\’The Brutalist\’ Review: A Dense Historical Epic About the Difficulties of Making Art

Reviews /

It’s been weeks, and there are images from Brady Corbet\’s The Brutalist that haven’t left me. It’s an exquisitely crafted film, shot with care on VistaVision, a largely obsolete 35mm film format that hadn’t been used in the full production of a movie in decades. This is a large, dense film. In a strange way, it reminds me somewhat of Francis Ford Coppola’s Megalopolis but without the camp and bad green screen. It’s audacious, ambitious, visually distinctive, and structurally unique. Like Megalopolis, The Brutalist is an American epic. It’s about an architect, a visionary, and in many ways, it’s about filmmaking itself—art-making itself—and the ways that art interacts with commerce, the obstacles and sheer manpower that it takes to erect a building or create something like a film. It’s also an immigrant story, about people who come to America to build monuments and achieve the greatness promised by the American Dream. I still don’t know what to fully make of The Brutalist, but I do know that it’s been haunting my brain ever since we walked out of the Paramount Theatre in Austin, where we had the pleasure of seeing it projected on 35mm. The experience was fantastic, and seeing a movie that was shot on film projected on film is, bar none, one of the best ways to experience a movie like this. It not only looked amazing, but the material quality of the projection made it feel like watching the past come to life, which is exactly what you want in a historical drama. Set in the post-war period, the movie follows László Tóth (Adrien Brody at his best), a Hungarian-Jewish architect, the titular brutalist, who makes his way to Philadelphia to build a life after being separated from his wife Erzsébet (Felicity Jones) and orphaned niece Zsófia (Raffey Cassidy), who are still in Europe after the Holocaust. There, his life becomes entangled with rich industrialist Harrison Lee Van Buren (Guy Pearce), who recognizes his talent for building and gives him a project. The film is structured in two parts, with a built-in 15-minute intermission in between, as well as an overture and an epilogue to bookend the whole endeavor. Structurally and formally, it\’s one of the most striking movies I’ve seen in a long time. The use of a near-forgotten film format, the length and distinct two-part structure, the inclusion of an intermission—all of these elements are a kind of cinematic brutalism, emulating in a way the architectural movement that gives the movie its title. Brutalism was and is an architectural movement borne out of the tumultuous mid-century, a reaction directly in response to modernism and post-war architecture. The name is largely thought to have come from the French term, “béton brut,” meaning “raw concrete.” Concrete is one of the staples of brutalism, which was largely centred around creating functional buildings out of sturdy and cheap materials, left unadorned to expose their material qualities. The principles of brutalism emphasized simplicity, structure, and material honesty. At its inception, it was built on a utopian ideal of utilitarianism. As a movement, brutalism was short-lived and has something of a contentious legacy, with its large concrete structures often deemed cold and ugly. Its legacy is, however, far-reaching, found in everything from Soviet housing blocks to underground transit systems to city halls and libraries and cultural centres around the world. Personally, I find a lot of brutalist architecture to be beautiful in its own way. Brutalism is a blank canvas and an open question. It’s both utopian and dystopian, minimalist and maximalist, all at once. It’s confrontational. Of course, it was doomed to fail. Of course, it fell out of favour. But the best architecture, like the best cinema, invites you in, asks you to make your own interpretation, makes you feel something. That\’s exactly how I experienced The Brutalist. I was captivated and moved by it. I was left with an open question. I realize I’ve said little about the actual movie so far, but it\’s a movie that I don\’t think I can really do justice by simply telling you about it. It’s not a perfect film. The first half moves and breathes more fluidly than the second half, which gets a bit lost in the fog of its own ambition, somewhat akin to Tóth himself. But I can say that I was never bored during its three-and-a-half-hour runtime, which is a rare feat. Adrien Brody also gives what is surely one of the best performances of the year, while Guy Pearce steals almost every scene he’s in. There’s beauty, humour, and darkness here in spades. In fact, some beats are bleak to the point of almost being borderline melodramatic, but the film somehow never buckles under the weight of those choices. If the end result has its rough edges, like raw concrete, the whole of it—long and dense and difficult, but still beautiful and balanced—is something you can’t help but admire. Verdict The Brutalist is big, bold, and beautiful. I loved so much about it, and I haven\’t stopped thinking about it since leaving the theatre. It\’s one of the most beautifully shot films I\’ve seen all year, and it takes big swings in a way that I can\’t help but respect. If you want a sweeping historical epic about people in all their flawed humanity trying to build things that will leave their mark on the world, portrayed by some of the best actors we\’ve got, then this is one movie you don\’t want to miss.

