Pussy Riot: A Punk Prayer
A Russian band had broadcasters, journalists and pundits saying dirty word on television, but their story was on the nightly news for less-than-humorous reasons. Three members of the punk anarchic-feminist group Pussy Riot, Maria Alyokhina, Yekaterina Samutsevich and Nadezhda Tolokonnikova, were in custody for dissenting. Several talking heads discussed their odds of ending up in labor camps and whether their rights were violated. Pop stars came out in support, decrying the artistic censorship.... read more
Berberian Sound Studio
For as much as horror movies rely on their visual component to scare us, their less-appreciated weapons are their use of sound and suggestion. Often, we can imagine something far more terrifying than what our eyes can see, the recesses of our brains able to conjure frights that play on our central nervous system in ineffable ways. This explains why the superb Berberian Sound Studio isn’t technically a horror movie but sure feels like one. Writer-director Peter Strickland shows no blood, but he wrecks havoc on your mind. Much like his main character, you can’t quite explain what’s got you... read more
Man of Steel
Man of Steel begins well enough. Director Zack Snyder brings his signature richness of design to Krypton, treating its final days like the end of a rollickin’ space opera upon which the viewers have stumbled. read more
Violet & Daisy
Violet & Daisy is a cinematic pop mashup replete with references to comic books and Harajuku girls, following the exploits of two teenage assassins, Violet (Alexis Bledel) and Daisy (Saoirse Ronan). The duo kills for hire in order to make their rent, indulge in sweets and buy the latest fashions. They instantaneously turn from shotgun-toting killers to tricycle-riding, patty-cake-playing girls, over-exaggerating the stunted emotional growth of these characters.... read more
The East
In their followup to Sound of My Voice, co-writer-director Zal Batmanglij and co-writer-star Brit Marling infiltrate another insular community, shifting their attention from a kind of sci-fi cult to activist anarchists who live off the grid while planning and executing terrorist acts targeting corporate executives they hold responsible for poisoning people and the environment. The similarities between the writing partners’ first two films are too obvious to ignore: In both, well-meaning individuals go undercover intending to expose the group and bring the leader to some form of justice but find themselves coming under the movement’s spell. But here, Marling’s role... read more
Now You See Me
Louis Leterrier’s first film since Clash Of The Titans plays as a fun but shallow heist movie where magic meets charitable crime and the house always wins. Now You See Me will surely remind viewers of the Ocean’s Eleven franchise, where the criminals are so talented they’re admirable, and one cannot help but root for the bad guys (who are really just good guys with a lot to prove). However Leterrier’s sixth feature film relies so heavily on the flashiness of a great show that the characters become props whose motives and storylines disappear amidst all the smoke and mirrors... read more
Shadow Dancer
A woman’s betrayal of her family serves as the linchpin of the taut political drama Shadow Dancer, directed by James Marsh (Man on Wire, Project Nim). Set during “the Troubles” of the 20th century between Britain and Northern Ireland, the era’s bloody violence often pitted neighbor against neighbor and tore families apart. Screenwriter Tom Bradby began the novel on which the film is based while a television correspondent in Northern Ireland in the 1990s. His perspective as a journalist balances the storytelling from both sides of the conflict, never forcing the audience pick a political ideology.... read more
Missed Connections
Missed Connections, the feature film debut of writer, director and producer Martin Snyder, takes on love in the time of technology—more specifically, in the Craigslist era. Set in a New York law office, the romantic comedy opens with I.T. guy Josh (Jon Abrahams) lamenting the fact that his longtime secret office crush, Lucy the lawyer (Mickey Sumner), is not only moving to the London office, but she’s also posted a “missed connections” online ad to find the dapper stranger she ran into (literally) in the firm’s revolving doors.... read more
Fill the Void
It’s a situation we’ve seen before: tragedy strikes and a community comes together to help those affected. But the circumstances, and indeed the community, of this movie are likely different than the ones you’re used to seeing on the screen.... read more
The English Teacher
Audiences, young and mature, tend to flock to movies set in high school. The memories, the petty horrors, and the glory of senior year all seem to resonate with people, regardless of age. Still, aptly capturing the reality (and ridiculousness) of high school while creating an interesting, sophisticated film is quite a feat. The English Teacher accomplishes this, both appropriating and dismantling other clichés (like the inspirational teacher and the student/teacher love affair) with just the right of amount of tongue-in-cheekiness throughout all of the drama. Funny and fulfilling, Craig Zisk has created a small, triumphant feature film debut.... read more
We Steal Secrets: The Story of WikiLeaks
Alex Gibney—the prolific documentarian behind Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room, the Oscar-winning Taxi to the Dark Side and Mea Maxima Culpa: Silence in the House of God—turns his lens on WikiLeaks, the nonprofit website dedicated to making public secret and classified materials from anonymous sources. At the center of Gibney’s latest exposé is the enigmatic Julian Assange, founder and editor-in-chief of the site. But unassuming Private First Class Bradley Manning, who launched the organization into the big time when he allegedly leaked hundreds of thousands of documents from classified U.S. military and diplomatic servers, gets equal time in... read more
