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Out in Theaters: 6 YEARS

*This is a reprint of our SXSW 2015 review.

In the throes of first love, life becomes exasperatingly disoriented. We convince ourselves that there is but one person who can appreciate, understand and care for us and that that person should not be let go, lest we never experience such a sensation of belonging again. Future aspirations come to head with plans of fidelity and the person you are and the person you want to become begin to be at odds. With 6 Years, Hannah Fidell is able to poke her camera into the epicenter of a relationship at the structural crossroads of graduating from college as they differentiate the needs of the “me” versus the needs of the “us”. Read More

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Documentary Dossier: BEST OF ENEMIES

Best of Enemies gives a gripping account of the momentous ideological clash between William F. Buckley Jr. and Gore Vidal during the 1968 presidential primaries. In a bid for ratings, ABC (widely considered the “budget car rental of television news”) pitted conservative political commentator Buckley against Vidal, the creator of transsexual literary icon Myra Breckinridge and the one person (bar all communists) whom Buckley had sworn never to appear on screen with. Read More

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Out in Theaters: MISTRESS AMERICA

Noah Baumbach again arrives in auspicious fashion, delivering a fast-talking farcical bumblebee of a film whose honey is sweet and sting is bruising. It’s as much a diatribe about the fickle nature of youth as it is a pure slapstick comedy, featuring a humdinger of a hipster prophet in the form of a footloose Greta Gerwig. Baumbach’s latest is also decidedly his lightest, opting for a kind of 21st century update to the surrealist verisimilitude of “I Love Lucy” or a feminist take on “The Three Stooges” – that is, it’s his brand of “But ours goes to 11” absurd. Everything he and his characters touch upon is based in reality – on someone, on something, on somewhere – but is forcefully exaggerated in its screwy presentation. As such, Mistress America has allowed Baumbach and Gerwig to craft modern day archetypes – the awkwardly desirable nerd, the college-bound tabula rasa, the hipster goddess – and mock them to high heavens in pure unapologetically absurdist manner. Read More

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Documentary Dossier: MERU

“Everest is for f*cking p*ssies, man.” Not an actual quote from the film, but it might be a good one for you to slip in at the next kickback when the conversation inevitably shifts to what documentaries you and your significant other have been watching on Netflix and what you think of the new season of HBO’s (fill in the blank). Meru is about serious climber bros, dudes who casually remark they’ve been to the top of Everest “four or five times” and one of them has even “skied off the top of Everest.” Hell, when you weekend warriors climb Everest “you can hire Sherpas to take most of the risks.” (And those are actual quotes.) Read More

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Out in Theaters: FORT TILDEN

*This is a reprint of our SXSW 2014 review.

Remember when tying your shoes was an impossible chore? When you could only get places at the discretion of your mom’s minivan? When you didn’t know how to cook yourself a meal so you relied on someone else’s feeding hand so that you wouldn’t starve? These, among others, are lessons that Fort Tilden‘s anti-heroines never seemed to learn. Read More

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Out in Theaters: STRAIGHT OUTTA COMPTON

F. Gary Gray’s blimp rose alongside Ice Cube. In 1992, he directed Cube’s “It Was a Good Day” before directing the rapper-turned-actor’s cinematic debut Friday. He went on to carve a real name for himself at a ripe young age directing music videos for other black artists including Ice Cube homeboy and N.W.A. group member Dr. Dre, Tupac, Jay-Z and hip-hop supergroups Cypress Hill, TLC and Outkast. In 2003, Gray blew up the box office with a retelling of The Italian Job while his last film, Law Abiding Citizen, more blew up in his face. 6 years on, Gray has returned to Hollywood to aid in telling the tale of hip-hop superstar group N.W.A. (we’ll go by the innocent ignorance of Jerry Heller and pretend that’s the abbreviation for “No Whites Allowed) with Straight Outta Compton. Read More

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Out in Theaters: COP CAR

Succinctness in the contemporary thriller is a rare and precious virtue. In the case of Cop Car, the brute simplicity of the narrative and visuals make for a dread-filled, inexorable ride through an experience of unadulterated suspense and brutal humor. 

Cop Car begins innocently (though worryingly) enough: two pre-teens cross an empty expanse somewhere flat, sun-drenched and dry; one is reciting increasingly bad swear words, which the other repeats, laying out the dynamic of their relationship that will lead, inevitably, to what comes next. They spot an apparently abandoned cop car in a lonely copse and dare each other to get closer, until they are not only sitting in the front seats but driving it – slowly at first, then egging each other on to hit the 100mph mark. The film cuts to moments before: Kevin Bacon, who we learn is the sheriff, parks the same car where they will find it, and begins a bit of “cleanup” work just outside of hearing range; when he returns, the car is gone, and so the chase begins. Read More

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Out in Theaters: THE MAN FROM U.N.C.L.E.

Guy Ritchie is the Rembrandt of slick action capers. His signature twisty-turny plotting suggests a much more reined-in Shyamalan while his carefully syncopated, pop-art action beats share a locker with contemporaries Zack Snyder and Matthew Vaughn. From Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels to Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows, Ritchie has operated within a comparable sandbox, utilizing a very similar set of stock tools within shifting budgetary constraints. With The Man From U.N.C.L.E., Ritchie has set aside his signature accoutrements for something with an embarrassment of cinematic fervor. His latest creation is chic and classic, timely yet timeless, shiny on the surface with rich characters driving the engine underneath. This much fun is rare at the theaters. Read More

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Out in Theaters: PEOPLE, PLACES, THINGS

*This is a reprint of our 2015 Sundance review.

Having retired from his role as the Hiphopopotamus, Jemaine Clement frequents our living rooms and theaters all too infrequently. His 2014 cameo in Muppets Most Wanted didn’t nearly suffice to fill our favorite Kiwi quotient and we’ve yet to take in his lauded vampire comedy What We Do in the Shadows [Editor’s note: we’ve now seen Shadows. We loved it.] Nor can we really kid ourselves into believing that Clement’s existence beyond Flight of the Concords has been far-reaching – though his role as Boris the Animal was an easy highlight of Men in Black 3 and tapped into his unrealized Hollywood potential. So it’s with a heaving sigh of relief that we can announce that Clement has finally been given a role worthy of his gawky stature in the delightful, funny and tender People, Places, Things. Read More

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Out in Theaters: THE BOY

*This is a reprint of our SXSW 2015 review.

Ted (Jared Breeze) is a serial killer in the making. He’s only nine years old but all the warning signs are there in Craig William Macneill’s slow burning but explosively rewarding motion picture. Like the great unmade redneck prequel to The Good Son, The Boy shows the quiet transformation of ennui to psychosis as an immeasurably bored towhead graduates from coaxing animals to their death to killing them outright before finally setting his sights on his own genus and gene pool. Read More