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\’The Order\’ Review: Jude Law\’s Neo-Nazi Docudrama Is One of the Best Cat-And-Mouse Crime Thrillers of the Year

Reviews /

The Order was one of the biggest surprises of AFF for me. I went into it with no expectations, not really knowing anything about it. What I got was one of the tightest crime dramas of the year so far. Of director Justin Kurzel’s previous work, I’d only seen his gritty, brooding adaptation of Macbeth, starring Michael Fassbender. Most of the rest of his filmography consists of smaller films set in his native Australia and probably his most high-profile film, the poorly received Assassin’s Creed adaptation from 2016. Likewise, screenwriter Zach Baylin’s previous credits include the Oscar-nominated King Richard alongside films like this year’s The Crow reboot and Bob Marley: One Love. All in all, a mixed bag, so you’d be forgiven for going into The Order with some trepidation. I assure you, however, it’s well worth your time. Set in the 1980s, the film is based on true events, following the FBI’s investigation into a white supremacist group, called The Order, behind a string of increasingly violent crimes with the goal of eventually overthrowing the US government. Jude Law plays the aging FBI agent in charge of the investigation, opposite Nicholas Hoult as Bob Matthews, the icy and persistent leader of The Order. If the plot sounds familiar or particularly resonant with recent history in America—well, it is. I was, personally, unfamiliar with the events depicted in the movie, so watching it was pretty eye-opening. I couldn’t believe that I had never heard about The Order or their crimes, some of which were quite high-profile and led to one of the largest manhunts in FBI history.   Impressively, the movie manages to stay propulsive and entertaining without sensationalizing or diminishing the weight of the events it depicts. For having such dark, frighteningly relevant subject matter, it toes that line very well. Maybe it’s that I had just watched another gritty cat-and-mouse thriller in Dirty Harry earlier during the festival, but The Order felt like it had the sensibilities of a 70s procedural, despite its 80s setting. It’s stylistic without being flashy, dark and naturalistic, straightforward but still propulsive and thrilling. I’ve been a fan of Nicholas Hoult’s since I was a Skins-obsessed teenager (shout out to my other formerly Skins-obsessed girlies), but I’ll readily admit he’s been a fairly under-the-radar presence since breaking out into bigger film roles. He’s never bad, but he’s never particularly stood out, either. But here, he is chillingly good as a racist insurrectionist, giving what is undoubtedly a career-best performance so far (this one edges out his performance in Juror #2 for me, though he\’s very good there too in a different kind of moral tale). Law is also fantastic as the down-and-out, mustachioed Agent Husk, in what might also be one of his best performances to date, making a role that could easily fall into tropey familiarity feel lived-in. Even the supporting cast is excellent, particularly Jurnee Smollett and Tye Sheridan, who both bring a lot of pathos to characters that might otherwise feel surface-level. I wasn’t expecting to be so moved by this film, yet I was. The movie’s action sequences—shootouts and robberies and an unforgettable final raid in a smoldering house—stand out as thrilling set pieces. But the film also effectively conveys the weight of collateral damage amidst all that violence. While there are clear bad guys and good guys here, given one side is made up of militant neo-Nazis, the movie draws some interesting parallels between its two leads. In particular, it draws a line between the sacrifices that are inevitably made in dogged pursuit of a single-minded obsession—whether it’s pursuit of an ideological conviction or of justice. Husk’s career of chasing criminals has cost him his family and his health, and over the course of the movie, we see Sheridan’s overzealous rookie cop character increasingly buy into Husk’s determined approach, almost “indoctrinated,” as screenwriter Zach Baylin put it in the post-film Q&A at AFF, in parallel to Matthews\’ indoctrination of his disciples and his children. Of course, Sheridan’s Jamie is driven by his moral compass and a desire to protect his family, wanting to make the world a little safer for his biracial child. But in a strange way, family is also what Bob Matthews offers to his followers—a twisted form of acceptance and community, ironically based around a hateful and destructive ideology. For all his talk of brotherhood and family, however, he’s selfishly obsessed with furthering his own bloodline, at the expense of his wife and their adopted children. The explosive and unnatural violence that\’s borne out of his commitment to his cause stands in stark contrast with the vast and natural beauty of the film\’s Pacific Northwest landscape (gorgeously shot by DP Adam Arkapaw). These larger thematic threads all give the film some depth, despite what is largely a by-the-book narrative. Ultimately, there’s nothing revolutionary here (how many times have we seen the ‘grizzled detective with skeletons in his closet’ trope before?), but the movie accomplishes what it sets out to accomplish remarkably well. It’s tightly paced, with beautiful cinematography and excellent action sequences, and tells a story that’s both emotionally and historically resonant. Verdict If you’re looking for an old-school meat-and-potatoes historical crime thriller about cops and neo-Nazi robbers, The Order fits the bill perfectly. While some of the supporting characters are thinly drawn, the movie is bolstered by standout performances, propulsive action, beautiful cinematography, and a story pulled from one of the many dark chapters in American history, one that’s in many ways still being written.

