Category Archives: Reviews, previews, profiles and movie news

Yeah, it’s a dramedy. Sad and dark and funny. July 7. Take a gander.

Put the French thriller “Rodeo” in enough theaters, and the main thing greeting the next “Fast/Furious” iteration — along with tens of millions at the box office — would be hoots of laughter. “Rodeo” is an unblinking, gritty and nervous … Continue reading →

Imagine “Weekend at Bernie’s” as a caper comedy directed by John Waters’ Filipina sister. That’s “Partners in Crime,” a campy Filipino romp filled with drag performers, only because they’re Filipino, they’re of a culturally accepted “third gender,” baklâ. Watching the … Continue reading →

“A Handful of Water” is a feel good immigration tale that doesn’t quite the deliver the feels. A choppy, untidy narrative, abrupt shifts in temperament and a vague grasp of right, wrong, morality and the law drag this slight, sentimental … Continue reading →

Today’s trip “Around the World with Netflix” is a nostalgic and cute Italian comedy the tells us “You can go home again.” Or as the Neopolitans put it, “The happy bird makes its next in its own valley.” “A Breath … Continue reading →

My favorite memory of the landmark Canadian Internet browsing browsing phone was at a mid-90s screening at the Toronto Film Festival. I’m sitting near the back, and those damned green screens completely decorated the auditorium, distracting one from the latest … Continue reading →

The boy looks like any one of the hundreds of hustling teens on Panama City’s streets. His scam is using traffic cones to sell parking spots with implied “Be a shame if something happened to your nice car” “protection” in … Continue reading →

No, this trailer gives away…nothing. But that cast, with André Dussollier, in a drama about the Biggest End of Life Decision from François Ozon, who gave us “8 Women” and “Swimming Pool?” That’s worth marking April 14 on your calendar.

What a fascinating, layered character “Return to Seoul” is built around. Frederique is ever-so French — aloof, patronizing and occasionally downright rude. She is young, bourgeois and pretty, an only child. That adds headstrong, impulsive and sexually assertive to the … Continue reading →

The wonder of “Joyland,” Pakistan’s contender for this year’s Best International Feature Oscar, is that such a marvel exists. A more bitter than sweet transgender love triangle romance filmed and set in the Muslim world? How could this be? Director … Continue reading →