It didn’t used to feel complicated to be Jewish before October 7th, 2023, and the Israeli-Gaza Conflict began. Having grown up in a Reform Jewish household, I believed in the existence of and even the right of a Jewish state… Read More ›
Sundance Film Festival
Documentary “Cookie Queens” heralds the trials and tribulations of your local Girl Scouts during Cookie Season. [Sundance]
The official Girl Scouts of America website identifies Juliette “Daisy” Gordon Low as the individual responsible for creating the organization in 1912 in Savannah, Georgia, and to whom all the troops worldwide are connected. While all the efforts of the… Read More ›
“Mum, I’m Alien Pregnant” will have you laughing and crying while being arm-deep in goop, gore, and gunk. [Sundance]
Photosensitivity Warning: Several sequences in Mum, I’m Alien Pregnant feature flashing or sudden bursts of light. This may prove triggering for photosensitive individuals. Children are parasites. Yes, you read that correctly. After the sperm and egg connect and a zygote… Read More ›
Documentary “Third Act” captures self-realizations and the discovery that they run generations-deep. [Sundance]
History can only be buried for so long before the truth comes out. This relates to large revelations (the purposeful attempts to control and reduce Indigenous populations through residential schools in the U.S. and Canada) and interpersonal discoveries that wield… Read More ›
Beware the creature of the night who promises peace in “Touch Me.” [Sundance]
Trigger Warning: The narrative of Touch Me grapples with difficult topics involving sexual abuse and addiction. Additionally, there are a few brief sequences of light-strobing that might be difficult for photosensitive viewers. “And crawling on the planet’s face, some insects,… Read More ›
Family rom-com “Aliens Abducted My Parents and Now I Feel Kinda Left Out” is a tale for the lost and not-yet-found. [Sundance Film Festival]
Whether young adult or full grown, rom-coms tend to follow a similar track. The characters are on different trajectories, there’s a meet-cute, they find themselves drawn to each other, and then there’s conflict. Perhaps it was a conflict the audience… Read More ›
Eroticism is in the details in Patricia Ortega’s “Mamacruz.” [Sundance Film Festival]
When director Patricia Ortega found a revealing picture of her mother as a young woman, scantily clad in an open bathrobe, she didn’t recoil in embarrassment. She made a movie about it. Ortega was surprised by such a blatant display… Read More ›
Axel Danielson and Maximilien Van Aertryck’s doc “And the king said, what a Fantastic Machine” will get you thinking about the relationship you possess with your camera. [Sundance Film Festival]
Part historical revue, part sociological examination, co-directors Axel Danielson (Kneg) and Maximilien Van Aertryck’s (Kneg) documentary And the king said, what a Fantastic Machine (also referred to simply as Fantastic Machine), premiering at Sundance Film Festival 2023, takes the audience… Read More ›
Director Jacqueline Castel explores the torment that comes without self-love in horror-romance “My Animal.” [Sundance Film Festival]
For some reason, despite its longevity in the realm of storytelling (not just cinema), horror is often pushed to the sidelines in the hallowed halls of critical praise in favor of dramas, comedies, thrillers, or traditional action-oriented narratives. Even though… Read More ›
Documentarian Paula Eiselt’s “Under G-d” explores interfaith opposition to abortion bans. [Sundance Film Festival]
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government… Read More ›
Sex positive, hilarious, and kind, Mike Donahue’s short film “Troy” explores the social contract of neighbors. [Sundance Film Festival]
There’s a trope in storytelling about the nosey neighbor, the one who’s always at their window or peephole, lurking around, trying to know everything about everyone all the time. This person who folks don’t like because they are forcing themselves… Read More ›
Documentary “Framing Agnes” overflows with love and positive intention, as overwhelming as it is inspiring. [Sundance Film Festival]
Director Chase Joynt is as much an investigator as a raconteur when it comes to his documentaries. His first feature, 2020’s No Ordinary Man, co-directed with Aisling Chin-Yee, reconfigured the structure of a traditional documentary by staging informal reenactments of… Read More ›
Martika Ramirez Escobar’s “Leonor Will Never Die” combines art and imagination to craft exuberant cinematic chaos. [Sundance Film Festival]
Movies are magic. They can transport you to a different place and time, can help you process emotions you didn’t realize you had, or can just be a salve for what ails you. Even the most wild films, the ones… Read More ›
“Emily the Criminal” eschews the familiar thriller trappings, decrying the subjugation of self, making for a memorable heist of identity. [Sundance Film Festival]
From May 11th, 2016 – August 19th, 2018, there was a one-man Broadway show titled In & Of Itself in which actor/magician/trickster Derek DelGaudio first challenged his audience to pick a single word identifier for themselves to finish the phrase… Read More ›
The answer to Stephanie Allynne and Tig Notaro’s rom-com “Am I OK?” is you will be. [Sundance Film Festival]
Whoever started the narrative that you’ll have yourself figured out by the end of your 20s should be drawn and quartered. Especially as the way in which the world has changed commercially, the expectation that someone will go to school,… Read More ›
Vietnamese childrens’ story “Maika” doesn’t tread any path you haven’t trod, but that doesn’t make it any less fun or emotional. [Sundance Film Festival]
A young boy struggling with loss. An outsider who brings the opportunity for healing. A journey that mixes the fantastic with the real. This describes any number of child-centered stories from cinematic classics like E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial (1982) and The… Read More ›
Sci-fi drama “After Yang” asks the audience to consider what we miss when distracted by our lives. [Sundance Film Festival]
Trigger Warning: After Yang contains scenes involving strobing. If you have any kind of light sensitivity, be advised that this pertains to the credit sequence and an intermittent exploratory sequence. Connection. Connection appears to be a universal need at almost… Read More ›
Once you find “Something in the Dirt,” the compulsion to explore it will never leave you. [Sundance Film Festival]
Creative multi-hyphenates Justin Benson and Aaron Moorhead have a fascination with the line between the explained and the unexplainable, crafting stories that walk the line on a razor’s edge. This continues with their fifth feature film, Something in the Dirt,… Read More ›
Danish horror “Speak No Evil (Gæsterne)” is pure nightmare fuel, powered by interpersonal tension and full-fledged dread. [Sundance Film Festival]
“I don’t want to be in a situation for even an hour where I’m not enjoying myself” – Kim Cattrall I like to believe I’m a pretty friendly person. My mother raised me that way. I’m inclined to view the… Read More ›
Director Riley Stearns’s duplicitous “Dual” is a deceptively disarming droll deposition delving into diacritic distinction. [Sundance Film Festival]
Last at Sundance with his short The Cub (2013), writer/director Riley Stearns is back and brought his new feature film Dual which is, at a glance, a science fiction film in which a woman faced with losing her life must… Read More ›