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The Taste of Things
(2023)
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Vadim Rizov
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I can’t help but notice the, let’s say, “micro-focused” nature of my complaints; the movie transformed me into my own Dodin-Bouffant...
Posted Sep 20, 2023
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Flipside
(2023)
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Vadim Rizov
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Wilcha condenses his unrealized docs to a hyper-edited blur, they’re still interesting. The glimpses of his commercial work are likewise fascinating...
Posted Sep 19, 2023
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Hit Man
(2023)
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Vadim Rizov
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Hit Man has Linklater making everything hum in part because he’s so adept at getting disparate parts to all live in the same amiable tonal place.
Posted Sep 15, 2023
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The Holdovers
(2023)
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Vadim Rizov
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The movie is a skillfully crafted tribute to the effectiveness of standard coverage when well executed with talented performers, frequently funny while avoiding the unacceptably maudlin...
Posted Sep 15, 2023
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Evil Does Not Exist
(2023)
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Vadim Rizov
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Whatever’s going on here, Evil Does Not Exist is pleasingly obdurate, genuinely confounding in an uncommon way.
Posted Sep 15, 2023
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Lousy Carter
(2023)
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Vadim Rizov
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Byington’s reconfigurations of misanthropy and mournfulness are a flavor combination that’s to my taste.
Posted Sep 13, 2023
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Family Portrait
(2023)
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Vadim Rizov
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Exhibiting compositional poise both in its static and moving shots, Family Portrait attempts a leap from the mildly inexplicable to the fully oneiric in its final section. The gear shift doesn’t come off, but the impulse is laudable.
Posted Sep 13, 2023
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Dreaming & Dying
(2023)
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Vadim Rizov
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Dreaming & Dying is most interesting as an exercise in seeing his methods brought to bear upon unfamiliar material...
Posted Sep 13, 2023
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The Human Surge 3
(2023)
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Vadim Rizov
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Human Surge 3 isn’t a technological element but that’s it’s all of a uniform piece; instead of traveling across three countries in discrete, successive segments as he did in the first Surge, Williams scrambles them together...
Posted Sep 13, 2023
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Poor Things
(2023)
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Vadim Rizov
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But rhetorically checkmating keyboard warriors isn’t Poor Things‘ primary agenda, which is issuing a statement against the patriarchy and rape culture (cheers, supportive applause) via Bella’s intellectual and allegorical coming-of-age.
Posted Sep 08, 2023
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Fallen Leaves
(2023)
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Vadim Rizov
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Shooting on 35mm as ever, Kaurismäki’s sense of vibrant color remains extremely pleasurable; he can make a supermarket’s employee locker room pleasing just by painting the lockers in shades of red, green and orange.
Posted May 26, 2023
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Anatomy of a Fall
(2023)
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Vadim Rizov
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The movie gives a sense of continually opening up to new possibilities -- it’s the rare film that’s more, not less, surprising as it approaches the end.
Posted May 26, 2023
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About Dry Grasses
(2023)
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Vadim Rizov
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Ceylan is a real believer in a kind of arthouse cinema that barely exists anymore; it’s “vibey,” only the vibe is severe and late ’60s, and when it’s entirely gone I’ll miss it.
Posted May 24, 2023
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The Sweet East
(2023)
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Vadim Rizov
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The Sweet East is definitely its own thing, greater than the sum of its easily identifiable parts, which include Sean’s visual sense... and Nick’s ridiculously profuse vocabulary, which manifests with characteristic regularity.
Posted May 24, 2023
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Asteroid City
(2023)
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Vadim Rizov
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Shot in Spain, Asteroid City‘s fully constructed American Southwest looks like Looney Tunes meets Red Desert, an unlikely and fairly breathtaking synthesis.
Posted May 24, 2023
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The Delinquents
(2023)
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Vadim Rizov
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I enjoyed it very much: it’s got the formal chops and comedy I crave, a too-rare combination.
Posted May 19, 2023
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The Goldman Case
(2023)
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Vadim Rizov
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The visual language near-seamlessly simulates a documentary of the time, complete with inelegant zooms onto faces and sudden jerky pans from the speaking subject to the person interrupting them.
Posted May 19, 2023
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Occupied City
(2023)
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Vadim Rizov
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McQueen connects the Holocaust to present-day oppressions and racisms, making a point that’s as unexpectedly obvious as it is valid.
Posted May 19, 2023
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The Plough
(2023)
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Vadim Rizov
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Those uncannily convincing performances, the result of months of rehearsal and other invisible labors, generate a low-key tension juxtaposed against the larger artifices containing them.
Posted Mar 03, 2023
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Tropical Malady
(2004)
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Vadim Rizov
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Tropical Malady used subtitles to impose a narrative on nighttime nature footage of monkeys; this pauses its main Crusoe narrative about 15 minutes in to shift attention over to inherently comical goats...
Posted Feb 16, 2023
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Sunshine State
(2002)
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Vadim Rizov
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Another approach to engaging with and defanging anti-blackness in once-venerated cultural objects...
Posted Feb 16, 2023
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Wicked Games
(2021)
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Vadim Rizov
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At its best, Seidl’s worldview is pitiless, blackly funny, deterministic and extremely compelling...
Posted Feb 16, 2023
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The Mysterious Affair at Styles
(1990)
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Vadim Rizov
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Theoretically, there’s the potential for total overload, especially with the additional layer of subtitles; in practice, the images have such an obvious and literal relation to the plot that it’s easy to keep up.
Posted Feb 16, 2023
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The Square Circle
(2022)
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Vadim Rizov
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The dazzling finale has one circle grow out of another in impossible ways, dimension jumping from circle to circle...
