‘Perfect Days’ Review: Wim Wenders’ Latest Finds the Beauty in the Mundane | Toronto
Films like Perfect Days are rare to come by. Rather than opting for a clear-cut narrative with dramatic twists and turns, this is a quiet,... Read More
Mina Takla
Mina Takla is a foreign correspondent for AwardsWatch and the co-founder of The Syndicate, an online news agency that offers original content services to several film brands including Empire Magazine’s Middle East edition and the Dubai Film Festival. Takla has attended, covered and written for multiple film festivals online including the Dubai International Film Festival, Abu Dhabi Film Festival, Cannes, Venice, Berlin and Annecy Film Festivals. He has been following the Oscar race since 2000 with accurate, office-pool winning predictions year after year. He writes monthly in Empire Arabia, the Arabic version of the world’s top cinema magazine and conducts press junkets with Hollywood stars in the UK and the US. He holds a Master’s degree in Strategic Marketing from Australia’s Wollongong University and is currently based in Dubai, UAE.
‘Mandoob (Night Courier)’ Review: Ali Kalthami’s Nocturnal Debut Feature is a Satisfying Plunge into Saudi Nightlife | Toronto
A few years after Saudi cinema made a splash with Haifa Al Mansour’s Wadjda and the Perfect Candidate, the Kingdom witnessed a major overhaul with... Read More
‘Klondike’ review: Ukrainian Oscar submission from Maryna Er Gorbach is an uncompromising, startling look at war, displacement, and resistance
The shooting of Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 and the Russian-Ukrainian conflict at Donbas are both central to Maryna Er Gorbach’s powerful feature Klondike – but... Read More
‘Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery’ review: Rian Johnson’s follow-up to his smash hit is a worthy sequel that entertains and grips throughout [B+] | Toronto
One of the most anticipated films at this year’s Toronto International Film Festival, Rian Johnson’s Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery arrives three years after... Read More
‘A Gaza Weekend’ review: Basil Khalil’s feature debut is an underwhelming, uneven comedy of finding human compassion in the direst of circumstances [C-] | Toronto
One of the most anticipated feature debuts at this year’s Toronto International Film Festival, Basil Khalil’s A Gaza Weekend is the filmmaker’s follow-up to his... Read More
‘The Fabelmans’ review: Steven Spielberg’s most personal film celebrates the art and struggles of telling stories through film [B+] | Toronto
In his most personal film to date, one that will certainly delight cinephiles as well as mainstream audiences who love his work, Steven Spielberg’s The... Read More
‘Plan 75’ review: Chie Hayakawa’s feature debut is a heartbreaking look at isolation and displacement [B+] | Toronto
Japan’s official submission for this year’s Academy Awards in the International Feature Film category, Chie Hayakawa’s Plan 75 is an emotionally dense, harrowing look at... Read More
‘Saint Omer’ review: Alice Diop’s feature debut is a radical, unsettling, and fascinating look at motherhood [A-] | Toronto
There are films that linger with you after the lights go back on. You keep thinking about them, their characters never leaving your thoughts, as... Read More
‘EO’ review: Jerzy Skolimowski’s film is a poetic, contemplative and heartbreaking account of human cruelty [A-] | Toronto
Certainly one of the year’s standout films, Jerzy Skolimowski’s EO is almost silent but says quite a lot about humanity, or lack thereof, showing us... Read More
‘The Worst Ones’ review: Romane Gueret and Lise Akoka’s blurred reality drama is one of the most touching and illuminating films of the year [A-] | Toronto
To create cinema, to tell a story, to perform in a film…these are all seemingly enjoyable yet inherently painful and arduous, simply because as a... Read More
Seattle Film Critics Society (SFCS) Nominations: ‘Sinners’ Leads with Record-Tying 14 
AwardsWatch Podcast Ep. 318 – The First Week of Awards Season with Critics Choice, Spirit Awards Nominations; NYFF, NBR, Gotham Winners 
Critics Choice Awards TV Nominations: ‘Adolescence’ Leads, Followed by ‘Nobody Wants This’ 
Michigan Movie Critics Guild Nominations: ‘One Battle After Another’ Leads with 12