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September 5 Review — A Tense Look at the Munich Crisis Through the Eyes of the Media

Reviews /

The last of my coverage from the Austin Film Festival (AFF) is with this review for the upcoming film, September 5.  September 5 was co-written and directed by Tim Fehlbaum, a Swiss film director in his first mainstream feature film. Moritz Binder and Alex David join Tim as co-writers.  The film chronicles the 1972 Munich Olympic hostage crisis, but what makes this movie more unique is that it’s all from the perspective of the ABC Sports crew that was managing one of the first ever live coverage broadcasts.  The cast that fills out that ABC Sports crew is an impressive one that includes Peter Sarsgaard (Jarhead, Batman 2022) and John Magaro (The Big Short). The supporting cast includes Ben Chaplin, Leonie Benesch, and Zinedine Soualem among others!  So, should you tune in to September 5 or change the channel?  My Thoughts  September 5 is a solid movie that did a lot of things right. First of all, I was completely unfamiliar with the 1972 Munich Olympic hostage crisis and if you don’t know much about that incident, I assume the movie is a bit more compelling overall to you. With that said, the strength of the movie isn’t really in the hostage crisis itself, but the ABC Sports team that is in Munich to cover the Olympics.  I really enjoyed this perspective as a way to make the movie feel a bit more unique than other movies like it. The added layer is that they were first a sports crew and not a news team, but also that this incident was a first of its kind with live footage being broadcast during the crisis itself. Something we’re all too familiar with in 2024.  While this offers an interesting perspective, it’s also a pretty big risk because almost all of the movie takes place in the building the ABC crew is broadcasting from and so you can’t place the audience anywhere in the crisis itself, except for what the live cameras can show us in the room.  I definitely think this risk pays off for the most part, especially towards the end of the movie. Without giving away any spoilers, as the hostage crisis concludes, the final location is completely dark both literally and in the sense that there are no cameras to really see what is happening. If, like me, you had no idea how the hostage crisis ends, you and the news team are left in the same position, wondering what is happening and struggling to balance reports about what actually occurred.  Regardless of the narrative, for a movie like this to succeed, the cast needs to be incredibly strong, and they certainly were. The biggest standout for me was definitely John Magaro, who was effectively running the live coverage from the control room. His character starts his shift with some questions floating around about his qualifications to even call the coverage for the Olympics, but then as the hostage crisis unfolds, he’s forced to make some major decisions that will be seen by millions around the world. He really does carry the bulk of the movie on his shoulders, but everyone around him (especially Peter Sarsgaard, Ben Chaplin, and Leonie Benesch) does a fantastic job as their characters challenge and support him throughout the crisis.  With all of that said though, the movie really struggled to elevate itself to something truly great for me. I did see this in the middle of a full day at AFF, but the movie ultimately struggled a bit with the pacing. I just felt a lack of momentum, especially as the ending built more to a confusing and unclear moment instead of something more concrete. This makes sense given that the ABC Sports crew was in the same boat as the audience is in terms of not knowing, but it just struggled a bit to build and maintain momentum for me. This is definitely part of the downside of the risk I mentioned earlier about keeping the focus so tightly on the ABC crew, when there were moments occuring that would have been more interesting to see outside the control room. To be clear, I\’m not making a case of \”Oh the movie would have been more interesting if it did something differently,\”. Firstly, because I\’m not sure that\’s even true, but more importantly I don\’t really believe in that kind of criticism. The idea that a movie is different than what you wanted or expected and is therefore not as good, is very hollow criticism to me. What I mean here is that I found my mind being more drawn to what\’s actually happening in the crisis while the movie was trying to make me more compelled by what was happening in the control room. While I found the conflict in the control room interesting, it still wasn\’t as interesting as the conflict they were covering. One thing I also feel compelled to mention is the apparent controversy that is already brewing ahead of the film\’s wide release. For those unaware, without spoiling the movie at all, the hostages that were taken were Israeli coaches and athletes and they were taken by Palestinian terrorists. When I went to log the film on Letterboxd (you can follow Adriana and I on there) the top review said “I’m sorry, but it felt like watching Israeli propaganda.” Further, there was speculation that the film was rejected from the Toronto International Film Festival because of the ongoing Israeli and Palestinian conflict.  For what it’s worth, I do disagree with the idea that this feels like Israeli propaganda, but it’s obviously hard to not think about the movie while ignoring the ongoing conflict. I think the movie itself is very focused on the time and the situation and it never felt preachy to me or anything like that either. It was very much about the ABC Sports crew and them having to pivot and cover the crisis. The text blurbs that appeared at the end

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Operation Taco Gary’s — A Road Trip Movie with Conspiracies, Comedy, and a Few Bumps Along the Way