Posted Feb 16, 2023
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Milisuthando
(2023)
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Vadim Rizov
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Milisuthando slowly but definitively transitions from personal familial archives to a wider national found-footage dive, full of unsavory images of colonizers doing their thing.
Posted Feb 06, 2023
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The Tuba Thieves
(2023)
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Vadim Rizov
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Its originality of conception on multiple levels and baseline excellence in technical execution are clearly a cut above.
Posted Feb 06, 2023
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My Animal
(2023)
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Vadim Rizov
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A nice final film to watch on-the-ground—confident in its pocket, not overplaying its “I Love the ’80s” hand.
Posted Feb 06, 2023
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5 Seasons of Revolution
(2023)
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Vadim Rizov
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No matter how courageous its subjects, 5 Seasons is a badly made testament, both compared with some of the best of the many nonfiction films that have emerged from the Syrian Civil War and related turmoil and in general storytelling terms.
Posted Feb 06, 2023
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A Still Small Voice
(2023)
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Vadim Rizov
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It’s startling to be reminded of the surrounding context in a film so focused, as signaled by its title, on formally creating a hushed space for contemplating death and care that it seems to take place in a vacuum.
Posted Jan 31, 2023
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Joonam
(2023)
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Vadim Rizov
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Much of Joonam is scrupulously well-intentioned and lacking in cynical attempts to juice audience reaction, but it also lies pretty flat.
Posted Jan 28, 2023
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The Eternal Memory
(2023)
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Vadim Rizov
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It’s predictably upsetting and unilluminating.
Posted Jan 28, 2023
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Sorcery
(2023)
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Vadim Rizov
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Sorcery falls apart fast, overturning colonial power in ways that are equally righteous and stock.
Posted Jan 28, 2023
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Nam June Paik: Moon is the Oldest TV
(2023)
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Vadim Rizov
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Moon meets the standard of delivering more information about Paik than a Wikipedia page.
Posted Jan 28, 2023
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Against the Tide
(2023)
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Vadim Rizov
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A solid verite doc.
Posted Jan 28, 2023
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The Fishbowl
(2023)
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Vadim Rizov
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Approaches most scenes with just enough of a degree of difference from what’s expected to make it mildly surprising.
Posted Jan 28, 2023
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Cat Person
(2023)
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Vadim Rizov
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An adaptation of the short story that resolutely ignores that complicating follow-up essay, toggling between overt comedy and horror.
Posted Jan 28, 2023
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Fremont
(2023)
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Vadim Rizov
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Fremont‘s variation is that its performances are low-key naturalistic rather than hollowed-out deadpan, and it gains a lot from the specificity of its characters and their unglamorous milieus.
Posted Jan 28, 2023
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Like Father, Like Son
(2013)
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Vadim Rizov
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The overall message (don’t work so much and fly a kite with your kid) isn’t that far off from the usual Hollywood family film guilt-tripping of absent fathers.
Posted Jan 25, 2023
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Blue Is the Warmest Color
(2013)
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Vadim Rizov
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Blue‘s a well-acted plot outline lacking sexual or psychological specificity, exactly the details needed to make the well-trod beats of a relationship drama work.
Posted Jan 25, 2023
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12 Years a Slave
(2013)
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Vadim Rizov
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Given 12 Years A Slave’s subject matter, it’s a welcome surprise that John Ridley’s script pushes McQueen to prove he can proficiently execute multiple tones.
Posted Jan 25, 2023
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Norte, the End of History
(2013)
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Vadim Rizov
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Norte is extremely watchable, and there’s the rub: it’s reasonable to expect transcendence at that sustained length, but instead we get a relatively straightforward tract on political abuses...
Posted Jan 25, 2023
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What Now? Remind Me
(2013)
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Vadim Rizov
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A remarkably successful/empathetic mind-meld overall.
Posted Jan 25, 2023
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Manakamana
(2013)
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Vadim Rizov
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Expectations of reliable recurring patterns are set up and knocked down throughout, which is intellectually scintillating if sometimes tough going viscerally. It took me nearly two-thirds of the running time to finally enter the rhythm; results will vary.
Posted Jan 25, 2023
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Prologue to the Great Desaparecido
(2013)
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Vadim Rizov
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Hopefully, this unrepresentatively awful short won’t serve as anyone’s introduction to Diaz’s epic dramas.
Posted Jan 25, 2023
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Puss in Boots: The Last Wish
(2022)
|
Barry Levitt
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Strap in and get ready, because the DreamWorks renaissance has arrived—go see The Last Wish if you don't believe me.
Posted Jan 25, 2023
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The King's Body
(2013)
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Vadim Rizov
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The men speak with endearing candor about their lives, vulnerabilities and tattoos, and the short ends before diminishing returns set in too much.
Posted Jan 25, 2023
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Bastards
(2013)
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Vadim Rizov
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Denis’ typically impeccable editing strings together individually stunning shots into fast-paced hypnosis, but her fluid command meshes poorly with self-conscious morbidity, culminating in an arguably silly/unnecessarily provocation-minded ending.
Posted Jan 25, 2023
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Trouble Every Day
(2001)
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Vadim Rizov
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Now near-canonical...
Posted Jan 25, 2023
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Stray Dogs
(2013)
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Vadim Rizov
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If the first two-thirds offer more or less what you’d expect from a Tsai film, Stray Dogs shifts (through an appropriately dramatic thunderstorm) into dark fairy tale mode, with an intangibly creepy charge.
Posted Jan 25, 2023
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The Machine Which Makes Everything Disappear
(2012)
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Vadim Rizov
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The Machine Which Makes Everything Disappear can be as affected as its title and doesn’t take full advantage of the freedoms made possible by its loose premise, but it’s still a worthy attempt at new storytelling forms.
Posted Jan 25, 2023
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