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[Sundance Review] The Intervention
2 hours ago
While The Big Chill certainly wasn’t the first of its kind, Lawrence Kasdan’s 1983 hit has become a cultural benchmark for the glut of features depicting a weekend outing between twenty/thirty-somethings in which insecurities are divulged amongst the entertaining banter. With their one-location setting and small-scale drama helping budget costs, Sundance seems to premiere a fair share of them. The latest is The Intervention, coming from actor-turned-director Clea DuVall, an enjoyable, if ultimately muddled character-focused diversion.
Jessie (DuVall) and her partner Sarah (Natasha Lyonne) have invited their friends to their family’s lavish summer home in Savannah in the hopes to confront Ruby (Cobie Smulders) and her work-obsessed, asshole of a husband Peter (Vincent Piazza) about getting a divorce so they can both have some peace. There to aid the intervention is also Annie (Melanie Lynskey), dealing with her own alcoholism and impending marriage to Matt (Jason Ritter »
- Jordan Raup
[Sundance Review] Lovesong
3 hours ago
Tender and haunting, So Yong Kim’s Lovesong is a carefully observed, nuanced character study beautifully written, directed and edited. Much of the action, like in her pervious features In Between Days, Treeless Mountain and For Ellen occurs at the edge of the frame. Exploring the bounds of motherhood, childhood and maturity (as she has in Treeless Mountain and For Ellen), Lovesong is an impressive and observant feature which Kim allows the relationships the breathing room they require for authenticity.
Riley Keough stars as Sarah, a young mother who married young. The director’s own daughters Jessie Ok and Sky Ok Gray, play daughter Jessie at ages 3 and 6, respectively. Lonely and transplanted to the suburbs from the city by her absent husband Dean (played by filmmaker Cary Joji Fukunaga in a Skype cameo), she finds herself on the edge of depression. An old college friend Mindy (Jenna Malone) re-enters her »
- John Fink
[Sundance Review] Agnus Dei
4 hours ago
Captured on cinema since it commenced, if a filmmaker doesn’t find a new angle in which tell the horrors of World War II, then it can perhaps seem like a futile effort. Agnus Dei, the latest film from Coco Before Chanel director Anne Fontaine, digs up such an example of a compelling, true story from Philippe Maynial. Its title, translated as Lamb of God from its Latin origin, most commonly refers to the sacrificial giving that Jesus offers. However, specifically in the Old Testament, it can refer to a person who succumbs to the punishment of sins without willing to do so, which is clearly where Fontaine more specifically draws from.
We begin in December 1945, a few months after World War II ended, and its effects are perhaps being most felt in a secluded convent outside of Warsaw, Poland. It’s there where an outfit of Soviet soldiers raped the nuns during the war, »
- Jordan Raup
[Sundance Review] Ali and Nino
4 hours ago
There is nary a film genre more tried and true than the war-time romance. From Casablanca to Doctor Zhivago to The English Patient, the structure allows for a micro conflict injected into a macro scenario. From a script by Christopher Hampton (Dangerous Liasons, Atonement), adapted from the novel under the pseudonym Kurban Said, and directed by Asif Kapadia (Senna, Amy), Ali and Nino strives for the status of epic but falls considerably short.
Starring Adam Bakri as Ali Khan Shirvanshir, a young Muslim Azerbaijani man who falls in love with Nino Kipiani (María Valverde), a Georgian princess, the film is set in and around Baku, the capital city of Azerbaijan on the brink of the Bolshevik Revolution. The couple hopes to marry quickly, but the rumblings of war postpone everything. Nino’s parents (Mandy Patinkin and a woefully-miscast Connie Nielsen) are convinced the conflict will be over in months. Ali won’t have it, »
- Dan Mecca
[Sundance Review] Kiki
4 hours ago
Ball culture is alive and well in New York. Though the practice of young gay and trans people of color organizing themselves into Houses of support and meeting in dance and costume competitions has by no means entered the mainstream in the years since Paris is Burning brought popular attention to the scene, the participants have strengthened their place in their communities. It’s neither under nor wholly above ground — mostly normalized. One can go to a daytime vogueing class, and House members daylight as social justice activists. For all the progress America has made in Lgbtq rights, this subculture remains a vital refuge for many who have been otherwise alienated because of their sexuality or gender identity.