Frances Ha
Frances Ha is endearing, kind and, in many ways, Noah Baumbach’s best movie to date. One could trace his films, from his debut (Kicking and Screaming) to his most recent (Greenberg) and see a slow but steady focus on the individual, as well as his abandonment of an ironic, sometimes caustic stance against the very characters he writes. It is as if Baumbach could only write a certain type of person—the privileged, socially crippled intellectual with either too much self-awareness or none at all—and for a while it seemed like even the writer himself couldn’t stand to be in the... read more
Venus in Fur (2013 Cannes review)
One of the big critical sensations from this year’s Cannes was All Is Lost, a daring drama that featured Robert Redford all by his lonesome on screen for the film’s entire running time. It’s such an impressive feat of acting that it succeeded in overshadowing the festival’s other great example of minimalist narrative. Venus in Fur gives us two characters engaging in a battle of wits, practically in real time, in which the power dynamic slowly changes over the course of about 95 minutes. But because we’re never quite sure of the true motives of one of the two leads,... read more
Tore Tanzt (2013 Cannes review)
God works in mysterious ways, but the main character in Tore Tanzt (Nothing Bad Can Happen) never doubts His presence, no matter how terrible things get. Maybe he should: In this dark drama, first-time feature director Katrin Gebbe puts Tore through a harrowing journey that might have been too much even for Job, introducing him to a family ruled by a truly sadistic father. The path is difficult for him—and for the audience.... read more
Max Rose (2013 Cannes review)
The sentimental drama Max Rose is the first film to star Jerry Lewis in 18 years. It’s not a happy return for the comic legend, who has also been superb in weightier fare. (His performance in director Martin Scorsese’s dark satire The King of Comedy remains a career highlight.) A story about an aging widower looking back on his life, Max Rose has an icky earnestness and general incompetence that make this potential comeback vehicle a rather exasperating viewing experience. Lewis has claimed that he thought the script by writer-director Daniel Noah was the best he’s read in 40 years.... read more
Grigris (2013 Cannes review)
If he lived somewhere else—or had been dealt a better hand—maybe Grigris would have a happier life. And yet despite being hampered by a crippled left leg and living in poverty in Chad’s capital city of N’Djamena, this slender 25-year-old almost always has a smile on his face. Maybe it’s in part because he’s found an escape from the world around him through dancing at a local nightclub, his friends and admirers chanting his name whenever he takes the floor. His moves are graceful, his confidence without question. Despite his difficult situation, his sweet temperament seems bulletproof.... read more
Only Lovers Left Alive (2013 Cannes review)
Jim Jarmusch treats genres the same way children treat their Christmas toys—as endlessly fun things to batter around, and if they break in the process, well, at least you can’t say they weren’t enjoyed thoroughly. His version of a Western was the poetic, deadpan Dead Man. His idea of an espionage thriller was the off-kilter aloofness of The Limits of Control. His samurai movie was Ghost Dog. So it should be no surprise that his take on the vampire film would be uniquely his own. Thankfully, Only Lovers Left Alive is the farthest thing from a commentary on Twilight. It’s... read more
The Immigrant (2013 Cannes review)
The Immigrant isn’t just set in the past but feels like it’s been made from another time. Harking back to seemingly unfashionable modes of storytelling, the latest from director James Gray goes about its business with perfectly manicured detail and a deliberate pace, looking at the exploits of a luckless Polish woman newly arrived to the U.S. who learns how difficult attaining the American Dream can be. This is such an intelligent, mature work that it’s frustrating—and a little mystifying—that it isn’t more emotionally engaging than it is.... read more
Nebraska (2013 Cannes review)
The first question at the Cannes press conference for Nebraska, the new film from Alexander Payne, was about why the director decided to shoot his comedy-drama in black and white. It’s an understandable query. Studios don’t like black-and-white movies from a commercial perspective and, because Payne’s films emphasize character and dialogue, they’re not necessarily thought of as being grandly cinematic, which might require such a striking look. But after seeing the film, the choice makes more than a little sense. Payne doesn’t use black and white to make his movie grand. Quite the contrary, he uses the lack of color... read more
Blue Is the Warmest Color (2013 Cannes review)
Three-hour movies usually are the terrain of Westerns, period epics or sweeping, tragic romances. They don’t tend to be intimate character pieces, but Blue Is the Warmest Color (La Vie D’Adèle Chapitres 1 et 2) more than justifies its length. A beautiful, wise, erotic, devastating love story, this tale of a young lesbian couple’s beginning, middle and possible end utilizes its running time to give us a full sense of two individuals growing together and apart over the course of years. It hurts like real life, yet leaves you enraptured by its power.... read more
