Christopher Machell

★★★★☆ “This is the most important decision of my life”, single father John (James Norton) pleads to his social worker. “How will I know if I’ve got it right?” The decision in question, and the premise of Italian director Uberto Pasolini’s latest film Nowhere Special, is who will adopt John’s son, Michael (Daniel Lamont) after…

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★★★★☆ A beautiful wide shot of a lush, rain soaked forest painted in deep greens and browns fills the frame. As the camera slowly pushes in, several figures emerge from the morass of leaves and vines: a man and his dogs, slowly making their way through the undergrowth. The man is one of Piedmont’s famous…

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★★★★☆ The murder of Tupac Shakur in 1996, and the subsequent killing of Biggie Smalls the following year, are so important to the history of hip hop – the former inspiring a thousand conspiracy theories – that it is fair to describe them as mythic. Returning to the scene of his 2002 documentary, Biggie &…

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★★★★☆ Swedish director Magnus von Horn follows up his 2015 feature debut The Here After with Sweat, depicting three days in the life of an Instagram influencer. Structured in parts like a thriller, Sweat is truly most successful as a character study, while its representation of social media gives rise to a nuanced understanding of…

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★★★★☆ Ten years since his last film, renowned Palestinian filmmaker Elia Suleiman makes a welcome return to the fore. At its premiere at Cannes, It Must Be Heaven was selected for the Palme d’Or, garnered a Special Jury Mention and received a standing ovation. It’s not hard to see why: his latest is at once…

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★★★★☆ Adapted from her 2018 short, Emma Seligman’s debut feature is a taut, stressful and brilliantly constructed chamber piece. Set during the first day of a shiva for a recently deceased family friend, Shiva Baby is ostensibly a comedy yet has all the tension of a thriller. At its most emotionally fraught, it uses the…

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★★★★★ Are any of old age’s trials as terrifying to contemplate or heart-breaking to witness as the gradual erosion of self that dementia wreaks? In his astonishingly assured debut feature, French playwright-turned-director Florian Zeller handles the mental decline of an elderly man with sensitivity and insight. Last year, Natalie Erika James Relic manifested dementia as…

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★★★★☆ Since 2008, writer-director Robert Machoian has built up an impressive and prolific body of work, largely comprised of shorts and documentaries and peppered with a handful of features. In his fourth feature, The Killing of Two Lovers, Machoian has crafted an intense, moving and bleak portrait of a disintegrating marriage and fractured masculinity. David…

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★★★★★ Premiering at Telluride back in 2019 and now finally receiving a theatrical release courtesy of MUBI, First Cow has the honour of being among the year’s finest films three years running. No surprise, coming from Kelly Reichardt, one of the United States’ most brilliant and exciting directors. “History isn’t here yet. It’s coming, but…

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★★★★☆ Darius Marder’s first directing credit since 2008’s documentary, Loot, Sound of Metal is an astonishing accomplishment for both its long-nascent director and its British star, Riz Ahmed, for whom his turn as heavy metal drummer Ruben represents a career-best performance. Seemingly as at home with American-led blockbusters as he is with British indie cinema,…

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