Director Sara Jordenö, a Swedish visual artist, made Kiki in collaboration with Twiggy Pucci Garçon, a self-described gatekeeper of the Kiki scene. Co-credited as screenwriters, it’s easy to picture Garçon leading »
- Daniel Schindel
[Sundance Review] Unlocking the Cage
4 hours ago
Revered documentarian duo Chris Hegedus and D. A. Pennebaker have been in the game long enough that putting together a reasonably engaging piece of work on an unlikely subject is old hat. In the same way, there have been enough documentaries about animal rights that audiences can accept nonhuman cognition and interiority as a given, without much need to rehash old scientific evidence. This is backed up in Unlocking the Cage, which includes a scene in which the characters discover a survey which shows that more than half of Americans believe to some degree that animals deserve at least some of the rights that come with personhood, rather than being relegated to the status of things for humans to do with as they please. In a straightforward but effective way, Hegedus and Pennebaker chronicle a multiyear effort to launch the first court case on behalf of a chimpanzee.
The lead character is Steve Wise, »
- Daniel Schindel
[Sundance Review] The Illinois Parables
4 hours ago
In 11 chapters occupying a mere hour’s running time, The Illinois Parables biographizes the namesake state from prehistory to the present. Each segment is tied to a specific town or locale in Illinois — which, as the official descriptions of the film assert, is “often called a miniature version of America.” This idea might best be summed up by the first chapter, in which a black man in Native American garb performs a traditional song in front of a pre-Columbian earthen mound. That thread of mixing cultures continues through stories of displacement and resettlement. It’s present both in chapters about the Trail of Tears and about the death of Joseph Smith. With geographical fixtures as its focal points, Deborah Stratman’s experimental documentary browses how people unite around narratives tied to places.
We learn of how the town of Nauvoo, established by migrating Mormons in 1839, was a colony of the Icarians, »
- Daniel Schindel
[Sundance Review] Tickled
4 hours ago
New Zealand entertainment reporter David Farrier discovered possibly the oddest conspiracy to yet feature in nonfiction film. Farrier came across Internet videos of “competitive endurance tickling,” in which strapping young men are strapped to chairs and ceaselessly tickled by other strapping young men. When he reached out to the company behind the videos for a story about the “sport,” he was met with a bafflingly vicious response, full of homophobic attacks and legal threats. Naturally, this only aroused Farrier’s curiosity further, and he set out to uncover just who was behind these poorly disguised fetish videos. In the process, he and co-director Dylan Reeve unravel an escalatingly bizarre web of intrigue.
I’m generally in the bag for documentary material this weird, but Tickled too often gets in its own way. Though it makes sense that Farrier centers the narrative on himself as the main character, digging through the truth, »
- Daniel Schindel
[Sundance Review] The Lovers and the Despot
4 hours ago
It’s astonishing that the story of Shin Sang-ok and Choi Eun-hee has not made it onto movie screens before now, whether as a documentary or a work of fiction. In 1978 Shin, a South Korean film director, and Choi, his actress ex-wife, were both kidnapped by North Korean agents and taken to Pyongyang on the direct order of Kim Jong-il. The brutal dictator was also a dedicated cinephile, and he was displeased with the quality of his state’s film industry. For a real-life supervillain, the obvious solution to such a problem was to abduct some outside talent and put it to work.
Shin and Choi spent years being imprisoned and constantly surveilled, ultimately making films for Kim and even falling back in love before making a dramatic vehicular escape in Austria. Every single element reads like it sprung from the mind of a Hollywood hack. And yet it all happened. »
- Daniel Schindel
[Sundance Review] Spa Night
4 hours ago
I firmly believe that we’ll know the representation gap in American entertainment will have been closed not when the prestige dramas featuring minorities are getting their fair Oscar shake, but when people don’t bat an eye at the most banal films of every possible category just happening to be about people of color and/or Lgbt individuals and/or whatever else. In that respect, Spa Night is ahead of its time. Instead of being an indie film about a disaffected young white man adrift in the world, it’s an indie film about a disaffected young closeted Korean man adrift in the world. As such, it’s mostly content to adhere to all the expected conventions of the genre, but its choice of main character and setting does indeed set it apart from the rest of its ilk, if only marginally so.
That said, some of the best »
- Daniel Schindel
[Sundance Review] Frank & Lola
20 hours ago
Frank & Lola, a noirish erotic thriller from journalist-turned-director Matthew M. Ross, finds leads Michael Shannon and Imogen Poots in top form. They excel as lovers in this tightly-wound psychosexual love story that has elements of the best of Eyes Wide Shut.
