It begins with rapid titles. “WB,” “DC,” The Batman, all flash up on screen quickly, before an opening point-of-view shot through binoculars takes in a well-dressed man in an opulent mansion. Watching, observing, planning and judging, this extended shot is unsettling in its voyeurism, especially as the viewer shares the perspective of this watcher, who…
That will do, super pig. That will do. Animals never have it easy in Bong Joon-ho’s world: “Barking Dogs Never Bite” paints those that yap as vermin that need terminating, “The Host” mutates a fish into a rampaging abomination and now Okja follows a hybrid fated for the abattoir. Yet, rather than rage at or…
“Let no one be slow to seek wisdom when he is young, nor weary of the search for it when he has grown old. For, no age is too early or too late for the health of the soul.” — Epicurus Filled with dream and fantasy sequences in the tradition of the great Italian director…
Biopics are a bit of a conundrum, aren’t they? On one hand, they seem like ideal fodder for movie adaptations since the subject of the film will likely carry a guaranteed audience, especially when popular musicians and bands are the focal point. But on the other hand, how can one film possibly be adequately succinct…
One man’s harrowing journey through a personalized hell has been the focus of each of Steve McQueen’s three features, but never has the metaphor been so effectively explored by the filmmaker as it is in his deeply moving fact-based drama 12 Years a Slave. McQueen’s penchant for precisely pointed perspective is applied again here, but…
How far would you go to find your child if he or she were missing? What laws would or should a parent break to make sure they could have their babies back again? These are the fundamental questions asked in the newest film directed by Denis Villeneuve (“Incendies“), Prisoners, which tells the tale of a…
Stop me if you’ve heard the premise of Looper before. 2044. Time travel hasn’t been invented yet. Fast forward thirty years later, when time-travel is illegal and used by future gangsters to dispatch targets. The target is bound, hooded and sent back to a one-way encounter with a Looper — hired guns in 2044 making…
