★★★☆☆ The distant memory of former glories fuels the tragicomedy of Ivan Ostrochovský’s fiction feature debut, Koza (2015). The title is the Slovak for ‘goat’ and was the nickname of protagonist Peter Baláž (himself), a boxer who represented his country at the Atlanta Olympics in 1996. A pretty emotionally distant Continue Reading
★★☆☆☆ If there’s something that can be said of Russian director Ilya Naishuller’s Midnight Madness violence-fest Hardcore (2015) it’s that you’re unlikely to see anything else like it, which deserves to be celebrated in and of itself. On the downside, its central gimmick does wear thin – and begin to Continue Reading
★★★★☆ As the name would suggest, Toronto’s Platform strand offers up-and-coming filmmakers a springboard from which to showcase their work on the world stage. The singularly named writer-director Diastème brings his devastating second feature French Blood (2015) to the festival from his native France, a country he considers overwhelmed by Continue Reading
★★★★☆ With Maidan (2014), Ukrainian director Sergei Loznitsa made a stunning document of recent events, giving the sensation that history was being freshly minted and world-changing events taking place amidst the stink of burning tires and the febrile excitement of new hope. Although The Event (2015) is set in Russia Continue Reading
★★★★☆ Casting a peculiar spell over its audience, The Wonders (2014) is a rural ghost story masquerading as a coming-of-age tale. Unfolding like a morbid reverie for a bygone era, Alice Rohrwacher’s follow up to 2011’s Corpo Celeste reverberates with the strange frisson of a world pining for a reality Continue Reading
★★★★☆ Life in the twenty-first century is saturated with images. Our hourly or more likely by-the-minute interaction with screens presents us with a multitude of ideas, news and more often than not, waffle clamouring for our attention. Yet a singular image can still manage to grab us and come to Continue Reading
★★★★☆ Opening with spectacular aerial shots of the labyrinthine Andalusian wetlands, where the raped and mutilated bodies of two local teenage girls are found, Marshland’s (2014) plot twists prove as compelling, obscure, and ultimately treacherous as the terrain it features. True Detective fans will doubtless be struck by thematic similarities Continue Reading
★★★★☆ Aleksei German’s epic Dark Ages sci-fi Hard to Be a God (2013) took over a decade to make its way onto DVD and Blu-ray this week. Shot on-and-off for more than six years, the revered filmmaker regretfully passed away before the lengthy edit could be completed, but thanks to Continue Reading
★★★★☆ It’s been more than two decades since audiences last got to see a new film from visionary Chilean director Alejandro Jodorowsky, with Frank Pavich’s documentary on an abandoned sci-fi epic – Jodorowsky’s Dune (2013) – looking like being the closet they might get. Now comes The Dance of Reality Continue Reading
★★★★☆ There was a shot in Joss Whedon’s box office behemoth Avengers Assemble (2012) which set fan’s tongues a-wagging when it popped up in a trailer. The camera panned around the team of superheroes as they regrouped against an overwhelming alien hoard. If sequels are supposed to be bigger and Continue Reading