Blowing me away (as well as many audience members) at Fantasia International Film Festival in 2024, Steppenwolf is a Kazakh language thriller which follows two characters — a psychopathic, murderous former police investigator (Berik Aytzhanov) and a woman consumed by… Read More ›
Films can be more than just the latest sci-fi/superhero blockbuster or summer comedy. Some films aspire to teach audiences lessons and history. I Am Cuba (Soy Cuba), a 1964 political propaganda film, is one such story. Its historical richness and… Read More ›
Memory is a strange thing. It doesn’t work like I thought it did. We are so bound by time, by its order. But now I am not so sure I believe in beginnings and endings. – Arrival (2016) In 2019,… Read More ›
Even though practically no one has seen it, Unrest (Unrueh) is certainly the film of 2023. The best film? Easily a top 10. The most relevant? Absolutely. 2023, the year of Hot Labor Summer, now Hot Labor Fall. The WGA… Read More ›
No matter how hard we try, we are always bound to a system. At birth, we’re in the hands of our caregivers. In adolescence, we’re in the hands of those who guide us. In adulthood, we’re in the hands of… Read More ›
Trigger Warning: A newsreel montage near the beginning includes footage of wartime incidents, including the dead and wounded. We are a world on the brink of a third global war all because of pride and greed. For nearly 10 years,… Read More ›
“You Won’t Understand A Single Thing.” There is not a more on-target tag in all of cinema history, I think, than this one attached to the new Diana Galimzyanova (The Lightest Darkness) project, Plan 9 from Aliexpress, currently on the… Read More ›
Acts of aggression always come with unintended consequences. On the smaller scale, as when my children fight, it could be that the toy they’re fighting over takes a break for a bit and neither gets to use it. On the… Read More ›
Back in July, Well GO USA released director Marian Bushan’s Sniper: The White Raven, an adaptation of the true story of Ukraine’s most famous sniper. Whether you’re a fan of war films or just enjoyed this one specifically, EoM is giving… Read More ›
Patience and endurance. According to a character in director Marian Bushan’s (Lucescu Phenomenon) Sniper: The White Raven, what separates snipers from soldiers is patience and endurance. Snipers don’t rush, they don’t preen, and they don’t attack unless the shot is… Read More ›
More than any other form of storytelling, horror provides an opportunity of self-discovery through exploration of the darkest parts of ourselves. Sometimes this takes the form of a wordless, unstoppable shape, sometimes a clown with an acidic tongue, and other… Read More ›
With the fall of the United Socialist Soviet Republic (U.S.S.R.) in 1990, there was a surge of Jewish immigrants fleeing for other countries. My hometown of Roanoke, Virginia, was one such place where my temple welcomed many new families and… Read More ›
After releasing on Shudder, Russian supernatural horror-thriller The Superdeep is dropping on home video and digital-to-own early January 2022 in partnership with RLJE Films. Whether you’re the kind who likes to own the media you consume or you’re just too curious… Read More ›
Between 1978 – 1990, a series of brutal murders were committed by Russian serial killer Andrei Chikatilo, totaling more than 50 women and children before he was captured, convicted, and executed via firing-squad. This absolute horror serves as the narrative… Read More ›
Everyone has a thing that they look for before deciding if they want to engage with a piece of art. It could be the cover of an album that lures them in, the style of brush strokes crafting a painting,… Read More ›
Spine #1084 of The Criterion Collection is writer/director Andrei Tarkovsky’s Mirror, the fifth of his films to be added to the collection. A Russian filmmaker, Tarkovsky helmed 12 projects over his lifetime, including one short and one made-for-TV movie. Upon… Read More ›
Storytelling is all about execution. You can have the most fascinating, compelling, edge-of-your-seat concept, but, if the execution flounders, nothing else matters. Take the story about the 1964 Olympic Games in Tokyo which saw the introduction of volleyball as an… Read More ›
According to the press notes for Call for Dreams, Israeli director Ran Slavin started the project in pursuit of a “new cinematic form.” Slavin began with the idea to collect dreams from strangers that he could use as inspiration for… Read More ›
I could name five French films that have released in the past year, the same with Korean, Chinese, German, Swedish, and Spanish films as well. However, despite being the largest country on Earth by landmass, I probably couldn’t name five… 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 ›