|
|
100%
|
Short Term 12 () |
"
Perhaps the most promising thing about Cretton, though, at least going by this one feature film under his belt, is his generosity of vision and the refreshingly wide emotional range that vision admits."
—
House Next Door
Posted May 14, 2013
|
|
|
24%
|
Friday the 13th Part VII - The New Blood (1988) |
"
In the end, what's the point, especially when, in the case of The New Blood, there isn't a whole heck of a lot in the way of human interest or wit to compensate for the lack of viscera?"
—
House Next Door
Posted May 9, 2013
|
|
2.5/4
|
57%
|
Unmade In China (2013) |
"
Not even its problematically touristic gaze is enough to derail the fascination of this absurd tale's many nightmarish twists and turns."
—
Slant Magazine
Posted Apr 29, 2013
|
|
|
——
|
The Machine () |
"
After a disappointingly conventional action-movie climax, James sucker-punches us with a final scene that ends the film on a tantalizingly ironic note."
—
House Next Door
Posted Apr 25, 2013
|
|
|
——
|
A Case Of You () |
"
A Case of You is a frustrating case of a great opportunity blown."
—
House Next Door
Posted Apr 23, 2013
|
|
1.5/4
|
——
|
Flex Is Kings () |
"
Putting aside the generic human interest, however, Flex Is Kings turns out to be shockingly deficient in its on-screen depiction of flexing. "
—
Slant Magazine
Posted Apr 18, 2013
|
|
2.5/4
|
70%
|
Somebody Up There Likes Me (2013) |
"
Bob Byington's perspective may be above it all, but that doesn't quite account for the shades of melancholy that pop up unexpectedly in lines of dialogue and in some of the performances."
—
Slant Magazine
Posted Mar 25, 2013
|
|
|
——
|
Cheap Thrills () |
"
There's something deeply problematic about a film that seems to lavish so much creative glee in so thoroughly and gruesomely degrading its protagonists, and to no particularly revelatory ends."
—
House Next Door
Posted Mar 16, 2013
|
|
|
——
|
Before You Know It () |
"
An exemplary example of a documentary that successfully puts human faces on wider issues, eschewing polemics in favor of the personal."
—
House Next Door
Posted Mar 15, 2013
|
|
|
——
|
Downloaded () |
"
Alex Winter knows he has a great and timely subject and, for the most part, allows these people and the larger story to speak for themselves."
—
House Next Door
Posted Mar 15, 2013
|
|
|
66%
|
Spring Breakers (2013) |
"
Where else are you going to hear, for instance, "spring break" transformed into a whispery incantation, alternately celebratory and weighted with doom?"
—
House Next Door
Posted Mar 14, 2013
|
|
|
——
|
Museum Hours (2013) |
"
Cohen may risk presumptuousness with the implicit Bruegel comparisons, but damned if the best parts of Museum Hours don't match one of his canvases in scope, detail, and profundity."
—
House Next Door
Posted Mar 14, 2013
|
|
|
——
|
Drinking Buddies (2013) |
"
Drinking Buddies plays as a kind of comic tap dance at the edge of an adulterous abyss"
—
House Next Door
Posted Mar 12, 2013
|
|
|
75%
|
Prince Avalanche (2013) |
"
For those who were somehow waiting for the artistic apotheosis of the bromance, Prince Avalanche is it, for better and for worse."
—
House Next Door
Posted Mar 12, 2013
|
|
|
86%
|
V/H/S/2 (2013) |
"
What happened to S-VHS, the original title of V/H/S/2? The name change only helps to underscore the general lack of imagination on display this time around. "
—
House Next Door
Posted Mar 11, 2013
|
|
|
37%
|
The Incredible Burt Wonderstone (2013) |
"
Filled with all sorts of misanthropic grace notes that suggest equal-opportunity contempt toward just about everyone involved."
—
House Next Door
Posted Mar 11, 2013
|
|
|
——
|
Gebo et l'ombre () |
"
The longer we stay with these characters, the more the film begins to come across as an extremely deadpan comedy about people resistant to change beyond all rational reasoning. "
—
House Next Door
Posted Feb 19, 2013
|
|
1.5/4
|
57%
|
Shanghai Calling (2013) |
"
If you prefer your social commentary in the form of a glorified sitcom with broad humor and even broader caricatures, look no further."
—
Slant Magazine
Posted Feb 13, 2013
|
|
2/4
|
27%
|
The Sorcerer and the White Snake (2013) |
"
The film looks so glossy, plasticized, and unreal that all you end up thinking about is special effects."
—
Slant Magazine
Posted Feb 6, 2013
|
|
1.5/4
|
46%
|
Mumia: Long Distance Revolutionary (2013) |
"
Purports to tell the true story of the titular imprisoned, controversially outspoken death-penalty opponent, but eventually degenerates into an orgy of congratulation. "
—
Slant Magazine
Posted Jan 29, 2013
|
|
—
|
——
|
LennoNYC (2011) |
—
House Next Door
Posted Jan 22, 2013
|
|
2/4
|
57%
|
$ellebrity (2013) |
"
Comes off as little more than a feature-length trashing of colleagues who director and celebrity photographer Kevin Mazur feels are giving his profession a bad name."
—
Slant Magazine
Posted Jan 6, 2013
|
|
2/4
|
42%
|
Let Fury Have The Hour (2012) |
"
On a political level, the film is far from a Godardian dialectic, so the view of history that emerges is, to say the least, blinkered."
—
Slant Magazine
Posted Dec 10, 2012
|
|
1/4
|
67%
|
Parked (2012) |
"
The film takes dramatic material that sounds fairly standard-issue to begin with and proceeds to uncover precious little of genuinely fresh intrigue within it."
