An unhinged yet affectionate portrait of bad parenting from the Safdie Brothers.
Vivian Maier was a French-American photographer whose art, like many of the greats, only gained widespread success after her death. Most of her life was spent working as a maid for families in Chicago. Her masterpieces were only introduced to the world when the director of this documentary purchased a box of her negatives. This […]
A very touching film about Japanese children who are abandoned by their mother in their apartment and left on their own. It’s movie that perfectly encapsulates the world of kids and its alignment with this story is both heartbreaking and joyful. Their innocence will make you smile from ear to ear until moments come where you will shed tears. This is […]
A War (Krigen) is a Danish war drama that focuses on Commander Claus Pedersen (Pilou Asbæk) as he leads a company of soldiers in modern day Afghanistan, while his wife at home in Denmark struggles to care for their three children. During a mission to rescue a family from Taliban threat, Claus’ unit is overcome […]
A grizzly portrait of the cruel brutality of apartheid in 70s South Africa.
In About Lily Chou-Chou, two school teens, Yūichi (Hayato Ichihara) and Shūsuke (Shugo Oshinari), start out as friends who are obsessed with the music of Lily Chou-Chou. But when tragedy strikes, Shūsuke unexpectedly joins a gang and harasses his classmates, including Yūichi and their female friends. It’s a dark and challenging film, one that isn’t […]
The pervasiveness of misogyny and male violence in this black and white flick.
The first in famed Korean director Park Chan-wook’s Vengeance trilogy (after cult films Oldboy and Lady Vengeance), Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance follows a Ryu (Shin Ha-kyun), a deaf-mute man who resorts to crime when his ailing sister is in need of a kidney transplant. He decides to kidnap the daughter of a wealthy man named […]
The film for which Kristen Stewart became the first American actress to win the César Award. The Twilight star turned indie prodigy plays next to another award favorite, Juliette Binoche, as her assistant. When rehearsing for the play that launched her career many years earlier, Binoche’s character, Maria, blurs the line between fiction and reality, her […]
We Are the Best! is one movie that may be overlooked largely by viewers, though it perfectly captures counterculture, and relates to the misfit young and old. The movie is an adaptation of Moodysson’s wife Coco’s graphic novel “Never Goodnight”. Set in Stockholm, Sweden in 1982, Klara (Mira Grosin) and her best friend Bobo (Mira Barkhammar) are […]
A documentary about girls and young women in developing nations around the world facing and confronting a myriad of cultural pressures and injustices. The personal stories of nine girls are written by celebrated female writers from their individual countries (spanning The Americas, Africa and Asia), recreated in dramatic fashion by director Richard Robbins, and narrated […]
An affecting family drama that also asks questions about art, home, and mortality.
Kilo Two Bravo (Originally named Kajaki) is a must-watch for anyone who likes war dramas. It tells the true story of British soldiers in the Afghanistan war who find themselves trapped in a minefield during a mission, with their rescue team coming in a helicopter that might set off mines if it lands. It’s a slow, […]
Paul Thomas Anderson's first film is a small-scale crime drama with finely textured performances.
An intense and fantastically-performed film with probing questions that resonate with our times.
A somewhat repetitive but gloriously campy slice of Japanese superhero sci-fi.
Dario Argento returns to giallo horror in this ax murder mystery masterpiece.
A dark comedy about failed British terrorists that mixes accuracy with hilariousness .
Though it starts off somewhat slow, I was delightfully surprised at how much I loved this movie. A 28-year-old man ventures through Europe with a buddy, ending in Copenhagen, where he hopes to contact the last of his family. There he enlists a local girl to help him. An interesting relationship unfolds as they take […]
Man on Wire is a true technical masterpiece. You can almost feel the director telling the cameraman what angle to choose, or thinking about the questions that will generate the most resounding answers. However, this does not diminish the story this documentary tells one bit. It’s one that is glorious, riveting, and fun. It’s one […]
James Ivory’s coming-of-age drama examines not only who we fall in love with, but how we choose to love them—tenderly, honestly, wildly.
Elisabeth Moss is in it. Calling The One I Love a romantic-comedy, looking it up, or trusting anyone else about it — especially my review, will ruin this film for you. Just watch it. If one’s penchant is typically opposed to titles with ‘love’ in them, then it’s for you. Just hit ‘play’, or ‘start’, or whatever. The […]
An ambitious and absurdist series with a surprisingly humane touch.
Charlotte Rampling and Tom Courtenay both won Berlinale Best Actress and Best Actor for this movie. They play a couple who are only a few days away from their 45th marriage anniversary when they learn that the remains of the husband’s first lover have been found. He then starts obsessing about his previous relationship, to […]
An apartment building slowly scrambles into chaos in this unsettling psychological thriller.
This mesmerizing romance from Abbas Kiarostami follows a couple whose relationship transforms over the course of a day.
A black and white movie, A Coffee in Berlin is an early Woody Allen reminiscent film with a great emphasis on the emotions it handles. It flows naturally, telling the story of Niko, a young college dropout in a period of his life where he has to face loneliness and lack of money and success. He goes from […]
This is one of the most compelling and personal documentaries I’ve seen, revealing a side of life most people never consider. It’s the story of a young man recovering from a head injury and the obsession he’s developed with models and action figures. Not content with merely collecting, we see the man develop elaborate story-lines and plots between […]
The ultra-cool neon-lit crime thriller that helped shape the future of the genre.
Picked by Roger Ebert as the fifth best film of the decade. An observant, tender film about the little details in loneliness and then in relationships as we move through life. It’s funny, at times darkly so, and features a great performance by John Hawkes as Richard, an eccentric shoe salesman dealing with an ended marriage trying to turn his life […]
A sincere portrayal of the gritty British working class life through the coming-of-age story of a girl who loves rap music and dancing to it. It features a stunning and powerful performance from newcomer Katie Jarvis who had no acting experience whatsoever, and who was cast in the street after she was spotted fighting. She plays Mia, a 15 […]
