sps-70659

You can find this one for free on Romanian CINEPUB, at that rate, it's well worth a watch. It is classically Romanian cinema in its dry philosophy, we come in, we go out, there's no big epiphany. Ninety minutes flat, who makes 90 minute movies any more, in 2019?

But actually, Stefan's life has been completely turned upside down, when Nic's sudden death forces him to realise, what a deceiver his mate was, how much Nic's conned him, all his life in fact.

Does the director shout this at you? Nope, he almost deliberately looks straight ahead, or looks the other way. Stefan's enlightenment comes to him in slow degrees, in random moments of frustration with his wife, casual remarks from the accountant at work, fooling around with his rifle, oblique reveals from Nic's old friends.

Tonally, mood wise, Romanian cinema seems quite different to most European cinema, maybe the astringent Russian directors are an exception, like the guy who made Leviathan.

Fine production, world-level environmental figures, a must watch, for anyone anywhere, at all interested in environmental politics. You'll learn lots. Don't mind the music.

Brown is a world figure, and saving the Franklin was the stuff of legend. But don't you believe that other Australian legend. That his Greens knocked over a genius scheme that would have driven Australian emissions down, down. As if.

Compared with the early days of Milne and Brown, the position of women and gays is much improved in Australia. We wish we could say the same about the environment. Or indeed, equality.

At 2023, Australia practises ~ 2% population growth, dodgy climate laws, enthusiastic logging and land clearing, ongoing native species crashes, wild west irrigation, and so on. Plus ca change...

Thought I had a free ticket for this one, would never intentionally have paid as much as $10, I know Aster's form.

It improves, from a blurry opening sequence, but never really finds its way, and overdoes the gross-outs. It won't make Joaquin's Highlights Reel, when he finally retires from the biz.

In the middle, there is a lengthy cartoon or fairy-story digression that could almost be excised entirely, and the movie wouldn't be any better or worse.

Sometimes, a messy movie can fall over the line, by really nailing the ending. This one does the reverse.

After 2 1/2 hours of bloated mommy-guilt and family psychosis, we could do with a little finesse, or a neat sidestep.

Instead, Aster amps it up even more, and plays the guilt all over again. Literally inside a stadium. Literally with an announcer.

Naples, Camorra, crime, revenge. You feel as if not much can be added. But Martone gives it a good shake, and mostly succeeds. Some elements - the returning Neapolitan's aged mother - seem fresh and touching. Others - the priest who has the whole district on a string - are not new.

You can sort of half-guess the ending, and as it drew closer, I'm murmuring, let's not go there. If you reinterpret the ending as opportunistic rather than planned, nostalgic rather than spiteful, that might help get you over the line.

For pop connoisseurs, there's an obscure psychedelic 1967 track. Not 13th Floor Elevators, or Cryan' Shames, but "Greengrass" by The Ones.

At 2022, this one is freely available on Romanian movies website Cinepub.

Longish, but well worth a watch. Sort of brings the same B&W authenticity to old time rural Romania as Satyajit Ray brought to rural India. The male and female leads are both excellent.

You look at the synopsis, you think, ho hum, seen it all before, but you would be a bit wrong. Do watch it.

It gains surprising depth and punch over its short 120 minutes, and the other two principals lift, to lend grace to Dennehy's final film.

Mind numbing, terrible dialogue, astonishingly poor acting, virtually unwatchable.

Can't believe anyone would make anything so dated, in 2020.

What on earth has happened to Radha Mitchell? She used to have a future.

Has high energy and good moments, but overall, hard to figure out why Cage would bother to make this.

Kind of lame jokes and the ending is all wrong.

Clearly, this movie polarises viewers. For me, way better than same director's Drive My Car. As good as Burning, American Honey, Stuff and Dough, or Our Time, a few of my benchmarks for 21st century cinema.

The original Japanese title, which translates as Coincidence and Imagination, is much more apt than the clunky English title.

To illustrate his theme, the director writes the most utterly brilliant dialogue, which is sort of like 3D scrabble on steroids.

For all of that, it still needs the wonderful third reel, where the coincidences coalesce into genuine insight and wisdom, of the sort that can reduce you to sudden tears in a darkened cinema.

Hamaguchi-san, you are an ornament, go to the top of the class. I reckon the old masterful deceiver, Bunuel, will be smiling down upon you.

Tight 100m adaptation of the Annie Ernaux novel, with a terrific performance by the lead actress. Will watch future Diwan movies.

Sure, with US heading back to medieval times on abortion, there is every bit of contemporary relevance. But that is not at all the point here. Diwan wants to make the pride and anguish of the young woman real to you, no preaching attempted or necessary. Cinematically, she succeeds.

