‘L’immensità’ review: A solid performance from Penélope Cruz doesn’t save Emanuele Crialese’s broadly drawn family drama [C+] | Venice Film Festival
Filmmakers often use cinema to tell personal stories, sometimes stories straight from their own childhood. Recently we’ve seen Alfonso Cuarón, Paolo Sorrentino, Kenneth Branagh, Steven... Read More
Venice Film Festival
‘Don’t Worry Darling’ review: Be ready to witness a spectacular disaster [C-] | Venice Film Festival
‘Don’t Worry Darling’ review: Be ready to witness a spectacular disaster [C-] | Venice Film Festival
Throughout the story of the United States, there has often been called the ‘American Dream.’ Beyond the obvious rags-to-riches story, what is materially the American... Read More
‘The Banshees of Inisherin’ review: Brendan Gleeson and Colin Farrell fight a personal Irish Civil War in Martin McDonagh’s green and black comedy [B+] | Venice Film Festival
Pádraic (Colin Farrell) is a happy-go-lucky guy. He walks fictional Irish island Inisherin, in April 1923, as if he gets on with everyone, and convinces... Read More
‘The Whale’ review: Brendan Fraser’s incredible performance anchors a cathartic, emotional powerhouse [A] | Venice Film Festival
We watch movies because we seek entertainment, but at the same time we watch them because we want to be reassured that our world views... Read More
‘Argentina, 1985’: A great lead performance saves a flawed historical courtroom drama [B-] | Venice Film Festival
We may try to grasp history with our hands, but it always finds a way out of our control. How can we imagine catching it,... Read More
‘All the Beauty and the Bloodshed’ review: Laura Poitras’ profound portrait of artist and activist Nan Goldin is one of year’s best films [A+] | Venice Film Festival
Who is Nan Goldin? For people who are not photography enthusiasts, this name probably doesn’t sound familiar. I had personally never heard of her, so... Read More
‘Un Couple’ review: Frederick Wiseman’s first ever ‘fictional’ film imbues Tolstoy in his strange, artful ode to a woman [B] | Venice Film Festival
Un Couple has been described as legendary documentarian Frederick Wiseman’s first fictional, feature-length film. In truth it is neither. The 64-minute series of monologues performed... Read More
‘Tár’ review: Maestra Cate Blanchett tears up the rulebook with her best work in years in Todd Field’s wildly entertaining and expressionistic return [A-] | Venice Film Festival
Cate Blanchett has never been a bad actress, but she has rarely been this good. To say she “stars” in wildly entertaining, surprisingly funny drama... Read More
‘White Noise’ review: Noah Baumbach’s 1980s family drama builds up steam and lets off a whimper [B] | Venice Film Festival
Edgier and more expressionistic than anything we’ve seen from a director whose commercial sensibility can sometimes border on cautious, White Noise is a markedly ambitious,... Read More
Venice Review: “Reflection” is a brutal, technically accomplished, but emotionally cold look at war and its consequences
Ukranian director Valentyn Vasyanovych won the hearts of many at the 2019 Venice Film Festival, when his Atlantis won the Orizzonti section. Atlantis was a... Read More
2024 Camerimage Film Festival: Danish Oscar Entry ‘The Girl With the Needle’ Wins Golden Frog 
Interview: ‘Gladiator II’ Cinematographer John Mathieson on Reuniting with Ridley Scott and Continuing the Legacy and Lore 
Interview: Alan Menken and Glenn Slater on Creating the Songs and Score for ‘Spellbound’ and the “Perfectly” Cast Rachel Zegler 
2025 Oscar Predictions: BEST PICTURE and BEST DIRECTOR (November)