Reviews /

Our coverage of the movies we saw at the Austin Film Festival keeps moving along! This time I’m talking about Operation Taco Gary’s. Written and directed by Michael Kvamme, this comedy is a throwback to comedies of the early 2000s, even going so far as to cast Jason Biggs of American Pie fame. The two leads of the film are Simon Rex as Danny and Dustin Milligan as Luke, two brothers that share very little common ground when it comes to the way the world works. So, is this road trip comedy a nostalgic joyride or does it run out of gas? My Thoughts There’s definitely some laughs to be had with Operation Taco Gary’s! The setup is simple, as Luke is getting ready to leave and start his new chapter in Ottawa, to pursue a new job opportunity. Before he leaves, his brother Danny arrives, who is a big time conspiracy theorist and as they hit the road together, it appears that there might be more to these conspiracies than Luke thought. First, we gotta touch on the cast! Simon Rex definitely stood out the most, but Dustin Milligan was solid as well as the co-lead and the audience surrogate for the movie. The supporting cast here is great though too, with Brenda Song, Tony Cavalero (who is hilarious in this and the HBO series Righteous Gemstones), the previously mentioned Jason Biggs, and the amazing Doug Jones. A solid cast is key to a good comedy and writer/director Michael Kvamme definitely had plenty to work with here! Another thing that I liked about this movie was the way it actually handled the comedy around the conspiracy theorists in the movie. I found that the movie really balances the idea of laughing at and with the conspiracy theorist characters, which makes it more accessible to anyone and avoids the trap of just repeatedly mocking these kinds of people. It also manages to avoid feeling too much “of its time” by not being hyper focused on the conspiracies of the current era and takes a more creative approach to develop more unique conspiracies for the world of the movie, even if they take some inspiration from the real world occasionally. The best parts of the movie were a couple sequences in particular that really stood out, including a chase scene through the woods that had the audience at our screening in Austin cringing and laughing in equal measure. In fact, the highest points of the movie for me happened earlier in different scenes that took place in the woods. This hurt the movie a little for me on a pacing level, just because I laughed the hardest before the midpoint of the movie at a couple different sequences that they never really were able to top in the back half of the movie. On that note, I think the shortfalls of the movie fittingly were a lot of the shortfalls of the early 2000s era comedies. The narrative thread that is propelling the characters forward isn’t the most engaging, for example. It also has a particular brand of humour woven in throughout the movie that just didn’t land with me as consistently as I would’ve hoped, but if you get on its wavelength, you’ll definitely have some pretty consistent laughs. The third act in particular didn’t work as well for me, as the movie has a more serious moment that really clashes tonally with the rest of the movie. After this moment, I was kind of waiting for the movie to do something to undo that moment or make some light or add some humour to it and they just didn’t. Verdict Overall, I liked the commitment to a pure comedy that doesn’t rely on or overload itself with forced emotional moments. It’s definitely a throwback to that early 2000s era of comedies and if you like that idea, I think you will definitely like this movie! For me, while there were some incredibly solid moments in the first half, I thought the last half didn’t work as well. The movie doesn’t overstay its welcome, thanks the lean runtime, which kept it from feeling like a chore in the back half, even if it didn’t work as well for me. Still, if you’re looking for a break from the world, there’s definitely laughs to be had with Operation Taco Gary’s!

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\’The Beldham\’ Review: Eerie Sound Design and A Haunting Exploration of Motherhood Elevate This Indie Gem

Reviews /

The Beldham opens with a title card, informing us of the meaning of its title: “Beldham” (alternatively spelled “beldam”)—an old woman; a witch. It immediately clues us in to what kind of monster we may be dealing with in this indie horror gem. Directed by Angela Gulner in her feature debut, the movie follows Harper (played excellently by Mike Flanagan regular Katie Parker), a woman who\’s recently given birth and moves into an old house that her aging mother (Patricia Heaton) is in the process of flipping with the help of her new boyfriend (Corbin Bernsen) and a live-in aide (Emma Fitzpatrick). With that setup, you might expect a run-of-the-mill haunted house story, but The Beldham isn\’t as straightforward as it might seem. As a strange presence lurking within the house begins to reveal itself to Harper, it’s her own mind that starts to come into question—and it becomes clear that there’s more going on than meets the eye. One thing I appreciated about the movie is its use of setting. The whole movie takes place in the aforementioned house, and, while I’m sure that’s partly due to budgetary constraints, it makes the movie more focused and gives it a concrete sense of place. Like the best haunted house stories, however, it’s unclear if it’s the house or the psyche of its inhabitants that’s haunted. As one character puts it: “the brain is a wild beast.” In The Beldham, the mind itself is cast as a monster. Is Harper really seeing a witch or is it in her head? Can it be both? Is there something else entirely going on? For most of the film, that ambiguity drives the action, blurring the lines between the natural and the supernatural. That central metaphor not only makes for interesting narrative tension but also allows for deeper exploration of the movie’s themes. It’s easy to position the film in a line of modern-day motherhood-themed horror movies, but The Beldham reminded me most not of a movie, but of one of my favourite short stories—Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s “The Yellow Wallpaper.” First published in 1892, the story is about a woman suffering from what we’d now call postpartum depression but was then diagnosed as a form of hysteria. To treat it, her doctor, like Gilman’s real-life doctor, prescribes a “rest cure,” during which she’s prohibited from writing. The unnamed narrator, like Gilman, is a writer, so not being able to write, and being confined inside the asylum-like house she and her husband move into, causes her mind to slowly deteriorate in what is one of the greatest feminist psychological horror stories ever written. The key to its power lies in its ambiguity—is the narrator losing her mind? Or are there supernatural forces at work in the house? You can interpret it either way, and that’s what makes the story so effective. My favourite kind of story lives in that gray area between the natural and supernatural, and The Beldham fits into that storytelling tradition beautifully. It feels hewn from the same stuff that Gilman’s short story is: grief and rage and confusion and anger. The painful realities of motherhood and aging, of being a woman, and the archetypes that we\’ve been cast into for ages, since long before even Gilman\’s time—the mad-woman, the old crone, the beldham. It’s the stuff that the best horror stories are usually made of. As Gulner herself puts it, horror is “the internal made external.” This—this is exactly why I love the genre. Horror, maybe more than any other genre, is so good at taking the internal—the emotional and psychological realities we experience—and externalizing it through metaphor and fantasy, making complex human experiences more intelligible through the inhuman and profane. While The Beldham doesn’t reinvent the formula, its particular mixture of elements felt pretty fresh to me. In fact, the movie genuinely surprised me, with a narrative turn that I didn’t see coming. In today’s movie landscape, it’s a real feat for a movie to surprise its audience, and on that front, The Beldham succeeded for me where so many other recent horror movies have failed by being overly predictable. Sure, the beats here are familiar, but the movie is smartly written and confidently directed. Some of the creative flourishes—I’m thinking particularly of a few recurring dream sequences with very striking visuals and cinematography, as well as the sound design throughout the movie, not to mention that final shot and credits sequence—show just how creative you can get with a small budget and a single setting. Another thing I appreciated is that the movie isn\’t afraid to take its time as well. For having a short runtime of 85 minutes, the pace feels a bit slow at times, but its considered approach gives the characters more room to breathe. I was mostly compelled and on-board with the central relationships, although some of the characters (particularly the boyfriend) feel superfluous and lacking in depth. I did, however, appreciate that all of the main relationships are between women—mothers and daughters and caretakers—which is itself still something of a rarity to see. The performances here also stand out. I was especially impressed with Parker, who proves to be a capable lead in a role that demands a layered performance. Heaton is also great, at turns cold-hearted and almost villainous, and at other times, more of a caring mother figure, walking a fine line to great effect by the end. Like “The Yellow Wallpaper”, The Beldham is interested in the complex emotional realities of its characters, and it uses the tropes of haunted houses and witchcraft to explore larger themes of motherhood, aging, loss, and intergenerational trauma. Ultimately, this is a very solid debut, and I’m very jazzed to see more women-focused horror movies that are actually directed and made by women filmmakers. Verdict While The Beldham is more chilling and emotional than outright scary, and it treads some familiar ground, it’s also a surprisingly confident feature debut with some great performances and

