CineVue
For the latest reviews of arthouse, documentary and indie film in cinemas and on the festival circuit.
★★★★☆ The seismic psychological ripples of China’s one-child policy – so recently and wonderfully explored in Wang Xiaoshuai’s So Long, My Son – are keenly felt in this curiously titled and boldly played family drama. At the heart of this domestic narrative is a fractious, decade-spanning relationship between a mother and Continue Reading
★★★★★ Andrew Kötting is a filmmaker and Professor of Time Based Media. A visual artist who uses film and photography to explore the gaps between dreams and reality, autobiography and self-mythology. It’s hard to put the multi-disciplinary Kötting’s work into a box, and yet he has made an entire film Continue Reading
★★★☆☆ Fans of text adventures and the sadly defunct Telltale Games series can get their latest fill of branching narratives and choosing their own storyline courtesy of the new interactive sci-fi film, The Complex. “Here is a brand new idea in fiction – a story which ends in any one Continue Reading
With cinemas closed, major releases postponed, and current productions in limbo, this is a dark time for filmmaking. It’s horrible to imagine that after months in shutdown with no revenue, cinemas already struggling may not survive this crisis. The Covid-19 pandemic has potentially catastrophic consequences for film culture and for Continue Reading
★★★★☆ After his wife drowns in a tragic accident, Juha (Pekka Strang) enters a lengthy bout of depression, unable to connect with either his daughter, Elli (Ilhona Huhta), or his own feelings. A chance encounter with dominatrix Mona (Krista Kosonen) sets him on a new path of discovery. An erotic, Continue Reading
★★★★☆ It’s easy to think that our lives have become bottle episodes in recent weeks: single location stories cut off from the grand narrative of our ordinary lives and the usual onrush of world events, culture and sport included. Current uncertainty makes this hiatus feel like it’s stretching out to Continue Reading
★★★★☆ System Crasher is the outstanding feature film debut of German director Nora Fingscheidt. A tremendous slice of life filled with light and energy, which doesn’t shy away from the tough realities of what social care is like for children with severe developmental issues. Benni (Helena Zengel) is a foul-mouthed, rebellious Continue Reading
★★★★☆ The opening film of this year’s hastily – and impressively – digitised CPH:DOX festival, Kenneth Sorento’s The Fight for Greenland offers a balanced, clear-eyed view of an indigenous populace grappling with the prospect of autonomy from the Kingdom of Denmark. Colonised by the Danish in the early 18th century, Continue Reading
★★★☆☆ German auteur Werner Herzog’s latest has been described by some critics as his strangest film in years. His first fiction(ish) film since 2016’s Salt and Fire, it’s not hard to see why. Based on the phenomenon in Japan of hired family members, Family Romance, LLC is billed as a Continue Reading
★★★★☆ Bloody Nose, Empty Pockets’ vérité style belies a quasi-staged reality that challenges the distinction between fiction and documentary, studying the stories we tell ourselves to make sense of the world. Shot over the course of a single night, Bloody Nose, Empty Pockets depicts the final night of The Roaring Continue Reading
Hollywood certainly knows how to churn out a blockbuster or three. There are now nearly 50 movies that have generated over a billion dollars in revenue, and the vast majority of them were released in the last decade. Even though there are still some box office bombs (Cats, for instance) Continue Reading
★★★☆☆ Fabienne (Catherine Deneuve) is an ageing star of French cinema. Her self-aggrandising memoirs have just been published and her screenwriter daughter Lumir (Juliette Binoche), along with her husband Hank (Ethan Hawke), return to Paris with their daughter to celebrate the occasion. One immediate consequence is the resignation of Fabienne’s Continue Reading
★★☆☆☆ On paper the story of Marie Curie, a pioneering woman of science, seems like prime awards bait: with a big central role for Rosamund Pike, playing an eccentric proto-feminist. Sadly, Radioactive is as lifeless and inert as a rock, badly let down by a dismal script, and carrying all Continue Reading
★★★★★ It’s 1989 and convicted arsonist Amador (Amador Arias) has just been released from prison after setting forest fires in the Spanish countryside. Returning to his maternal home in the autonomous community of Galicia in northwest Spain, the quiet Amador tries to settle into the slowed quotidian rhythms of the Continue Reading
★★★☆☆ Richard Dreyfuss stars in Astronaut, Shelagh McLeod feature film debut, in which she also doubles up as screenwriter. It’s a low-key affair that made its World Premiere at last year’s Edinburgh International Film Festival. In many ways, it has the look and feel of a TV drama, which is Continue Reading
