msicism

Climax (Gaspar Noé, 2018)

Goddamn you, Gaspar.

Your work is often so rife with childish ideas and cheap provocation, it can...

Le Pont du Nord (Jacques Rivette, 1981)

What a joy. It's strange how few Rivette films I've actually seen, when compared with the amount of ple...

Something Old, Something New...

Eli, Eli, Lema Sabachthani? (Shinji Aoyama, 2005)

I'll admit, I don't quite get ...

Walking On Water (Andrey M. Paounov, 2018)

This is a somewhat straightforward documentary from the Bulgarian filmmaker Paounov, whose previous wor...

Turbulence (Ruy Guerra, 2000)

By almost anyone's reckoning, the 2000 Cannes Film Festival was in-SANE. In an average year, you're luc...

Reminiscences of a Journey to Lithuania (1972) / Jonas Mekas (1922-2019)

My viewing of Mekas's films has been a bit of a spotty patchwork. Of the confirmed masterworks, I have ...

Daisy Kenyon (Otto Preminger, 1947)

There's a particular caveat one finds in David Bordwell's writing, one that always gives me pause. Bord...

"That's right! We won!"

So the people have spoken. Thanks for your help. 

As the great Nictate might put it, "Come a...

The Man Who Killed Don Quixote (Terry Gilliam, 2018)

A few things need to be gotten out of the way. First, I'm not sure why this got such a horrid reception...

Time to Get Involved, Suckers.

I can't decide what I should watch next. Help me out, folks. Listed in no particular order:

Touch Me Not (Adina Pintilie, 2018)

For a film I really don't like, I have quite a lot of sympathy for Touch Me Not. It's a film t...

A Simple Story (Marcel Hanoun, 1959)

Marcel Hanoun's Une simple histoire is a film more commonly heard about in vague whispers than...

Rojo (Benjamín Naishtat, 2018)

It's often a dicey proposition when a highly experimental filmmaker aims for greater accessibility. But...

I Remember the Crows (Gustavo Vinagre, 2017)

As hard as it may be to believe, even in 2019 there remains a significant dearth of films, television s...

I Haven't Forgotten You....

I know it's been awhile since I've posted any new material. My apologies. But the spring semester begin...

Chongqing Blues (Wang Xiaoshuai, 2010)

Based on the three films of Wang's I've seen, he is a perfectly solid director of unmemorable films. Gr...

Knife+Heart (Yann Gonzalez, 2018)

Considerably more structured than You and the Night but no less decadent, Yann Gonzalez's late...

Tondal's Vision (Stephen Broomer, 2018)

No flies on Stephen Broomer! In addition to having made one of the most retro-poetic experimental films...

Happy New Year, Colin Burstead (Ben Wheatley, 2018)

Ashamed as I am to admit it, I have always liked the idea of Ben Wheatley more that I've liked...

She Wore a Yellow Ribbon (John Ford, 1949)

In my recent appearance on Craig Lindsey's "The Sour Hour," I made mention of the fact that my educatio...

Why did I watch Bird Box (Susanne Bier, 2018)?

Sometimes you've just got to try the shitty soup.

Three Selections from the Former Colonies

God Straightens Legs (Joële Walinga, Canada)

This is a potent medium-length doc...

Sorry Angel (Plaire, aimer et courir vite) (Christophe Honoré, 2018)

As many reviewers have already noted, the poignancy of Christophe Honoré's new film comes not so much ...

Too Late to Die Young (Dominga Sotomayor Castillo, 2018)

Without the context of understanding that 1990 was the year that democracy returned to Chile after 17 y...

Top 30 Experimental Films of 2018

30. The Other Side of the Wind (Orson Welles, U.S. / France, 1976/2018)

2018-12-26 18:39:04 +0000 UTC View Post

Double-Shot of Cannes Catch-Up

Asako I & II (Ryûsuke Hamaguchi, 2018)

I would have expected to be providin...

The Wild Pear Tree (Nuri Bilge Ceylan, 2018)

Nuri Bilge Ceylan is a filmmaker who generates highly original films that nevertheless wear their influ...

Monrovia, Indiana (Frederick Wiseman, 2018)

Ordinarily, a sense of ambivalence would indicate that a film-text was richer than usual and had more t...

If You Wanna Hear Me Ramble...

...I am the guest on the newest edition of the great Peter Labuza's podcast, The Cinephiliacs. Peter and I talk about movies, politics, my son Jace, and Su Friedrich's Sink or Swim. Check ...

Black Panther (Ryan Coogler, 2018)

1. What if Africa were the center of the world? I mean, it's the cradle of humanity. So why not an economic su...