At the risk of painting with too broad a brush, Sébastien Pilote’s traditional treatment of Louis Hemon’s Maria Chapdelaine is a headline for all the…
Titane What is the role of “transgressive” art in an ostensibly liberal society? Or, to put it another way: In a cultural context where the…
There’s nothing particularly novel about Oleg Sentsov’s Rhino, a rise-and-fall gangster narrative about a Ukrainian tough guy who carves a bloody swath through his enemies…
To make an effective political film, one frequently turns to documentary as the best medium for truth; it’s hard to deny in exemplars of the…
Reflection While Ukrainian writer/director Valentin Vasyanovych has been making films for a number of years, his breakthrough didn’t come until 2019’s Atlantis, which garnered awards…
Wife of a Spy can be too reserved in stretches, but is ultimately fully invigorated by its monumental conclusion. Though over three decades into his…
Little Girl misunderstands where its focus should be and strips away most of its ambiguity, leaving little to really contend with. In the opening scene…
The Judith Butler quote (from Dispossession) that opens Jun Li’s Drifting serves as a neat entry point: “Such bodies both perform the conditions of life…
One of the central tensions in cinema is that of authenticity: The inherent power of this medium comes from its depiction of images and experiences…
Stanley Kwan has never achieved the same level of critical renown here in America as his countryman Wong Kar-wai, which seems most certainly in large…
Tracing Her Shadow, the third feature by Song Pengfei (whose films are credited to just his given name), deals with a relatively little-known historical tragedy:…
The collective known as the Hong Kong Documentary Filmmakers – who have two of their films at this year’s CineCina Film Festival – accounts for,…
As an authentic example of guerilla filmmaking (with its roots in independent rebellion, rather than serving as an Escape From Tomorrow-esque marketing ploy), Sad Film…
“It’s your show I’m cancelling, not you,” remarks one character to another in The Accusation, encapsulating, intentionally or otherwise, the thorny politics at the heart…
Capitalizing on the considerable reputation he’s earned himself at the big international film festivals over the last few years, Radu Jude heads into this new…
Another year, another TIFF. Due in part to its situation in the calendar year relative to other major international fests, and in part to its…
The Card Counter takes a similar shape to many of Schrader’s Lonely Man films, but this latest can’t quite overcome the template and thrive on…
Kate isn’t doing anything new from an action-narrative perspective, but slick choreography and gleeful violence helps this girlboss brutality go down smoothly. Kate, a female…
TMBMZM oddly tilts toward authenticity rather than camp, to disappointing results. The Manson Brothers Midnight Zombie Massacre is a title that promises a lot. For…
Mona Lisa and the Blood Moon Leonardo da Vinci’s Mona Lisa is famous for its portrayal of an inscrutable facial expression, that indelible half-smirk-half-smile that…