Reviews and coverage from major film festivals including Sundance, SXSW, SIFF, TIFF, and Cannes, the best and the rest of festival cinema.
The proof-of-concept for Wild Horses is in the pudding: Robert Duvall in front of and behind the camera, festival “it” boy James Franco and once teenage heart-throb Josh Hartnett saddled at his side. Even though Duvall hasn’t directed a film since 2003’s widely panned Assassin Tango (what. a. terrible. name.) there is promise in the idea...
Remember those fetid middle school health videos about eating disorders? The concerned best friend, the bespectacled guidance counselor, the implied offscreen self-abuse. The gorging. The vomiting. The inevitable dramatic hospital visit. Excess Flesh isn’t quite that but Patrick Kennelly‘s wannabe horror feature is still very much the cinematic version of binging and purging. It crams...
Metaphysical bodysnatching from the POV of the snatcher, Advantageous is a soft sci-fi-drama centered around a cool idea but repeatedly undone by shoddy execution, unconvincing performances and dreadful FX. Commendable though Jennifer Phang‘s mother-daughter relationship study might be in the context of Sundance’s overabundance of father-son sagas, Phang is able to capitalize on the maternal...
There’s a flicker of hope early on in Reversal. A scuzzy captive batters her captor, gaining the upper hand and chaining him in the very binds she was kept in for who knows how long. She scours the house for car keys, stumbling upon a folder filled with Polaroids of similarly imprisoned females. She rages...