In the 1960s, the genre that would become known in Japan as pinku eiga had just taken shape. This was a genre that dealt explicitly…
Can an auteur just take the piss every now and then? There’s always something distinctly perverse and ultimately scintillating about major figures going minor. It’s…
Taking a look at a list of the 10 highest-grossing films worldwide of all-time, the suspects are usual: James Cameron sits there thrice, as does…
There’s an innate novelty to Ron Howard directing a film like Eden, and it’s disingenuous not to mention it. The filmmaker has by all reasonable…
Director David Mackenzie has had a fascinating career; in the past, we’d likely consider him a talented journeyman, the sort of solid professional who can…
“So it returns. Think you’re escaping and run into yourself. Longest way round is the shortest way home.” — James Joyce, Ulysses As the second…
Alex Russell’s debut feature, Lurker, is a mask-off exploration of rabid stan culture taken to extremes. When ascendant pop star Oliver (Archie Madekwe) walks into…
In all the consternation over the disappearance of the theatrical comedy, a trend hastened by post-Covid viewing habits that find comedies being largely relegated to…
Did you know that because 1985’s Red Sonja, which starred Brigitte Nielsen and Arnold Schwarzenegger, was not actively based on Conan creator Robert Howard’s character…
Carlos Reygadas’s Silent Light (2007) premiered at the Cannes Film Festival in 2007, where it won the Jury Prize, and has since remained one of…
“Trauma horror,” or “grief horror,” has become so ubiquitous that the subgenre has infiltrated even the most quotidian commercial horror films; it seems that the…
The Dead of Winter The cold is often a conduit for ardent symbolism, whether in the frozen recesses of repressed memories or in the merciless…
2021’s Nobody, which starred Bob Odenkirk as a suburban family man who is actually, basically, John Wick, was a breakout hit during the Covid days.…
In the late 1950s, Brazilian footballer Didi introduced a new technique for kicking the ball, the so called “dry leaf.” Much like a leaf falling…
Nisha Ganatra’s film Freakier Friday is the perfect case study in Disney’s endlessly stretchable IP. The idea for it all started with Mary Roger’s 1972…
“Welcome to the new West,” in which teenage rodeo riders with undercuts listen to cloud rap and horses are sold on TikTok. In East of…
It’s always fortuitous for a documentary filmmaker to find themselves able to capture seismic historical shifts as they are happening. But of course, this is…
Given the muted critical response and prolonged time period between its festival premiere and eventual (limited) distribution, the new Olivier Assayas film has apparently been…
While at 5’5” both he and Woody Allen are the same height, Roman Polanski stands tallest on the Mount Rushmore of reviled living filmmakers. As…
Dry Leaf Seeking to reduce a filmmaker’s chief thematic preoccupation is usually a waste of time, for any one worth their stuff works in a…