EIFF 2012: ‘Eddie: The Sleepwalking Cannibal’ review
★★★☆☆ Boris Rodriguez’s Canadian/Danish collaboration Eddie: The Sleepwalking Cannibal (2012) is the epitome of everything a midnight movie should be – entertaining, gory and...
★★☆☆☆ “An old, mad, blind, despised, and dying king,” Percy Shelley once wrote in his sonnet England in 1819. He was firing his barbs at King George III but the words could just as well be used for any number of English monarchs including Henry VIII.
★★★★★ Turkish master director Nuri Bilge Ceylan returns to the Cannes Croisette with About Dry Grasses, a wonderful wintry meditation on male fragility and the way we often make our own hells and then deceive ourselves that we’re trapped.
★★★★☆ From sub-Saharan Africa to Afghanistan, Syria to Iraq and Iran, the climate crisis, drought, war, and oppression has created a humanitarian crisis of epic proportions. It is treated as an ethical conundrum, but it isn’t. Either we wish to save those who are in danger of dying, or all our talk of human rights is just so much hot air. This is the core concern of Green Border.
★★★★☆ With Luca Guadagnino’s terrific Challengers, the acclaimed director of Call Me By Your Name brings us the sub-genre we never knew we needed: the erotic tennis thriller.
★★☆☆☆ Directors Bettinelli-Olpin and Gillett’s “Abigail” mashes up crime caper and monster movie, but fails to deliver fear or humor. Spoilery trailers and unoriginal characters overshadow promising elements, resulting in a dull, lifeless experience lacking creativity and wit.
★★☆☆☆ Maïwenn’s French period drama Jeanne du Barry is the perfect opening salvo for the 76th Cannes Film Festival. It is as glitzy and gaudy as the festival itself, with its vacuous politics drowned out by the thunderous sound of it slapping its own back.
★★★☆☆ Boris Rodriguez’s Canadian/Danish collaboration Eddie: The Sleepwalking Cannibal (2012) is the epitome of everything a midnight movie should be – entertaining, gory and...
★★★☆☆ Bringing together a wealth of American filmmakers including Ti West and Joe Swanberg, V/H/S (2012) is an experimental horror anthology that looks to...
★★☆☆☆ Luis Prieto’s Pusher (2012) is a vigorous British remake of Danish director Nicolas Winding Refn’s 1996 breakthrough hit of the same name. Starring...
★★★☆☆ From one half of the team that brought us The Blair Witch Project (1999) comes Eduardo Sanchez’s Lovely Molly (2011) – a severely...
★☆☆☆☆ Jennifer Westfeldt’s directorial debut Friends with Kids (2011) is the kind of messy, callous and nepotistic American ensemble comedy that can only be...
★★☆☆☆ Written and directed by Todd Solondz, the misanthropic master of cult classics Welcome to the Dollhouse (1995) and Happiness (1998), Dark Horse (2011)...
★★★★☆ Marius Holst’s King of Devil’s Island (2010) is a fine example of how even the ugliest and well concealed events of history can...
★★★☆☆ What do Attack the Block (2011), Die Hard (1988) and Alien (1979) all have in common? They all know how to use their...