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Special Delivery Review – Sex and Sound FX Lead to Love in This Surprisingly Sweet Short

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From the moment I read the synopsis of this short film while I was at the Austin Film Festival, I knew I had to see it. Written and directed by Emily Everhard, the synopsis for Special Delivery reads:  “A Foley artist for pornography falls in love with a porn star during an ADR session.” For anyone that doesn’t know what a Foley artist is, their job is to essentially make the realistic sounds you might hear in a movie or even a video game. I don’t want to give away any of the bits in the short, but some cool examples of this from other media are using coconuts to simulate a horse walking, using celery for breaking bones, or even using rain to create the sound of bacon cooking.  As you can imagine, being a Foley artist for pornography seems like fertile ground for comedy, and boy was that the case with Special Delivery. Right at the start I let out an audible belly laugh and there were more to be had in the brief 10 minute runtime.  What surprised me the most though was just how genuine I felt the romantic part of this short was. I’ve seen massive Hollywood features that had millions of dollars, A-list stars, and a feature length runtime and they couldn’t make me feel the warmth that this short did. It’s no surprise that Special Delivery won the Enderby Entertainment Filmmaking Fellowship and the Audience Award at AFF. Writer/director Emily Everhard absolutely crushed this and so did her great cast and crew!  Speaking of the cast, Kate Owens kills it as Sandy the Foley artist who takes her job VERY seriously and Rob Kellogg is fantastic as Tad, the pornstar who comes in for the ADR session.  By winning the Enderby Entertainment Filmmaking Fellowship Award, Emily will take a week-long trip to Enderby’s Los Angeles offices to benefit from their guidance, and for the opportunity to shadow executives and filmmakers on-site.  Verdict If it isn’t clear, I absolutely loved this short film. The concept alone is brilliant, but the addition of very genuine portrayals from Kate and Rob ensured that Special Delivery exceeded my high hopes for it. When the short is available for the public, we will update this review so you can see this one for yourself because it’s absolutely worth your time!

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Bird Review: A Heart-Wrenching Tale of Family, Struggle, and Growing Pains

