Oppression and fear stalk the environs of Babak Anvari’s superb Under the Shadow. Based on Anvari’s childhood experiences in Tehran during the Iran-Iraq War, Under the Shadow brings subjugation, menace and a palatable sense of dread to the screen, with a political element that is constant but never overbearing. The film’s focus is domestic, portraying…
The cerebral time-travel thriller Counter Clockwise is quite a piece of work, with a punchy script and tight editing and direction, all set to an eerie score. If you enjoyed Shane Carruth’s “Primer,” take a gander at this one — it has all of the intriguing metaphysical concepts, but is a little easier to follow….
The film Trolls opened several weeks ago and this review is a bit late, but it should not matter, as few people will see or care much for this lukewarm knockoff of the Smurfs franchise (which is a lukewarm entity in and of itself). The Rotten Tomatoes synopsis reads: “DreamWorks Animation’s ‘TROLLS’ is an irreverent…
Not all high school movies are the same. But if you were to map out the archetypal characters based on the films of the last thirty years, you’d probably come up with a list close to this one: You have your main character. They could be male or female, but they must be unpopular They…
The Devil does many things in movies. He rides out, he has a brigade, he hangs out with Miss Jones and Daniel Webster, and he even thumbs a ride. And, apparently, he lives in a farmhouse in rural Brazil in the aptly named The Devil Lives Here. (This would be useful information for the local…
Ah, what would this time of the season be without another motion picture featuring sex, drugs, rock and roll (and loud, annoying rap, to boot), fights, prostitutes, female pimps, gun threats, corporate layoffs, drunk driving (among other idiotic things committed while intoxicated), psychological disorders, sacrilegious sequences, rampant vulgarity, sexual harassment, child abuse, serious physical and…
I suppose the title, “The Christmas Pageant That Almost Never Was” would have worked, but Believe is fine. After all, it’s the holiday season, so we’re entitled to a little suspension of (dis)belief, as the newest faith-heavy film from writer/director Billy Dickson in his major debut, conveys. Drawing allusions to Frank Capra’s 1946 classic, “It’s…