—
Slant Magazine
Posted Nov 25, 2012
|
|
2.5/4
|
73%
|
Generation P (2012) |
"
The film is incredibly cynical, but the experience of watching it is occasionally joyful in its sense of freedom."
—
Slant Magazine
Posted Nov 8, 2012
|
|
|
——
|
Far Out Isn't Far Enough: The Tomi Ungerer Story (2013) |
"
One can sense the healing power of art simply by basking in his presence, which no amount of irritating directorial interventions can completely undermine."
—
House Next Door
Posted Nov 5, 2012
|
|
3.5/4
|
——
|
Girl Walk: All Day (2012) |
"
A proudly optimistic spirit animates this joyous film, illustrated by a combination of thrilling street ballet, exultant music, and unflagging verve."
—
Slant Magazine
Posted Oct 29, 2012
|
|
|
90%
|
Holy Motors (2012) |
"
No film as full of creative energy and imagination as this one can be said to be entirely nihilistic. "
—
House Next Door
Posted Oct 10, 2012
|
|
|
82%
|
Like Someone in Love (2013) |
"
The emphasis in Like Someone In Love is on the "like" rather than on the "love.""
—
House Next Door
Posted Oct 7, 2012
|
|
|
93%
|
Barbara (2012) |
"
Cool, precise, omniscient in its gaze. "
—
House Next Door
Posted Sep 26, 2012
|
|
3/4
|
100%
|
They Call It Myanmar: Lifting The Curtain (2012) |
"
The images and interviews Robert H. Lieberman and his crew have managed to capture are eye-opening enough to justify the dangerous effort."
—
Slant Magazine
Posted Sep 18, 2012
|
|
2/4
|
67%
|
17 Girls (2012) |
"
At which point does a superficially "nonjudgmental" approach simply seem coy rather than sincerely evenhanded? "
—
Slant Magazine
Posted Sep 17, 2012
|
|
2/4
|
62%
|
It Is No Dream: The Life of Theodor Herzl (2012) |
"
Offers at least one way to couch propaganda in a way that doesn't seem like the genuine article on the face of it."
—
Slant Magazine
Posted Aug 7, 2012
|
|
3/4
|
100%
|
Planet of Snail (2012) |
"
Even with the heaviness of some of its subject matter, the doc remains limpid and unsentimental until the very end, in keeping with its subject."
—
Slant Magazine
Posted Jul 22, 2012
|
|
3/4
|
——
|
Lo roim alaich (Invisible) () |
"
One can see the difference between the two traumatized main female characters right in their faces."
—
Slant Magazine
Posted Jul 8, 2012
|
|
—
|
84%
|
Dragon (2012) |
—
House Next Door
Posted Jun 30, 2012
|
|
|
97%
|
Ai Weiwei: Never Sorry (2012) |
"
As a portrait of a galvanized and galvanizing artist it's compelling, if less rigorous and multifaceted than it might have been in more inquisitive hands."
—
House Next Door
Posted Jun 11, 2012
|
|
2.5/4
|
95%
|
Marina Abramovic: The Artist Is Present (2012) |
"
As entertaining as the doc is, it never really measures up to the fascination and sheer force of personality of its subject. "
—
Slant Magazine
Posted Jun 9, 2012
|
|
—
|
——
|
Richard's Wedding (2012) |
—
Slant Magazine
Posted Jun 1, 2012
|
|
|
65%
|
American Animal (2012) |
"
D'Elia's debut feature is, I think, a challenge worth taking. Here, it appears, is a real emerging vision, original, gutsy, and uncompromising."
—
Slant Magazine
Posted May 14, 2012
|
|
3/4
|
100%
|
Under African Skies (2012) |
"
It does lightly suggest scintillating questions about the responsibility artists have in reflecting current political moments in their music."
—
Slant Magazine
Posted May 6, 2012
|
|
3.5/4
|
94%
|
Patience (After Sebald) (2012) |
"
A wide-ranging piece of literary criticism brought to vivid cinematic life, bursting with ideas and inspired visual translations of them."
—
Slant Magazine
Posted May 6, 2012
|
|
|
60%
|
Rubberneck (2013) |
"
Though the title of Alex Karpovsky's new film takes on a literal meaning its final moments, it also applies metaphorically to Rubberneck as a whole"
—
House Next Door
Posted Apr 29, 2012
|
|
3/4
|
89%
|
Death of a Superhero (2012) |
"
A generally affecting and occasionally insightful drama about the ways people handle an awareness of mortality."
—
Slant Magazine
Posted Apr 28, 2012
|
|
2.5/4
|
83%
|
Your Sister's Sister (2012) |
"
For long stretches in its first two acts, Lynn Shelton's film is distinguished by a disarming sense of freedom and spontaneity."
—
Slant Magazine
Posted Apr 22, 2012
|
|
|
85%
|
Sleepwalk With Me (2012) |
"
Charming and occasionally insightful."
—
Slant Magazine
Posted Mar 28, 2012
|
|
3/4
|
——
|
Twilight Portrait (Portret V Sumerkakh) () |
"
Twilight Portrait, as infuriating as it sometimes is in the moment, is ultimately haunting in its ambiguities."
—
Slant Magazine
Posted Mar 22, 2012
|
|
3/4
|
100%
|
Be Omid E Didar () |
"
An air of resignation hangs prominently over Goodbye, a sense of despair so oppressive that it seems to invade the world its main character inhabits."
—
Slant Magazine
Posted Mar 17, 2012
|
|
|
86%
|
Last Call at the Oasis (2012) |
"
The film is unassailable as activism, a work that demands to be seen and talked about. "
—
House Next Door
Posted Mar 17, 2012
|
76%
31%
83%
85%
46%
40%
