REVIEW: The Wife [2018]

Do what you need to do. After multiple expressions of frustration tinged with disgust on behalf of David Castleman (Max Irons) towards his father Joe (Jonathan Pryce), the time for the latter to finally tell the former what he thinks about his short story arrives. Joe is an acclaimed author who’s just landed in Stockholm to accept the Nobel Prize in literature and David has accompanied him and his mother Joan (Glenn Close) for the ceremony. She’s already been effusive with praise about her son’s latest piece while awaiting her…

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BIFF18 REVIEW: Thunder Road [2018]

Should we call the manufacturer? It’s unsurprising to learn the opening one-shot of Jim Cummings‘ SXSW-winning film Thunder Road is itself a revision of the writer/director/star’s Sundance-winning short of the same name. The sequence therefore plays like a mini-movie with its escalation of emotion, honest humor in tragedy, and subtle exposition readying us for the aftermath to come. Officer Jim Arnaud (Cummings) is a man struggling with the anguish and regret he feels as the reality of his mother’s death hits him like a ton of bricks—his macho, decorated hero…

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BIFF18 REVIEW: About a Donkey [2018]

Smaller than a horse. The Owens family is at a nexus point of chaotic emotions, troubles, and fears thanks to the start of new chapters in their respective lives. Mom (Katherine Wessling‘s Ann) has officially accepted what everyone else already had: a battle with depression. Burgh (Ben Kaufman) recently started seeing someone (Sarah Haruko‘s Cassie) he’s afraid to reveal to the family due to her having a past history with his younger sister. She (Alexandra Clayton‘s Annie) is ready to pop thanks to hers and husband Paul’s (Ricardo Manigat) first…

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BIFF18 REVIEW: The Rainbow Experiment [2018]

It’s nobody’s fault and everyone’s responsibility. My biggest takeaway from Christina Kallas‘ The Rainbow Experiment is that teachers really don’t get paid enough in this country. Think about new technologies, entitled parents, emotionally confused kids with no outlet, and dwindling budgets forcing them to spend out-of-pocket for resources all while a guillotine hangs above their necks if grade thresholds aren’t met. Suddenly those idealistic educators hoping to change the world find themselves caught in a futile game wherein job security becomes paramount at the children’s expense. Everyone’s back is pressed…

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REVIEW: Passengers [2008]

Better now than later. An explosion, crash, confused man, and burning plane: this is the sequence of images as Rodrigo García‘s Passengers commences. It’s a pretty straightforward visual set-up for the incident everything else will surround before his lead (Anne Hathaway‘s Dr. Claire Summers) is introduced during the next scene. She’s a trauma counselor enlisted by her boss (Andre Braugher‘s Perry) to take point on helping the small group of people who survived process the event. They’re all in differing stages of psychological distress with one remembering a fire (Ryan…

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REVIEW: Becoming Jane [2007]

Are there no other women in Hampshire? I had never seen Julian Jarrold‘s Becoming Jane before today and yet my constantly being hit with a sense of familiarity while watching made me question that truth. The reason stems from the fact that screenwriters Kevin Hood and Sarah Williams crafted their tale of young Jane Austen fifteen years before her first novel (Sense and Sensibility) was published to unfold as though it was Pride and Prejudice. They’ve based this reading of Austen’s life on letters written to her sister Cassandra about…

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REVIEW: Havoc [2005]

There is a monetary zone of geography which we’re not allowed to pass. I can’t help wondering what Havoc might have been if Jessica Kaplan had the means to make it herself in the 90s like today’s aspiring filmmakers can thanks to affordable technology. She was seventeen when she sold her script “The Powers That Be” based on what she experienced growing up in West Los Angeles. It appears she was more or less the role Matt O’Leary plays (Eric)—an observer trying to understand why these rich white kids are…

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REVIEW: A Star Is Born [2018]

I love the way she sees them. It began with Hollywood as William A. Wellman and Robert Carson won an Oscar for their story about a young actress dreaming of super stardom in 1937. From there it went the way of the movie musical thanks to Judy Garland taking the lead before earning six nominations in 1954. Next came Barbra Streisand and Kris Kristofferson to shift things to the music world with its aging rock star and hopeful songstress adding a 1976 Best Song to the awards cabinet. Now—almost a…

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REVIEW: Miller’s Crossing [1990]

I’ll think about it. The mob is a business like any other. Leadership must be strong and decisive, employees must be loyal to a fault, and every once in a while you have to cut someone you like loose in order to not anger someone you might like less but definitely need more. Despite everything we learn as kids that ends up being useless, the concept of “choosing the lesser of two evils” will forever prove as useful as breathing and yet we have trouble reconciling such dilemmas due to…

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REVIEW: Blaze [2018]

Never stand in the way of true love. You have to respect the way Ethan Hawke approached his latest film Blaze and its central character Blaze Foley. He’d never heard the artist’s name or music until being stopped in his tracks upon listening to John Prine cover “Clay Pigeons.” That sparked an interest for research and eventually a door to Foley’s tumultuous life was opened. As luck would have it, Hawke’s friend Louis Black knew both Blaze and Townes Van Zandt (an important figure in this tragic country blues singer’s…

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TIFF18 REVIEW: Retrospekt [2018]

Every Wednesday and … coffee. I can’t think of a better term to describe Esther Rots‘ Retrospekt than her own: “sensory cinema.” We get a feeling for what this means during the opening scene as Dan Geesin‘s score and Bas Kuijlenburg’s boomingly operatic baritone drowns out the action onscreen with English lyrics telling a story of which we’re not yet certain is even worth our attention. We don’t know these characters beyond visible traits: a pregnant woman, her husband, and their young girl packed up in an RV heading to…

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