As a movie star, Gerard Butler owns January like Will Smith owns Memorial Day and the Meg movies own August. That Butler’s B-grade thrillers now dominate frozen oblivion at the box office in the first weeks of the year may seem like a Pyrrhic victory, but at least he’s king. Something. And Butler’s gruff, beady-eyed, … Read more
It takes a while on “a beautiful evening, a beautiful day” to reach Baren Island, a notorious penal colony in the former Yugoslavia, where no cells were needed and armed guards counted on the sea to keep the prisoners in line. However, a prison without bars reveals itself early in writer-director Ivona Jukka’s stark and … Read more
In his second theatrical feature, Mehran Modiri, one of Iran’s most beloved satirical TV comedians, turns his hand to the thriller genre, with mixed results. He writes, directs and performs in the intense and increasingly contrived social issues thriller “6 AM,” in which a small incident escalates into a major tragedy. Although this independent feature … Read more
Arguably one of the most insufferable characters in literature is the main character in Johann Wolfgang Goethe’s novel The Sorrows of Young Werther – a martyr of unrequited love who ultimately commits suicide. The author quickly distanced himself from this early work, despite the fame it brought him. There is no doubt that this is … Read more
In Rusudan Glogidze’s winter sophomore film “Vintage,” the title could refer to any number of withered relics: the beautiful, richly antique pieces of furniture that Georgian émigré Medea (Salome Demoria) illegally imports from her home country to Russia to sell; The once large but disintegrating apartment in St. Petersburg that she bought at a discount … Read more
An entertaining wedding switcheroo, “Laapataa Ladies” (or “Lost Ladies” in some areas) makes effective use of Bollywood’s broad social messaging. This style of storytelling can be clunky in order to draw in audiences, but director Kiran Rao deftly combines the literal and the symbolic, resulting in the audience being filled – for better or worse … Read more
Long before Peter Jackson screened The Lord of the Rings, audiences got a glimpse into the fantasy world of J. R. R. Tolkien through a trio of late-1970s animation projects: two Rankin/Bass animated television specials (of which no “The Hobbit” (still a fairly popular film) is a dark and ominous big picture directed by Ralph … Read more
Looking back seems to offer insight into the future in “The Hungarian Tailor,” Iveta Gruvova’s compelling adaptation of Peter Krzystovec’s novella “Emma and the Death’s Head” set in Slovakia during World War II. At that time, local residents had to navigate uncharted territory of authoritarianism, when the far-right Slovak People’s Party came to power (…)
With Lake George, Jeffrey Reiner makes his first independent film as a writer and director since the 1990s, after a quarter century of directing small-screen projects. The director cited formative viewing of classic film noir on television as an inspiration, but this twisted tale feels more like the late Ross Macdonald’s melancholic fairy tales – … Read more
The plague of missing and murdered indigenous women, long ignored and underappreciated across North America, has become more widely recognized in recent years, thanks to the depiction of awareness in everything from episodic television shows to feature films to award-winning documentaries. Awards. But rarely has barbarism been shown so brutally and poignantly as in “Missing … Read more
I’m perfectly capable of enjoying the Lindsay Lohan Netflix rom-com. Last year, I liked the song “Irish Wish” and had a remix because of it. (I’m on the side of affection.) But “Our Little Secret,” Lohan’s new Christmas romantic comedy, is crumpled tinsel of a different order. I’m inclined to say it achieves the complete … Read more
The Thai blockbuster How to Make Millions Before Grandma Dies is an emotional comedy-drama that blends filial piety and greedy schemes to a multi-faceted conclusion. Filled with family complications, the film revolves around a sluggish young adult who leaves his not-so-prosperous toy-picking career to care for his terminally ill grandmother. The smoothly crafted and leisurely … Read more