Since its commodification, Asia has capitalized on the horror genre perhaps more fiercely than any other continent. From early Japanese tales of feudal terrors like Ugetsu (雨月物語), Kwaidan (怪談), and Kuroneko (藪の中の黒猫), to more modern tales of turmoil like Ringu… Read More ›
In the middle of shooting a zombie film, the cast and crew find themselves fighting off an actual zombie attack. This is the premise for the 2017 release One Cut of the Dead from director Shin’ichirô Ueda adapted from the… Read More ›
Described as “a lively action flick with a samurai twist,” latest Well Go USA release Samurai Marathon meets that description with a unique vigor. Directed by Bernard Rose (Candyman) and adapted from the novel “The Marathon Samurai: Five Tales of… Read More ›
Myths and legends, stories like those of King Arthur and his Knights of the Round, Robin Hood, and Paul Bunyan and those of gods, goddesses, demons, and immortals, are often given the adaptation treatment in cinema. These stories are often… Read More ›
While anyone can insert their influences into their art, it’s something else entirely when the creation stands on its own. Writer/director Kirill Sokolov is open about his fondness for directors Sergio Leone (The Good, The Bad and the Ugly), Martin… Read More ›
Swedish writer and director Jimmy Olsson, who is known for short films like Repressed (2011) and 2nd Class (2018), examines some difficult subjects in his latest short, Alive. Running at just twenty-three minutes, Alive deals with ableism and relational boundaries… Read More ›
There’s an elegance and simplicity to writer/director Hoon-jung Park’s The Witch: Subversion that all begins with the opening. Via photo montage with intense tonal scoring, The Witch sets up a mysterious cabal performing medical experiments on children: iron lungs, tubes… Read More ›
We can pretend like Greta Gerwig not receiving an Oscar nomination for Best Director for Little Women is the end-all, be-all of discrimination against women in the film industry, but the misogynistic practices of this massive industry stretch much further… Read More ›
If you’re still looking for romance the week after Valentine’s Day, or perhaps if you’re desperate for something warm and colorful to beat the winter blahs, Masaaki Yuasa’s new anime feature, Ride Your Wave, might be just the pick-me-up you… Read More ›
With just one other feature film under his belt (Closeness, 2017), Russian director Kantemir Balagov takes on a challenge with his second feature, Beanpole. The film packs a complex story of female friendship and desire that requires precise characterization and… Read More ›
As early as 1945, two years before the liberation of Auschwitz, filmmakers began to grapple with the challenge of preserving Holocaust memory on screen. Directors like Mark Donskoy and Wanda Jakubowska took great risks with their films, The Unvanquished (1945)… Read More ›
I love lesbian romance movies. Please, hear me out before you think I’m a total sleaze. As a gay man, there’s no “entry point” for me in queer love stories involving two women. I am taken out of contention to… Read More ›
South Korea is a country technically younger than Helen Mirren, smaller than the state of Kentucky, with a population slightly higher than the state of California. Yet, when it comes to countries leading the way in the realm of technology,… Read More ›
“A priest, a rabbi and an imam walk into a bar…,” a setup to many jokes heard worldwide. Sometimes, the jokes are funny. Other times they might be offensive, but you’ve heard at least one that somehow pertains to the… Read More ›
Though Oscar-winning writer/director Guillermo del Toro’s been working since the mid-’80s, the majority of audiences know him as the director of either Hellboy (2004), Pacific Rim (2013), and The Shape of Water (2017). In cinema-focused circles, however, del Toro’s more… Read More ›
From the opening shot of director Alexandre Moratto’s Brazilian coming-of-age drama, Socrates, audiences will recognize that they are in for a very personal, brutally honest, and unrelenting emotional journey following the life of a struggling young teen in São Paulo…. Read More ›
When you think of horror films, what names come to mind? If you’re going old school, you’ll get John Carpenter, Wes Craven, George A. Romero, Mary Lambert, Sam Raimi, Tobe Hooper, Takashi, Miike, Lucio Fulci, Dario Argento, and David Cronenberg…. Read More ›
Oscar-winning director Denys Arcand offers The Fall of the American Empire, an eclectic genre mash-up combining crime drama, a thrilling heist adventure, and a social commentary. This French-Canadian film spoken almost entirely in the beautiful language of French (and subtitled… Read More ›
When it comes to crafting compelling stories, anything can inspire ideas: love won or lost, a desire to return to childhood innocence, moments of great historical significance. All of these and more provide the baseline for audiences to engage emotionally… Read More ›
Ana Murugarren’s The Bastards’ Fig Tree tells the story of Rogelio (Karra Elejalde), a soldier who’s fighting on the side of the fascist Nationalists during the Spanish Civil War. One night, he and several colleagues raid a house and execute… Read More ›