Teaching audiences to view films actively
By Chlotrudis Independent Film Society
Rating: 3.5 cats
Director: Thom Fitzgerals
Starring: Adrian Grenier | Jacki Weaver | Lucy Liu | Mya Taylor
Michael says: “Director Thom Fitzgerald was part of the cavalcade of talent present at our 10th Awards Ceremony, way back in 2004 with his debut film, HANGING GARDEN, taking the special Vanguard Award. His latest film, STAGE MOTHER, has got
Read the review...By Chlotrudis Independent Film Society
Rating: 4.5 cats
Director: Lawrence Michael Levine
Starring: Aubrey Plaza | Christopher Abbott | Sarah Gadon
Michael says: “When I perused the listings for this year’s festival, BLACK BEAR jumped out immediately because of lead actor, and two time Chlotrudis nominee, Aubrey Plaza. In fact, I had the privilege of presenting Aubrey with PIFF’s first ever
Read the review...By Chlotrudis Independent Film Society
Rating: 4.75 cats
Director: Fernanda Valadez
Starring: David Illescas | Juan Jesús Varela | Mercedes Hernández
Michael says: “This Mexican feature is a slow burn as a mother travels from her tiny village in Guanajuato to the Mexican/US border to find out what happened to her son. Along the way she encounter resistance, danger and mounting
Read the review...By Chlotrudis Independent Film Society
Rating: 4.5 cats
Director: Shalini Kantayya
Michael says: “This film couldn’t have been released at a better time as it explores the problematic uses and misuses of facial recognition, applied algorithms, artificial intelligence, and bias. But best of all it introduced me to Joy Buolamwini, a
Read the review...By Chlotrudis Independent Film Society
Rating: 4 cats
Director: Adam Jones | Darby Duffin
Michael says: “Filmmakers do a great job weaving multiple narratives into a cohesive story about the fishing industry from ocean to plate. From Gloucester, MA to Norway, Japan, Montauk NY, Washington DC, Wellfleet, and Los Angeles, this film manages to
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Rating: 4 cats
Director: Filippo Meneghetti
Starring: Barbara Sukowa | Jérôme Varanfrain | Léa Drucker | Martine Chevallier
Michael says: “Two older, retired women who have been romantically involved for the past twenty years live in neighboring apartments. They plan to move to Italy to live out the remainder of their lives together now that Madeleine has become
Read the review...By Chlotrudis Independent Film Society
Director: Scott Speer
Starring: Alexandra Shipp | DeRon Horton | Ian Tracey | Nicholas Hamilton
By Chlotrudis Independent Film Society
Director: Eugene Kotlyarenko
Starring: David Arquette | Joe Keery | Kyle Mooney | Sasheer Zamata
By Chlotrudis Independent Film Society
Rating: 4.5 cats
Director: Amanda McBaine | Jesse Moss
Chris says: “I’m often drawn to documentaries that focus on a subculture or an event that I personally would never, ever want to participate in, like this conference of a thousand teenage boys from Texas who come together in state
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Director: Robin Pront
Starring: Annabelle Wallis | Charlotte Lindsay Marron | Hero Fiennes Tiffin | Nikolaj Coster-Waldau
By Chlotrudis Independent Film Society
Rating: 5 cats
Director: Sanyuan Peng
Starring: Andy Lau | Boran Jing | Sandra Kwan Yue Ng | Tony Ka Fai Leung
Thom says: “It’s rather disconcerting to me that this excellent film from China took such a circuitous route to my viewing pleasure. First-time director Peng might have been a minor problem, but must-see Andy Lau is an in international superstar.
Read the review...By Chlotrudis Independent Film Society
Rating: 5 cats
Director: Radu Jude
Starring: Dana Marineci | Ivana Mladenovic | Lucian Teodor Rus | Serban Pavu
Thom says: “I’m roaring around my brain trying to discover who recommended this superlative film fare to me. While Jude is an established director in Romania I’ve only seen one of his 7 other full-length fiction films AFERIM!, which didn’t
Read the review...By Chlotrudis Independent Film Society
Rating: 5 cats
Director: Julia Reichert | Steven Bognar
Starring: Junming 'Jimmy' Wang | Robert Allen | Sherrod Brown
Diane says: “I guess I was mistaken that AMERICAN FACTORY was eligible, but anyway… This documentary played me like a pinball. It brought out my prejudices, made me question my values, and gave me a lot of angst. Directors Bognar
Read the review...By Chlotrudis Independent Film Society
Rating: 4 cats
Director: Christian Sonderegger
Starring: Coby | Ellen Richard-Hunt | Jacob Hunt | Sara Mound
Thom says: “I had seen Coby previously in an episode of QUOTIDIEN and was won over by his boyish charm. This telling documentary expands on the theme of the transformation of Coby from a 21-year-old female to a 21-year-old male,
Read the review...By Chlotrudis Independent Film Society
Rating: 5 cats
Director: Luis Bunuel
Starring: Alfonso Mejía | Estela Inda | Miguel Inclan | Roberto Cobo
Thom says: “Expect these further lapses as age rears its ugly head, but I was perusing new offerings on Prime Video and ran across THE YOUNG & THE DAMNED. From the 1950 date I recognized it to be from Bunuel’s
Read the review...By Chlotrudis Independent Film Society
Rating: 4 cats
Director: Ernesto Díaz Espinoza
Starring: Alejandro Castillo | Celine Reymond | Luis Alarcón | Marko Zaror
Jason says: “It is, perhaps, possible to tell just how well-done a parody is by how long it’s able to convince you that it’s the real thing. MANDRILL presents an exceptionally straight face, to the extent that it can come
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Rating: 4 cats
Director: Hun Jang
Jason says: “SECRET REUNION starts out like a spy movie, the sort they don’t set in the present day anymore because the Cold War has ended everywhere but Korea and Cuba (although from the recent news about a busted Russian
Read the review...By Chlotrudis Independent Film Society
Rating: 4.5 cats
Director: Banjong Pisanthanakun | Parkpoom Wongpoom | Paween Purikitpanya | Songyos Sugmakanan | Visute Poolvoralaks
Jason says: “The first PHOBIA (called 4BIA in festival programs) was a sort of sampler, offering up four short horror stories from four different directors, also tending toward different types of horror. The follow-up anthology brings the number of stories
Read the review...By Chlotrudis Independent Film Society
Rating: 3.5 cats
Director: Tae-gyun Kim
Starring: Asami Mizukawa | Dai Watanabe | Motoki Fukami | Tomohisa Yuge
Jason says: “It’s tough not to get just a little excited during the opening sequence of HIGANJIMA, because it makes a thoroughly enjoyable statement: That putting a stake through a vampire’s heart is for people who aren’t truly committed to
Read the review...By Chlotrudis Independent Film Society
Rating: 5 cats
Director: Peter Jackson
Starring: Danny Mulheron | Donna Ackersten | Mark Hadlow | Peter Vere-Jones | Ross Jolly | Stuart Devenie
Thom says: “This film was so over-the-top in so many delicious ways and it was totally unexpected. It’s currently unavailable on NetFlix but I came across it at my DVD store and since I’ve had such great luck in the
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