Frank (Shannon) is a high-flying chef working in top-end restaurants in Las Vegas. At the bar of his establishment he meets Poots’ Lola as she glides into his bar, and director Ross sets the scene by opening the film on the ensuing sex, a moody awkward sequence that heightens a sense of menace behind these beautiful starlets.
As time passes, Frank grows ever-conscious of the age gap between them both, and has suspicions about a rich younger man (Justin Long) who offers Lola a dream job at a fashion outlet. Soon his worst fears are confirmed, as Lola returns home one night in tears, admitting to a one night »
- Ed Frankl
In a Lonely Place: On Wim Wenders’ Road Movie Trilogy
23 hours ago
In his 1969 short film 3 American LP’s, the 24-year-old Wim Wenders, in the kind of feat of earnestness that can befit a young man, attempts to match his two greatest interests” America’s landscapes and its rock-and-roll music. If we’re to pick perhaps the most endearing eye-roller from this “rockist” mission statement, one can look no further than Wenders describing a Creedence Clearwater Revival album as being “like chocolate.”
But this isn’t necessarily an atypical moment in his filmography, as Wenders has always skirted the line of, for lack of a better word, corniness — if not just telegraphing his influences to at-times-obnoxious degrees, also with a kind of sentimentality both formally and politically speaking. Consider Wings of Desire‘s glossy look, which could so easily be reconfigured into a perfume-commercial aesthetic, or even just the title of one of his later, forgotten films; The End of Violence.
Yet »
- Ethan Vestby
New to Streaming: ‘The Assassin,’ ‘Crimson Peak,’ ‘Hearts Of Darkness,’ and More
29 January 2016 9:27 AM, PST
With a seemingly endless amount of streaming options — not only the titles at our disposal, but services themselves — we’ve taken it upon ourselves to highlight the titles that have recently hit the interwebs. Every week, one will be able to see the cream of the crop (or perhaps some simply interesting picks) of streaming titles (new and old) across platforms such as Netflix, iTunes, Amazon Instant Video, and more (note: U.S. only). Check out our rundown for this week’s selections below.
The Assassin (Hou Hsiao-Hsien)
If the meditative stylings of Russian auteur Andrei Tarkovsky were applied to the martial arts genre, the end result would likely resemble Hou Hsiao-hsien’s rapturous tone poem The Assassin. As much concerned with the essence of nature as it is the essence of humanity, this endlessly beautiful film is equal parts enigmatic storytelling as it is purely enthralling cinema. Though »
- TFS Staff
French New Wave Director Jacques Rivette Dies at 87; Explore a Late Master’s Work
29 January 2016 8:26 AM, PST
If I could properly describe the experience of discovering Jacques Rivette‘s films, I’d compare it to entering a room — a big one; sometimes a very big one — in which a conspiratorial game of deception and obfuscation is already underway between a group of handsome men and beautiful women. (Mostly the latter; sometimes only the latter.) While most directors ask you to sit and observe, you’re here invited to nestle somewhere between spectator and active participant, a patron whose close observation compensates for (or enhances) the fact that the plot doesn’t make total sense and associations between players requires some inference. By the time it ends, you’ll (ideally) come away with, if nothing else, the sense that something thoroughly, almost aggressively different has taken place — a mix of “well, what happened there?” with the desire to enter once more. And then again, and then again, and then again. »
- Nick Newman
NYC Weekend Watch: ‘Koyaanisqatsi,’ ‘The Shining’ Remix, Agnès Varda, Coen Brothers & More
28 January 2016 8:28 PM, PST
Since any New York cinephile has a nearly suffocating wealth of theatrical options, we figured it’d be best to compile some of the more worthwhile repertory showings into one handy list. Displayed below are a few of the city’s most reliable theaters and links to screenings of their weekend offerings — films you’re not likely to see in a theater again anytime soon, and many of which are, also, on 35mm. If you have a chance to attend any of these, we’re of the mind that it’s time extremely well-spent.
Museum of the Moving Image
Koyaanisqatsi kicks off “See It Big! Documentary” on Friday. Saturday brings the follow-up, Powaqqatsi, as well as Robert Flaherty‘s Louisiana Story. Close out Reggio’s trilogy with a Sunday screening of Naqoyatsi.
Labyrinth screens on Sunday, but is currently listed as being sold-out.
