LFF: Pasolini review
Creating a biopic of the controversial Italian director, poet and essayist Pier Paolo Pasolini is quite an undertaking, and while Abel Ferrara may have stumbled every now and again in Pasolini, he’s certainly made an admirable effort. Willem Dafoe, who does look rather like Pasolini, attacks the central role with confidence and imbues the film with a real sense … Read more
Interstellar review
Interstellar opens with the introduction of a farm, and the imagery brings to mind such middle-of-the-road fare as Field of Dreams and the TV adaptation of Stephen King‘s The Stand. There’s nothing in this sequence that even approaches the bleak beauty of John Steinbeck or the great dustbowl poets of the Great Depression, though that would seem … Read more
LFF: Wild Tales review
Wild Tales, a portmanteau film comprised of six stories, opens with one of the funniest sequences I’ve seen in some time. This scene ends with a punchline that is immediately obvious to some but takes a little longer for others to ‘get,’ which results in a slow build of laughter. In my screening, this climaxed at the … Read more
LFF: Nas – Time is Illmatic review
The starting point of Nas: Time is Illmatic, the debut documentary feature from director One9 and writer Erik Parker, is not just that Illmatic, Nas’ debut album, is a great album but that it is a perfect record. It’s no surprise, then, to find that the film is reverential in tone, but what is perhaps most … Read more