I have a complicated relationship with Luca Guadagnino. I love his work, sans one film of his, and even consider his 2018 remake of Suspiria to be in my top 5 films of all time (sidenote: someone please take the… Read More ›
adaptation
Maria Schrader seeks to honor the #MeToo Movement in “She Said,” available on home video now.
While the real-life work of an investigative journalist might feel like running head-first into a brick wall over and over again, movies and shows usually make it seem like an idealistic, noble, and exciting job that combines the thrill of… Read More ›
Director Masaaki Yuasa’s “Inu-Oh” is more than an anachronistic jam session, it’s an exploration of the enduring power of stories.
Every story ever told really happened. Stories are where memories go when they’re forgotten. – Doctor Who, Season 9 Episode “Hell Bent” Adapted from novelist Hideo Furukawa’s “The Tale of the Heike: The Inu-Oh Chapters,” Inu-Oh is a tale of… Read More ›
“Devotion” Digital Code & Book Giveaway
Director J.D. Dillard adapted Adam Makos’s novel Devotion: An Epic Story of Heroism, Friendship, and Sacrifice, based on an incredible true story, into the feature film Devotion starring Jonathan Majors as Jesse Brown, the first Black Navy Aviator, and Glen… Read More ›
Open Dialogue with “Women Talking” actor Sheila McCarthy.
Sheila McCarthy stars in the Sarah Polley ensemble-dialogue-driven film Women Talking. Listed on many ”Best of Lists for 2022,” this picture offers a thought-provoking story, stellar performances, beautiful cinematography, and it engages the audience with deep questions, and characters at… Read More ›
The house on East 88th Street comes to you as “Lyle, Lyle, Crocodile” is now available at home.
In 1962, children’s book author Bernard Waber published The House on East 88th Street, a story in which the Primm family moved into a brownstone in New York City is surprised to discover a crocodile already living there. As if… Read More ›
Shout! Factory and LAIKA Studios re-release “Coraline” for the first-time in a stunning 4K UHD edition.
In February of 2021, it was announced that LAIKA Studios and boutique home media distributor Shout! Factory made a deal to bring LAIKA’s incredible stop-motion films to U.S. audiences’ homes. Toward the end of 2021, Shout! Factory released Blu-ray/DVD combo… Read More ›
“Guillermo del Toro’s Pinocchio” may not have you wishing upon a star, but it’s exploration of identity and love will resonate nonetheless.
Since its publication in 1883, Italian author Carlo Collodi’s The Adventures of Pinocchio has been adapted on paper and for stage and screen many times. The most well-known, of course, being the 1940 Walt Disney animated adaptation. It’s a story… Read More ›
Animator Masashi Ando’s directorial debut, “The Deer King,” is available on home video from Shout! Factory.
Adaptations, in live action or animation, are the lifeblood of storytelling. We, as audiences, like to think that the magic comes from original stories, but, more often than not, that thing you love is an adaptation of a story originating… Read More ›
George Miller’s “Three Thousand Years of Longing” may find the audience it deserves on home video.
If the story of your life was told by another, would it be a great tale involving the taming of wild beasts and passionate love affairs, would it rattle off the far-flung places you’ve explored, or would it be a… Read More ›
Sarah Polley’s “Women Talking” will force you to examine all your contradictory ideas and make you better for it. [Film Fest 919]
I have two small gripes about the naming of Women Talking, which are my only two jokes I’m allowing myself to make about this film since it is such a serious affair. 1. I’m sad this movie has that name… Read More ›
“Three Thousand Years of Longing” Blu-ray Giveaway
Few storytellers can jump back-and-forth between genres with such ease, yet George Miller is the mind equally responsible for the Mad Max films and Babe. This year, Miller went to a particularly fascinating place by examining the significance of stories in… Read More ›
Noah Baumbach’s “White Noise” is so boldly unconventional, it makes this white whale of an adaptation feel somehow even more tremendous. [Film Fest 919]
Three years ago, Film Fest 919 opened the 2019 festival with Noah Baumbach’s Marriage Story, and I was taken. It was a much more muted affair for the Frances Ha and While We’re Young filmmaker, known for his quirkier approach… Read More ›
By not allowing for self-reflection, “She Said” comes off as a buzzword-ridden and self-congratulatory. [Film Fest 919]
When the hammer finally came down on Harvey Weinstein in the Fall of 2017, it felt as if Hollywood as a whole was having to reckon with the collective keeping of the industry’s worst-kept secret. Everyone knew Weinstein was a… Read More ›
The game is once more afoot in “Enola Holmes 2.”
Roughly 25 months since the Millie Bobby Brown-led Enola Holmes (2020) hit Netflix, a sequel drops on the streamer taking the same cast, as well as some new additions, on a brand-new mystery tour. Much as the 2020 outing is… Read More ›
If you dig the vibe of David Leitch’s action-comedy “Bullet Train,” snag a ticket to go on unlimited home viewing rides now.
Realism is overrated. We experience it every day: the fear, the frustration, the constantly moving goal posts. Sometimes, it’s really nice to experience something so off the rails, so unrealistic, that all you can do is hold on and go… Read More ›
Cartoon Saloon’s “My Father’s Dragon” is a potent family adventure that plays with the idea of knowledge and memory.
Since its first film release, The Secret of Kells, in 2009, animation studio Cartoon Saloon has made a name for itself by developing remarkable stories of adventure, catharsis, and healing through the lens of adolescence. Each of the four films… Read More ›
The performances within novel adaptation “Devotion” will ensnare your heart. [Film Fest 919]
I think we should get an ugly little detail out of the way so we don’t have to mention it again in this review as it’s a rather unfair talking point, but one that I do believe deserves touching on…. Read More ›
Dropping on home video from Paramount Pictures is animated family adventure-comedy “Paws of Fury: The Legend of Hank.”
Originally titled Blazing Samurai, the Paramount Animation family film Paws of Fury: The Legend of Hank released in theaters July of 2022, an anthropomorphic take on the Mel Brooks-directed comedy classic Blazing Saddles (1974). Loaded top to bottom with star… Read More ›
Open Dialogue with “Catherine Called Birdy” actors Bella Ramsey and Andrew Scott.
In this edition of Open Dialogue, Thomas Manning chats with Bella Ramsey and Andrew Scott about their roles in Catherine Called Birdy, a medieval coming-of-age comedy directed by Lena Dunham. Clips are used by permission for review, interview and media… Read More ›