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Adriana and I had the pleasure of attending the Austin Film Festival this year! We were joined by some friends for a few days of movies, panels, hot weather, and good times. We’re going to kick off our coverage of the Austin Film Festival with Bird, another film distributed by Mubi that we got the chance to review ahead of its release. If you missed our review of My First Film, the last Mubi film we reviewed, be sure to check it out! If you read that review, you know I\’m a big fan of Mubi and their focus on quality cinema that feels so different from mainstream offerings. Bird definitely fits into that category, too, with some unique visuals and some narrative swings that really stood out to me. The film stars Nykiya Adams as Bailey and Barry Keoghan as their father, Bug. Together, they live on the top floor of a very downtrodden apartment building with Hunter (Jason Buda), Bug\’s son and Bailey\’s brother. Franz Rogowski also stars as the titular Bird. Does Bird soar with heartfelt emotion, or does it struggle to get off the ground? My Thoughts Overall, Bird has a lot of merits and manages to weave together a heart wrenching story with its complicated characters. Growing up is hard for everyone, but it can be even harder for some than for others. These are people facing many hardships, some circumstantial, others perhaps self-imposed, but you can\’t help but feel for the characters and what their daily struggle is like. What stuck out to me most was that the movie makes a point of ensuring the characters are complex enough to avoid lazy clichés. Characters make choices that you don\’t like and say and do things you wouldn\’t, but I never found myself lacking empathy for anyone (aside from one particular minor character). Barry Keoghan is unsurprisingly a standout here, with his portrayal of Bug as someone who constantly seems happy in spite of his situation. Aside from a few brief moments, Bug is consistently shown to be happier than his kids. He also is definitely unaware of what daily life for his kids is like, but it’s still apparent that he cares and is there for them when they really need him to be. Of course, we also have to talk about Bailey and Bird. This pairing really drives the story forward and both of them are fantastic characters that you can\’t help but love. I won\’t go into too much detail about them so as to not spoil things, but these two find each other when they need each other most. It\’s through their collective experience that they both find some clarity and perhaps a bit more peace in their lives. I specifically want to mention how incredible Nykiya Adams is as Bailey. This is one hell of a way to make your feature film debut and I would expect a lot of good things ahead for Adams! Also, I want to talk about the visual style of this movie, because I absolutely loved it. There were some really great shots, including ones that used a projection on a wall, that I was absolutely transfixed by. Given the generic visual style of so much of the “content” released these days (and I use the word, “content,” very intentionally in this case), when you get to see a movie with some visual style, you’re reminded just how important it is to elevate a movie.  Finally, a quick note on the score and soundtrack because they were both very solid. From \”Yellow\” by Coldplay to \”Cotten Eyed Joe\” by Rednex, they use some solid songs to awesome effect and the ambient score sets the tone and gives this a vibe that I really dug. The only thing that I struggled with were some elements towards the end that sort of shook me out of the movie a bit. These choices don’t derail the movie for me, though, and there are still some incredibly strong moments that really landed for me.  Verdict I definitely liked this movie! Especially as we reach the end, there were a few different emotional beats that really hit me. This movie deals with some serious subject matter but does so with care and empathy and ultimately delivers a solid coming of age movie that takes enough risks to feel different from all the rest. Bird is currently out in theatres and will be availible to stream on Mubi soon!

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My First Film Review: Zia Anger’s Bold Autobiographical Journey Blurs Fiction and Reality

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My First Film is one of the most unique films I have seen in a while. From what I understand, the movie is at least partially autobiographical, based on events from the life of writer and director Zia Anger. It’s also incredibly meta. The movie stars Odessa Young as Vita, a young director recounting her experience making her first film. But to say that’s all that this movie is about wouldn’t be right.  It’s not just about the struggles of a first-time filmmaker, it also delves into the complexities of relationships, the female experience, and the very essence of what it means to create something.  I\’ve watched countless films, but this one stands out as perhaps the most raw and deeply personal. It’s precisely movies like this, though, that make me a big fan of this film\’s distributor, Mubi. For those unaware, Mubi isn’t just a distributor, but also a streaming platform and production company. Their library includes some major award-winning films, but what I like most about Mubi is how their content focuses on up-and-coming auteur filmmakers.  In my Alien: Romulus review, I went on for some time about the Disney-fication of cinema that is focused on cheap thrills, designed to manipulate an audience trained to cheer for the past rather than embrace something new. Mubi is the complete opposite, supporting risk-takers that dare to do something new and unique with their films. To be clear, this is not a sponsorship plug either. Mubi is one of the few streamers willing to support daring filmmakers and strive to offer their films in theatres, two things that matter very much to me. They also remain ad-free and one of the more affordable options while the other streamers repeatedly increase their prices and introduce ads.  My First Film will have a limited theatrical run starting on August 30th and will be available worldwide on Mubi on September 6th. If you’re not already a Mubi subscriber, you can sign up now and get your first seven days free. Billy Feldman co-wrote the film with Anger and the rest of the cast includes Devon Ross, Cole Doman, Jane Wickline, Philip Ettinger, Eamon Farren, Eleanore Hendricks, Sage Ftacek, Jackson Anthony, Seth Steinberg, Hailey Gates, Sarah Michelson, Abram Kurtz, and Ruby Max Fury.  So, was My First Film a promising new beginning for Zia Anger? My Thoughts When the credits rolled on My First Film, I found myself staring into space, trying to process what I’d just experienced. In a word, this film is authentic. Its rawness and Anger’s fearless approach create a deeply poignant experience. Certain moments, especially between Vita and her boyfriend, were so visceral that I felt a physical reaction. There was one scene in particular where I wanted to step into the film just so I could call out this character for how they were acting. I particularly loved Odessa Young as Vita. The whole thing really rests on her shoulders and she was absolutely brilliant. I always felt myself rooting for her character, even as she did things that upset and alienated people. Even if I disagreed with her choices, I understood them and this really comes down to a solid script and a strong performance from Young.  Beyond the writing and performances, the music and cinematography also stood out. The score amplified the film’s emotional depth, while creative lighting added a dreamlike quality to certain scenes.  But the heart of this movie lies in its themes. I mentioned earlier just how personal this movie felt, and I think this created some powerful moments. However, I also struggled to find my way into what I thought were the more prominent aspects of the movie. To be clear, this is not a criticism but more of an observation. Much of this movie is about creation, but that manifests in two large ways in the film: through the creation of a movie and the creation of life itself through pregnancy. Now, neither of these aspects are very applicable to me, but nevertheless I was still able to understand things, even if I didn’t feel them as strongly as some others might.  One particular aspect that stuck out to me, though, was the isolation that Vita experiences. She struggles during the production of her movie with this feeling that nobody is as committed to it as she is and the impacts of that are significant. This is further complicated outside of the production of her movie as Vita deals with some deeply traumatic personal experiences and unfortunately goes through them all alone. You feel the impact of these moments on the character, and I really appreciated that the narrative allowed the character to comment on these moments with the benefit of hindsight.  The movie also utilizes its meta aspects to great effect when communicating its themes. Characters discuss the meaning and intent behind their scenes in the movie they’re making, but it never feels forced, it’s integral to the narrative. They also got creative in the edit, sprinkling in real footage that Anger shot of herself into the movie at various points. Some aspects almost feel documentary-like. These moments feel very clear and visually distinct, but they aren’t distracting and they blend in seamlessly into the fictional part of the movie.  Without giving too much away, the film\’s final act is where it gets the most meta and takes the biggest risks. Anger takes a big swing here and I found myself uncomfortably laughing at how perplexing this scene was. During this scene, though, a character says a line that snapped me out of what I was seeing and sent me deep into thought. Verdict Some movies can be fully experienced and understood by just reading a plot summary. My First Film is the exact opposite. This is a film that demands to be experienced firsthand, with layers that can’t be captured in words alone. Undoubtedly, this is one of the most unique and personal films I’ve ever seen. Zia Anger blurs

