More Rendez-Vous with French Cinema 2016
Within 11 days’ time, New Yorkers can see a significant slice of current French films that have won acclaim at Cannes and earned praise back home.
Film-Forward
Overlooked Gems of 2015
Early on in the year may be as good a time as any to look back at 2015, before the number of films begins to snowball and as the awards season slowly winds down. What has been overlooked? What made the festival rounds but is conspicuously missing from this year’s lineup, having perhaps gotten lost […]
Rams
The opening credits spell it out: 800,000 sheep among 320,000 Icelanders. Living in the remote northern part of the country, two brothers, bachelor sheep farmers past middle age, live alone on side by side farms. Their family has lived in the region for generations, raising prized thoroughbred stock. Both brothers have an attentive, paternal relationship with their herds—their constant companions—yet the men haven’t said a word to each […]
The Club
Talk about your tough sell. Critics have their work cut out for them when discussing well-made but audience-repelling films. For example, Room, centered on a mother and her five-year-old son kept captive in a shed for years on end, is one of the lowest grossing films to be nominated for the best picture Oscar. The Auschwitz-set Son of Saul has earned wide acclaim, but it […]
Best of 2015
With a robust showing of documentaries and foreign and American-made films in 2015, there are more than enough to choose from for a top 10 list. The options make for a more spirited end-of-the-year discussion than usual and are also why so many of the awards and nominations that have been announced thus far have […]
The Big Short
The whiplash camera work of a faux-documentary. Actors breaking the fourth wall, staring straight into the camera with a what-the-hell bemused expression. All this plus the underlying cynicism with a smirk will immediately remind viewers of top TV fare such as the American version of The Office. As if on cue, that series’ star, […]
Dreams Rewired
It wasn’t really that long ago when many had to rely on dial-up Internet service, when listening to live-streaming audio sounded like an underwater long-distant phone call, and podcasts and streaming video on demand were merely ideas on the horizon. In the breezy Dreams Rewired, perspectives on the rapid-fire technical developments of a century ago […]
Youth
Don’t be fooled by the European poster for Paolo Sorrentino’s latest amorphous film. It may be hard to pin down what type of movie this is, but it’s definitely not the spry sex comedy hinted at in the ad campaign, where stars Michael Caine and Harvey Keitel sit in a swimming pool staring gob-smacked at […]
Macbeth
The opening shot of a dead child about to be buried as his parents mourn graveside sets the tone for this efficient and at times absorbing retelling of Shakespeare’s violent tragedy. The few and infrequent bits of the play’s comic relief have been excised for one uniform, despairing depiction of warrior Macbeth’s murderous ascent to […]