Relay Director David Mackenzie has had a fascinating career; in the past, we’d likely consider him a talented journeyman, the sort of solid professional who…
After This Death Movies about the music industry can be a tough pitch. Selling a superstar artist as just that demands either the savviest ear…
The Young Mothers Home Immersing yourself in a new film by Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne is akin to reluctantly catching up with an old friend.…
It Was Just an Accident Despite its almost apologetic title, the latest feature from Iranian filmmaker Jafar Panahi bears a highly incendiary load. Not quite…
Eddington When the world turned to shit approximately five years ago, satire marched ahead, determined to outpace the banality of lived reality. Old-school broadcasts and…
Sound of Falling Melancholy, that inexplicable feeling of pensiveness, constitutes the centerpiece of memory, at least when memory divulges itself to its owner and defers…
Underground Kaori Oda’s Underground is a film built around the meanings of its title, but it’s also apparently built up to 83 minutes out of…
Mad Bills to Pay “The working man is a sucker” — so reads the opening title card of Joel Alfonso Vargas’ debut feature, Mad Bills…
The True Beauty of Being Bitten by a Tick Filmmaker Pete Ohs’ working methods prioritize flexibility, openness, and spontaneity. As with all of his features…
“Everywhere animals disappear,” wrote art critic John Berger in his seminal book Why Look at Animals? Berger proposed an argument from capitalism, where the industrialized…
Little Boy In a less-than-apocryphal anecdote repeated throughout the French media, Jean Renoir once said, “I made La Bête humaine because [Jean] Gabin and I…
Desert of Namibia At first, Yoko Yamanaka’s Desert of Namibia seems to be just another entry in what this writer is calling Millennium Mambo-core, after…
Suspended Time Given the muted critical response and prolonged time period between its festival premiere and eventual (limited) distribution, the new Olivier Assayas film has…
Henry Fonda for President Thoughtful film curation asks us to consider films in a new light. Alexander Horwath knows this better than most, having served…
In the Mouth In the Mouth, the sophomore feature from Cory Santilli (Saul at Night, 2019) is everything from a film noir to a prison…
Pavements “The world’s most important and influential band breaks up and it’s not a big deal.” Thus begins Alex Ross Perry’s Pavements, establishing from the…
Blazing Fists I watched two films from IFFR’s 2025 festival: one was The Last Dance, the smash hit Hong Kong family melodrama set in the…
Yasuko, Songs of Days Past Like many Japanese directors his age, Kichitaro Negishi got his start at the legendary Nikkatsu studio making the only thing…
When I attended the International Film Festival Rotterdam earlier this year, I was struck by the festival’s efforts to cut its slate, having gone from…
Rumours Since his out-of-nowhere debut feature Tales from the Gimli Hospital in 1988, Winnipeg-based director Guy Maddin has become synonymous with a very particular brand…