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Alien: Romulus Review—A Soul-Crushing Example of Disney\’s Nostalgia Overkill

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The Alien franchise is returning to theatres across the world with Alien: Romulus, the latest from writer/director Fede Álvarez. I’ve enjoyed some of Álvarez’s previous movies, including the remake of Evil Dead (2013) and Don’t Breathe (2016). The cast of this film includes Cailee Spaeny, David Jonsson, and Archie Renaux, among others.  The Alien franchise is a weird one. It began with two classics in Alien & Aliens, but then it really goes downhill from there. Alien 3 was famously plagued with a troubled production and significant studio interference. After that, audiences were subjected to Alien: Resurrection and two Alien vs Predator movies, none of which I even enjoyed as a kid.  Ridley Scott, the director of the first Alien movie returned to the franchise with Prometheus and Alien: Covenant, which are prequels to his original film. I haven’t seen either movie in a while, but I remember feeling pretty middling on them overall.  This movie takes place between Alien and Aliens and the synopsis is very simple and spoiler-free:  “While scavenging the deep ends of a derelict space station, a group of young space colonists come face to face with the most terrifying life form in the universe.” I wanted to lay out the history of the franchise because if you count the AvP movies, then the Alien franchise includes nine different films and hasn\’t delivered anything a fraction as good as its first two entries.  A lot of the marketing and buzz around Alien: Romulus promised a return to the franchise’s roots. So does Alien: Romulus recapture the franchise’s glory, or should we jettison this one into space?  My Spoiler-Free Thoughts Oh boy. I have a LOT to say about this movie and I will eventually dig into spoilers, which you can read after the verdict section of this review. First off, I really dug this movie as it started. The sets and the props looked amazing. They managed to teleport me back to the first Alien movie with the retro futuristic tech that those early movies are really known for. I also loved the sequences in open space too. I was blown away by just how beautiful it all looked and how it all sounded. The tagline for the first Alien was “In Space No One Can Hear You Scream” and I loved the use of silence in these moments. That, combined with some stunning visuals really blew my socks off. I saw this at a smaller Cineplex theatre, but I would’ve loved to see the movie in IMAX for those shots alone.  I also liked the initial setup as well. The characters are in a location and situation that’s much different than other Alien movies. The main cast are also new to the franchise and are living in a less than ideal situation working for the infamous big bad Weyland-Yutani Corporation.  The movie doesn’t take much time to flesh out most of the characters, but I would say only David Jonsson as Andy did anything for me anyway (I will talk more about his role in the spoiler section). Cailee Spaeny as Rain was good as the film’s lead, but I think the character just didn’t have much on the page that really made me invested. Rain has a reluctance to participate in the mission, but she handles everything thrust on her as if it was natural to her and it honestly made me forget about that aspect of her character as the movie progressed.  This is where things took a sharp turn for me though. As the Alien part of the movie really begins, the movie starts to fall apart. First of all, we have yet another use of AI and CGI to recreate a dead actor, which I just am never going to be okay with (more on that in the spoiler section too). Aside from being pretty morally reprehensible, it also just looks terrible a lot of the time. Some moments it’s not so bad, but then there are some others where it just looks like they didn’t bother to finish working on it. The character is also present for a good chunk of the movie too and every single time they appeared I was just more and more disappointed with their inclusion.  This also though was the first sign to me of just what kind of movie this really was. When I logged this movie on Letterboxd, I wrote, “The Force Awakens of the Alien franchise (derogatory)” and I think that says it all. This movie is somehow derivative of basically all the movies that came before it. I will discuss this in more detail in the spoiler section, but basically this movie is just a generic Disney franchise film set in the Alien universe. It links to previous movies for no real narrative reason, it has cheap callbacks that made me audibly groan twice during the movie, and it does nothing compelling, new, or interesting.  I was perplexed thinking about just who this movie was for and why it exists, but it’s because I forgot for a moment that this was now a Disney owned IP. Disney acquired the Alien franchise when it acquired 20th Century Fox. So naturally, Disney had to make its generic and derivative rehash of a beloved IP because that’s all they seem to bother doing now.  For all of the faults in the Alien franchise, and there are plenty, this movie felt the most soulless of all of them. I will elaborate more in the spoiler section after the verdict.  Verdict If you’re all aboard the Disney train and you love watching movies that are simply trying to cash in on your affinity for older movies that you love, you might be happy with what Alien: Romulus has to offer. Despite a very solid acting performance and some beautiful visuals, this movie falls apart when it uses the digital recreation of a dead actor, adds ham-fisted lines recycled from better movies, and does absolutely nothing