Spectacle
You’ve probably heard about The »
- Nick Newman
[Sundance Review] Yoga Hosers
28 January 2016 4:57 PM, PST
They may be “red and white and never blue” and they may “not even supposed to be here today,” but the clerks of Eh-2-Zed are certainly having an abnormal adolescence. Yoga Hosers marks the second film in Kevin Smith’s True North series, an American parody of Canada that may repay the favor for American Venus, Bruce Sweeney’s rare Canadian send-up of American values. This is certainly reading too much into the film, even if Smith takes the joke a little too far. There’s only so many times you can parody the pronunciation of the letter “o” as “eh.”
By all measures our heroines, the Colleens (Harley Quinn Smith and Lily-Rose Depp), are regular North American teens. Constantly on their phones, they dream of going to “grade 12” parties with cute boys even if they plan on stealing their souls. The girls practice yoga in a strip mall »
- John Fink
Kathryn Bigelow to Direct Mark Boal-Scripted Detroit Riots Drama This Summer
28 January 2016 3:59 PM, PST
With no shortage of potential projects lined up, it looked liked Kathryn Bigelow and Mark Boal would follow up Zero Dark Thirty with another recent military story, that of the former Pow Bowe Bergdahl. As the new season of Serial dives into the controversy surrounding his detainment and release, with the help of Boal’s recordings, there’s still much more of that story to be uncovered as his court-martial was pushed to the summer. In the meantime, the writer and director duo have found their next project.
Backed by Megan Ellison‘s Annapurna, they are going to be making a movie about the 1967 riots in Detroit. Exploring the racism that resulted in the five-day riots that left 43 people dead, nearly 1,200 injured, and over 2,000 establishments destroyed, it should be quite a big scope for Bigelow, depending how she wishes to the tell the story, which is scripted by Boal after over a year of research. »
- Jordan Raup
Watch: 1.5-Hour Talk With Christopher Nolan, Alex Ross Perry, and More on the Future of Film
28 January 2016 3:28 PM, PST
They may be on different sides of the budgetary spectrum, but Christopher Nolan and Alex Ross Perry (Listen Up Phillip, Queen of Earth) share a mutual deep appreciation for film, opting to use it over digital in their features. Joined by fellow celluloid enthusiasts Jurassic World director Colin Trevorrow and cinematographer Rachel Morrison (Dope, Fruitvale Station), they all sat down for a 1.5-hour talk at the 2016 Sundance Film Festival today to discuss the art of film, and it’s now online in full.
Touching on a wide range of topics within the over-arching subject, they discuss film schools, piracy, the future of exhibition, conspiracies to kill film, the importance of having children grow up seeing movies shot on film, the horrors of motion smoothing, and much more, it’s a great chat with some added humor from Perry. Nolan even calls out the press who jumped on a botched press screening for The Hateful Eight, »
- Jordan Raup
[Sundance Review] The Hollars
28 January 2016 3:11 PM, PST
The premise is worryingly familiar. A handsome young man named John Hollar (John Krasinski), currently in a rut, is told by his pregnant girlfriend Becca (Anna Kendrick) that he has to go home because his mother Sally (Margo Martindale) is in the hospital.
Once home, we meet John’s brother Ron (Sharlto Copley, over-the-top but charmingly so) and weepy father Don (Richard Jenkins). Jason (Charlie Day), the nurse treating his mother, happens to be the man who married John’s high school girlfriend Gwen (Mary Elizabeth Winstead). Oh, and Don’s heat & oil business is on the verge of bankruptcy.
Written and directed by Krasinski (his second feature following Brief Interviews With Hideous Men), the convenient plot and archetypal characters work well enough thanks to strong performances and an earnest script from James C. Strouse, who wrote and directed the lovable People, Places, Things from last year.
Casting himself in the lead role, »
- Dan Mecca
[Slamdance Review] Chemical Cut
28 January 2016 3:09 PM, PST
A wise woman named Sheryl Crow once said, “a change will do you good.” For Irene, a pretty 23-year old-ish artistically inclined misfit, it’s as simple as a haircut.
A scathing critique of the modeling industry as a search for belonging and friendship turns into an absurd and at times cringe-inducing comedy, Chemical Cut is a fresh feature written, directed, edited and staring Marjorie Conrad, a former contestant on America’s Top Model. Parodying a world where artists and models are expected to work for free — often in uncomfortable, morally compromising positions for a “resume item” — the parody emerges into a disturbing psychological drama as Irene is pushed to the brink.
We meet Irene as she works full time in a Los Angeles boutique. She spends her evenings hanging out with her Gbf Arthur (Ian Coster), an aspiring novelist who ultimately decides to travel abroad for his Mfa. Growing »
- John Fink
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