This article was originally published on Film Threat (June 28, 2018). Shana Feste draws from her personal experience and uses her fascinating father as a muse for her latest film, Boundaries. Laura (Vera Farmiga) is a work in progress and needs to learn how to stand her ground. The film begins in the middle of her therapy session.…
Continue reading ➞ ‘Boundaries’ Review
This article was originally published on Film Threat (April 18, 2018). David and Nathan Zellner wrote, directed, and star in the unconventional and off-beat comedic Western, Damsel. This quirky film is an acquired taste. Viewers enter the theater expecting the unexpected, yet it still manages to be stranger than imagined. Parson Henry stumbles into his new…
Continue reading ➞ ‘Damsel’ Review
This article was originally published on Film Threat (April 18, 2018). The tragic tale of Frankenstein’s Monster is greatly known. There have been several adaptations of the creature’s misunderstood torment over the years. Haifaa Al-Mansour’s Mary Shelley offers a refreshing and relatable take on how the monster mirrors Mary’s (and her similar peers’) struggle. After learning the…
Continue reading ➞ ‘Mary Shelley’ Review
Leave No Trace tactfully tells an equally heartwarming and heartbreaking story of the unconditional love shared between Will (Ben Foster) and his 13-year-old daughter, Tom (Thomasin McKenzie). Foster and McKenzie deliver raw, tender, captivating and transcending performances. The bond between them isn’t only compelling, it is inspiring. It is immediately evident that the actors and characters…
Emma Thompson is going to be very busy this awards season. She delivers an extraordinarily brilliant, intensely moving, enchantingly witty, and remarkably vulnerable performance as High Court judge Fiona Maye in The Children Act. She is one of those rare compelling performers that allows an audience to simply enjoy watching her think. The usually stoic Maye is fittingly…
Continue reading ➞ ‘The Children Act’ Review: A child’s life is on the line
Malin’s life gains new meaning when he is abruptly plucked from his career as a Russian Literature professor at the University of Havana and unexpectedly tasked with a gut-wrenching new job in Un Traductor. He has been assigned to the children’s ward of a local hospital that is treating victims of Chernobyl’s nuclear disaster. Every night,…
Michael Pearce’s spellbinding debut feature, Beast, captures the audience’s attention from beginning to end. This riveting, intense, unsettling and surprisingly funny film consistently challenges the viewer’s perception of the charismatic and suspicious protagonists, Moll (Jessie Buckley) and Pascal (Johnny Flynn). These kooky kindred spirits are drawn together by an undeniably steamy magnetism. Moll and Pascal are…
Continue reading ➞ ‘Beast’ Review: A Chilling Tale of Love and Suspicion
In his compelling, unsettling and visually stunning documentary, The Human Element, National Geographic photographer James Balog shows viewers why we, as a society, can no longer turn a blind eye to the drastically changing world around us. After watching how our planet is essentially crumbling before our eyes, his closing words are crystal clear: “Today, truth and evidence…
Continue reading ➞ ‘The Human Element’ Review: Climate Change is Very Real
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https://youtu.be/b09aJdWqVp4 I was captivated by HBO’s ‘Barry’ from the moment I saw the first trailer for Bill Hader and Alec Berg’s paradoxical and ambitious brainchild. The eight episode dark comedy follows Barry Birkman (‘SNL’s’ brilliant Hader), a former Marine turned hit man who stumbles into Gene Cousineau’s (hilariously portrayed by the always delightful and riveting…