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Out Come the Wolves – Spoiler Free Review

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When it comes to creating horror, films often look outside our natural world to make audiences feel uncomfortable. Whether it\’s ghosts or aliens, using the unknown can be an incredibly effective way to get some reliable scares. Out Come the Wolves, the latest film from Canadian director Adam MacDonald, recognizes the horror that exists in our natural world too. What we don’t know definitely scares us, but what about things that can and do happen to people? What happens if you get caught in a forest that happens to be the hunting ground for a pack of wild wolves? Well, Out Come the Wolves gives you a very gory and occasionally tense answer to that very question. The movie stars Missy Peregrym as Sophie, Joris Jarsky as her long-time best friend Kyle, and Damon Runyan as Sophie’s boyfriend Nolan. So does this movie sink its teeth in you, or is it all bark and no bite? My Thoughts The movie instantly pulled me in with its opening shots. Like in Azrael, I very much loved the panning scenic shots of the woods. It could be that I grew up with lots of areas like that around, but the establishing shots were beautiful. As the movie progresses, I found the camera work and the editing really go a long way in creating anxiety and tension. Quick cuts from someone prepping the four-wheeler to all of a sudden driving down the trail creates a feeling of unease. The movie does things like this very well throughout the lean 86 minute runtime. Speaking of the runtime, I really respect a movie that comes in under 90 minutes. Adriana has been taking months (ironically) to write an article about the “tight 90”. To her point, it feels like movies these days are getting longer. Now, that alone isn\’t a bad thing, but the longer your movie is, the harder it is to keep an audience engaged. Pacing is everything in a movie. If you find your mind wandering when you\’re watching a movie, chances are that the movie isn\’t paced well enough, so you\’re not engaged with it. I can\’t remember the last time I\’ve watched a movie this lean, and it was really refreshing to see a movie this focused. Of that lean runtime though, there are only a few moments in the movie that are the kind of tense thriller sequences that you might expect. I felt they were all really effective, but I wish there were a bit more of them. Outside of those moments, we\’re spending time with our three main characters and this is where the movie really didn\’t work as well for me. The performances themselves were good enough, but it was more the writing I struggled with. There are a lot of cliches that make themselves obvious right from the start. Characters act in particular ways and do things that seem unnaturally mean or over the top. Unfortunately, a good chunk of that 86 minute runtime is spent with these characters outside the more tense and dangerous moments, and I think we definitely would have benefitted from less time with the characters before things really get going. Although, I have to give a special shoutout to the music the characters listened to which included some Canadian classics from Honeymoon Suite and Our Lady Peace! The real issue for me though is that the dynamic between the three characters becomes apparent almost right away, and then we just spend more and more time reaffirming that. Eventually, there\’s a moment between two of the characters that starts off the tension, but I really didn\’t like the choices the writers made. Without giving anything away, a character acts a certain way and makes certain choices that made more sense for the other character to do. I\’m not a fan of criticism that goes, “Well it\’s not what I would have done,” and this isn\’t that kind of critique, either. The issue was that it didn\’t quite make sense for the characters to act the way they did and do the things they do. If you just swapped their actions, I think the movie would\’ve felt a bit more sensible and cohesive. Verdict Overall, I was very mixed with this movie. There are some genuine moments of tension and gore that are really unsettling, but there aren\’t enough of those moments. The time spent with the main characters also felt repetitive and took up too much of the short runtime. The high points of this movie were definitely the more technical aspects. There wasn\’t enough here for me to be able to recommend the movie, but if the setup sounds interesting to you, the movie\’s lean runtime means you won\’t feel like you wasted time, even if you don\’t enjoy the movie. Out Come the Wolves hits theatres in the USA and Canada on August 30th and will also be available on streaming as well.

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