The genre of great abortion movies is pretty small, one thinks of the Romanian 4 months 3 weeks and 2 days, but this one is near the top. Good news is, real Ernaux overcame her brutal ordeal and became a decorated French writer. Read her if you can, in the original French if you can.

Not up there the Boyhood, or the Before trilogy, but fun nevertheless.

The recreation of the 1960s Linklater family tropes is heartfelt and truly etched, and the rotoscope animation is brilliant, but there is a little too much ticking-the-box of 1960s topical events and cultural trends.

The winsome fantasy of the kid astronaut is meant to be the rocket propellant that binds it and lifts it, but this does not quite come off.

Not going to claim this is the best one by Denis, but it is still a good go by the 70-plus French stalwart. If anyone else had made a movie out of the Angot novel, it would not be anywhere near as good. Denis gets terrific work out of the troupers Lindon and Binoche, and finds real depth in material, that maybe is not all that deep actually.

Next time around, she brings to the screen one of the late novels by the wonderful American writer, Denis Johnson. No relation, of course.

Too many prim reviewers have dissed this movie. They don't approve of its topic. They don't think it should ever have been made.

Get over it, Sunday School moralists, the human species is merde. If few of us ever commit suicide or murder, the thought is never too far away. The unbearable pain inside Martin Bryant is the pain inside us all.

Justin Kurzel's take on Bryant is clinical and highly affecting, aided by great lens work. Though Caleb Jones got a best-actor gong, I thought he was upstaged by the actorly motions of Judy Davis, playing the mother of the mass killer. The soundscape, by Jed Kurzel, is also ominously good.

This won't do big box office, but do watch it if you can. A fitting companion piece for Kurzel's 'Snowtown'. Ain't my fault, if gruesome murder is almost the only topic, that moves Australian directors to greatness.

This one is watchable on free-access CINEPUB website, at 2021.

Nothing wrong with a smaller canvas, if you fill it well. Romanian movies often give the impression that there's Bucharest - and then there's the rest. On this occasion, there's less success attached to the Bucharest writer returning to his hometown, than meets the eye initially. The long cafe scene drags a bit, but Cohn brings it home well, and his final "reveal" is done in a charmingly self-deprecating way. Realistic and astute.

Many thanks to Cinepub Romania for making this available, great stuff.

Does anyone set out to make a movie this good? For all the witty script and fiendish hard work, I wonder. Demian based this on real events of 1970, and it was shown at Cannes "Certain Regard" 1982. Did he ever make any other movies? According to David Stratton, he later moved to Australia. Very strange.

In a narrow sense, these are Ceausescu-era detectives hunting a small-town murderer. But it seems clear they won't get a conventional arrest or trial.

Like Forman in Fireman's Ball, Demian is taking the piss out of the regime, but in a controlled, deadpan and humanistic manner. The corrupt net of villagers is us, and we could be them. It's timeless.

Half the time, the action is seen through the lens of police investigative recordings, half the time it's not. The "staged" behaviour subverts the un-staged, and vice versa. As the shambolic probe wanders to and from the scenic murder spot, blurry images of the victim continue to mess with your mind.

Refreshingly short too, but Demian sticks the ending pretty well.

Generally endorse the review here by Besserglik. The short length keeps it from overstaying its welcome, and the performances are great.

At time of review, 2021, you could find this one on Kanopy.

You can't fault the honesty or good heart of this movie. Also, better for a first-time director to achieve a modest success than some kind of train-wreck.

Neither did I mind, the unsurprising progression, of the sassy teenage protagonist's small-town blues with her parents and friends.

While the ending is apt and hopeful, I just had the feeling that a little more script work could have delivered a more arresting and challenging movie.

Larrain has done better movies. This time, there's less to it than meets the eye and ear. The scenic city of Valparaiso is the best actor in the movie, while the pulsing soundtrack overplays its hand.

You can enjoy the dry humour, the local culture and swiftly shifting alliances, but the main problem is the eponymous female lead. Whose intersecting compulsions of narcissism, pyromania, dancing, and evil-doing, are sometimes hard to follow and not always easy to believe.

Self-absorbed Ema thinks she is a fascinating character. The director rather agrees - but he doesn't always make the case to the viewer.

I love the non sequiturs of Kelly Reichardt, so I'm fine with not much happening in a movie. I don't need bushels of plot.

But, despite, McDormand's brave contribution, I didn't think director Zhao hit the mark. For me, the pro actors didn't quite mesh with the real folks.

You could run the movie in reverse, it wouldn't make that much difference, such is its neutral tone and low affect throughout.

A drifter movie that just drifts. Nowhere near as good as American Honey, which is holding up as one of the great American drifter movies of this century or the last.

