inside, commenting on an unseen…
Giraffe is often beautiful, but strikes an imbalance between its form and its flagging emotional core. Frequently beautiful but frustratingly opaque, Anna Sofia Hartmann’s Giraffe plays…
Reinventing the superhero genre often entails energizing it, usually with piled-on camp (as with Troma Entertainment’s The Toxic Avenger and, more recently, Marvel’s Deadpool) or…
On a personal note, Rye Lane couldn’t have come at a more significant time. I only recently moved away from South London, and have started…
Once in a while, a debut film comes along that announces the arrival of a potentially major new talent. A.V. Rockwell’s freshmanfeature, the Teyana Taylor-starring…
The music on sister duo Aly & AJ’s last album, 2021’s A Touch of the Beat, ranged from fireplace-warm pop-rock (“Listen!!!”) to tense synthpop (“Lucky…
In May 2022, Andy Fletcher — the keyboard player and one of the founding members of the prestigious British synth-pop/electronic rock group Depeche Mode —…
The last time we saw Adam Sandler and Jennifer Aniston on screen together as Nick and Audrey Spitz, the mid-life, middle-class Brooklynites were caught up…
Byun Sung-hyun’s Kill Boksoon belongs to a time-honored (or less generously, clichéd) subgenre of the assassin movie: the kind in which the stoic, unbelievably badass…
Since his breakout 1997 film Xiao Wu, Jia Zhangke has emerged as one of the most gifted artists chronicling life in 21st-century China. Three of…
For years now, director Ursula Meier has been interested in boundaries and the reasons we cross them. Her debut feature Strong Shoulders (2003) is about…
Let’s start with a little personal history: when this reviewer caught the live-action adaptation of Norman Bridwell’s endearing giant canine in 2021’s Clifford the Big…
In Mark Jenkin’s Enys Men, the unnamed protagonist (Mary Woodvine, in a role mysteriously dubbed “The Volunteer”) sets out on a mundane, quietly transfixing routine.…
In 2017, Léa Mysius premiered Ava at Cannes, an exhilarating directorial debut and a vibrant coming of age tale that showcased a filmic bravado and…
Three features into his career as director, and Louis Garrel’s vision remains unexpected and lively, channeled into decidedly comedic pieces that stand apart from the…
Narrative video games have been an appealing cash-grab for years now, but the recent phenomenon of The Last of Us has made game adaptations hot…
Depicting larger-than-life subjects has always posed some representational challenges: inch the individual too perfectly into focus, and one runs the risk of hagiography, but impose…