Berlin
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Berlin 2017: Vazante review
★★★☆☆ Daniela Thomas’ Vazante is a minor Greek tragedy transposed to colonial Brazil. A slow-burning drama about slavery in all its forms, this austere, visually striking film combines a harrowing period of Brazilian history with devastating accuracy of emotion. Vazante lacks much in the way of exposition, choosing to eschew the comforts of historical context…
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Berlin 2017: Centaur review
★★★★☆ Is it mythology or tradition that holds societies together? That’s the question posed by Aktan Arym Kubat’s Centaur, a profoundly moving tale about life in rural Kyrgyzstan that’s defined by its simple, heartbreaking approach. Ancient tales and folklore about the relationship between men and horses, and the customs forged over decades of social change…
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Berlin 2017: Golden Exits review
★★★★☆ An exquisitely rendered study of entitlement and millennial dissatisfaction, Alex Ross Perry returns to the Berlinale with his fifth feature, Golden Exits. Starring Jason Schwartzman, Mary-Louise Parker, Chloë Sevigny and Emily Browning, Perry’s latest is a sprawling ensemble piece full of pungent observation of human frailty. This Brooklyn tale of fractured identifies and duplicitous…
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Berlin 2017: My Happy Family review
★★★★☆ With their debut feature In Bloom, directing duo Nana Ekvtimishvili and Simon Gross showed how even after Georgia gained its independence in the 1990s, its women remained constrained by a staunchly patriarchal society. Their follow-up turns the clocks forward to the present day to show how little has changed. Switching the focus from youth…
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Berlin 2017: Dayveon review
★★★☆☆ To 13-year-old Dayveon (Devin Blackmon), who we first encounter cycling down a deserted Arkansas street, “everything is stupid”. The concrete, the houses, the trees, even the sky above him; “everything is stupid”. A stream of consciousness made spatial, Amman Abbasi’s debut feature Dayveon is an experiential coming of age tale very much anchored to…
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Berlin 2017: Our Festival Highlights
The 67th edition of the Berlin International Film Festival kicks off this Thursday with Etienne Comar’s Django, a biopic about the late jazz guitarist and composer Django Reinhardt. Born into a gypsy family, Reinhardt’s nomadic roots beautifully bookend the themes and issue that dominated last year’s Berlinale: namely migration and the power of art to…
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Berlin 2016: Ta’ang review
★★★★☆ When history is violently forced from its intended path by the outbreak of war, it’s society’s poorest and neglected who suffer most. Ta’ang, the latest film from documentarian Wang Bing, focuses on the lives of the numerous refugees living on the border between Myanmar and China. The Ta’ang (also known as the Palaung) are…
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Berlin 2016: Mapplethorpe review
★★★☆☆ “You can do it as a hobby, but what are you ever going to do with art?” This was the attitude of Robert Mapplethorpe’s father, Harry, who never understood the desire of his mischievous, provocative artistically-inclined son. Robert would go on to become famous for his stylish black and white photography, often challenging in…
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Berlin 2016 Le Fils de Joseph review
★★★★★ Eugène Green’s first feature produced with the Dardenne brothers, Le Fils de Joseph could easily be interpreted as a contemporary riff on The Nativity. Divided into five parts, each relating to a passage in The Bible, Le Fils de Joseph follows Vincent (Victor Ezenfis), a young boy who’s been lovingly raised by his single…
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Berlin 2016: Genius review
★☆☆☆☆ British theatre director Michael Grandage makes his cinematic debut with Genius, based on A. Scott Berg’s Max Perkins: Editor of Genius and starring an excitable Jude Law as novelist Thomas Wolfe. With a screenplay written by Gladiator writer John Logan, Genius tells the story of how Scribner’s Sons editor Max Perkins (Colin Firth) wrangled…