On this occasion, La Salle at SF Chronicle is dead right, Brody at New Yorker is dead wrong.

July has an interesting premise, but her screenplay remains too internal to her, and she fails the simple test of engaging the viewer.

After one too many twee LA earth tremors, it gets better towards the end, before ruining itself completely with a not-credible hookup.

Stuff that July seems to think is insightful or revealing is just excruciating and boring. Mow the lawn, write an email, have a nap, instead.

HSS loves to come at it sideways. This movie opens in the morning to a batch of chooks, whose owner is going for a job interview, and neighbour Young-soon wishes her well. Is the interview successful? An evening CCTV shot is a clue.

But visiting Young-soon is Gam-hee, who tells us repeatedly she's "never apart" from her new husband, a translator. Except, it's his idea, not hers.

The two pals hold an absurdist lunch conversation about the nature of eating meat, while another Young-soon neighbour begs her to stop feeding the local cats. This meta-conversation bats back and forth. The cat steals the scene.

Gam-hee's next visitee Su-young is also interrupted by an annoying bloke, a self-important poet who can't get over a one-night stand. But once again the two pals converse a little too brightly about nothing in particular - clothes, art, the mountain, the neighbourhood, the mystery person who discounted the price on Su-young's apartment. We never quite find out why.

Gam-hee runs into a third pal, and apologises for some long-previous slight. We never find out what. This third pal just happens to be married to Gam-hee's ex, a famous, and famously windy, writer.

Can the writer be sincere, if he just keeps saying the same thing over and over? An obvious reference to HSS himself, with two dozen movies in two dozen years. Then Gam-hee herself works a brittle encounter with the ex himself.

Cerebral manoeuvres about art and artists, but this is a movie, which has to signify through visuals, not just dialogue. Inside 80 minutes, HSS largely pulls it off. He is one of a kind, and I wish his movies were easier to access.

If you find "Parasite" over the top, try HSS instead, for a different aspect of Korea's wonderful cinema.

Agree with earlier review by "pacolopez". Take this for what it is - a kindly etched slice of life among two young protagonists who've settled into adulthood, and probe around for what comes next. Where indeed will they "grow old"?

The two female friends from Lisbon are highly relatable characters. Their Belo Horizonte social set are mainly real people appearing under their real names.

At the end, it seems that not much has happened. But each friend is that much further ahead, in making the leap from the young person's world of broad possibilities, to the more settled paths that usually await us.

At time of writing, could be found on Kanopy, great COVID-19 friend.

Great to see a strong female lead, with full-on anger management issues, as if that were the most natural thing in the world. She's got plenty to be pissed about.

Vikander aces her first full feature. You can see why, her career kicked on from there. But I lean towards the lesser end of the User Reviews.

The music and philosophy props don't seem deeply felt, or played. The ingenue's progression with the older male, you've seen it all before.

How it subverts itself, you haven't seen that too many times. Brava!

All been said before, right, especially as regards adultery in the cultured classes?

Not with Reygadas. Here's a man who's really prepared to give the genres a nudge, really has the chops to pull it off.

Starting with no intro, and seemingly innocent scenes of kids playing at a lake, Reygadas carries 170 stylish minutes better than most directors carry 90.

There is a narrative arc, but Our Time deliberately operates at its edges. Characters argue off screen. Husband writes to wife. Does same, to wife's lover. Daughter comes on, for a couple of voice-overs. There's horse- and cow-play aplenty, often bearing a jagged relation to what's going down with the humans.

Reygadas still needs his get-out-of-jail card, to take the movie to the next level. This arrives with a late detonation, when the husband visits a dying friend.

As a full on movie addict, it's a surprise to feel sudden tears, in real time. This did it for me. One to remember.

Richard Ford, so I jest, used to write slimmer but inspired books for guys, now he writes bulkier but uninspired books for gals. Wildlife, which I reviewed in the Australian press when it first came out, is of the first kind.

I loved Dano as Brian Wilson, in a movie that exceeded my expectations. After a slow start, this one did too. Jake G and Carey M have done it all before, Bill Camp makes his crucial scenes work, so the Australian teenager Ed Oxenbould is the one who's under pressure.

At first he seems to do little, but in crucial later scenes, where his parents are well outside their best behaviour, he starts to shine. The last 20 minutes I thought carried a real effect and justified the movie. The ending (which is much more elliptical than the novel's ending) is well-judged by Dano and his co-writer.

I'm not saying we have the new Clint Eastwood, but for a first-time actor-director, Dano makes a few thoughtful technical choices, that I really liked. Mulligan in particular seems to bring out a bit extra in response to him.