Film Reviews, Interviews and Articles
King Arthur: Legend of the Sword starts with elephants the size of castles and ends with snakes the size of rivers and there isn’t much sandwiched in between that’s any less ridiculous. A monochromatic mess replete with sketchy, video game-esque CGI and an often out of focus, mangled 3D conversion, Guy Ritchie’s bonkers fantasy film ditches the legend of the sword in the stone of yore for something that feels equally indebted to Heavy Metal and Shadow of Mordor cut scenes. Read More
In Buster’s Mal Heart, Rami Maleck plays a man at war. Struggling to overcome bad wiring, Rami’s “Buster” (or Jonah as he’s called in earlier memories) is a fractured individual in the throes of a crisis of faith and self. Writer and director Sarah Adina Smith cleverly skirts objectivity, opting for storytelling that operates in moody abstracts, whose core is more about emotionally resonance than narrative distractions. Her surreal deconstruction of a man mentally and spiritually fractured defies easy answers which had us all the more excited to chat with her about her work. Read More
Like the US government, the big whigs at Marvel have a sordid history of interventionism. Professed “creative differences” drove visionary Edgar Wright from Ant-Man, ran Patty Jenkins off Thor: The Dark World and kept Ava DuVernay at bay from Black Panther. The films in the MCU are larger than any standalone film; they must click and connect in complicated corporate webs, webs that have given us material such as the infamous Thor in a sauna scene in the widely forgotten Avengers: Age of Ultron. Which makes Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2, a film written and directed by one man, James Gunn, such a wildly fresh breathe of air.
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It’s nothing short of ironic that the 5 films featured in SIFF ’17 that I’ve already seen, I haven’t actually written anything about yet. So, in hopes of getting you all up to speed on as many of the SIFF features as possible, I’ll fill you in on the likes of those that I’ve already digested, complete with grades because, this is 2017 and you won’t tolerate a lack of grades. Spoiler alert: they’re all good. Also be sure to check out The 8 SIFF ’17 Films We’re Dying to See. Read More
As is always the case, gazing upon the list of 400 entires to the Seattle International Film Festival can be daunting for even the most knowledgable of cinephiles. Cutting through that list to cull a selection of desirables is an unwieldy task that demands more research than should be dedicated to a pleasure activity but to simplify the process for you dear reader, we’re trimmed that list of 400 down to a mere 8 films at SIFF ’17 (a clean 2% of their offerings) that we’re dying to see. Read More
Anyone who ever found themselves wishing for a cross section between The Cable Guy and The Exorcism, rejoice in thy ancient cursed tongues. Carson D. Mell’s supernaturally awkward brom-dram is a conjoined twin of ghost tale hula-hoops and male acquaintanceship hoopla. A batty genre-defying lark to its close, Another Evil deals with the clumsy delicacies of fledgling friendships weighed against the silly absurdities of cloven hoofs and blessed needles. Read More
Inept romantic drama Below Her Mouth is awesomely bad. This next level cinematic scourge is a perfect confluence of ineptitude, a wholly pitiful effort defined by horrendous acting, terrible scripting and amateur direction that inspires any captive audience member to gawk in horror at its epic multitude of failures. In more ways than one, Below Her Mouth, which contains a whopping seven fully nude sex scenes in its first hour, finds pace with classic movie dumpster fire The Room in that it’s undeniably awful and yet you can’t look away from the cinematic implosion onscreen. Read More
From the Peruvian rainforest to the Katmai Alaskan Wilderness, the depths of the Chauvet caves of Southern France to McMurdo Station in Antarctica, Werner Herzog is a journeyman who has long questioned man’s relationship with nature. In Salt and Fire, Herzog takes us to Bolivia’s sprawling Salar de Uyuni, the worst’s largest salt flat. A desolate beauty of biblical proportion, here transpires a kidnapping and desertion in this eco-minded quasi-thriller that feels like a natural extension of Herzog’s last documentary, Into the Inferno. The auteur again twisting his most recent obsession (volcanoes) into narrative form to varying success. Read More
Controversy has plagued Ghost in the Shell since the day Hollywood “It” girl Scarlett Johansson was cast in the pole position. Adapted from a serialized Japanese manga of the same name, Ghost in the Shell tells the story of Major, a Japanese cybernetic counter-terrorist agent. Before anyone starts yelling “Whitewashing!”, it’s easy enough to see the problem lurking. Even those without a ton of processing power may be thinking to themselves, “Hey, but Scarlett Johansson isn’t Japanese…what gives?” Indeed, what gives? Johansson being the most bankable actress in the world, teeing her up to lead an effects driven potential franchise starter makes perfect sense. From a financial perspective, the move is logical. But… Read More
I suppose it’s fair to say Raw is not for everyone. Turns out a lot of the general populace don’t like subtitled French movies. Much less ones where humans gleefully feast on each another’s flesh. But let me tell you, Raw is every bit the toothy show-stopper that I wanted it to be. And much funnier. A familial politics drama smuggled inside a coming-of-age cannibal story, the feature debut from writer/director Julia Docournau tells the story of vegetarian veterinary student turned budding people-eater Justine (Garance Marillier) and is served up with all the fixin’s. To say I loved it would be an understatement. Read More