Teaching audiences to view films actively
By Chlotrudis Independent Film Society
Rating: 4 cats
Director: Lorenzo Bianchini
Starring: Lidia Zabrieszach | Marco Marchese | Renzo Gariup
Jason says: “I had the feeling when I saw ACROSS THE RIVER (OLTRE IL GAUDO in Italian) that when the time came to expand the capsule I wrote for my blog to a full entry, I would not have a
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Rating: 3 cats
Director: Raoul Ruiz
Starring: Chamila Rodriguez | Christian Vadim | Pedro Villagra | Santiago Figueroa | Sergio Hernández | Sergio Schmied | Valentina Vargas
Bruce says: “Some films should come with their own primer. Certain people might find that concept quite insulting. For me, having background information before viewing NIGHT ACROSS THE STREET would have been very helpful. Raul Ruiz, who died last year
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Rating: 2 cats
Director: Christian Linahan
Starring: Iwa Moto | Mercedes Cabral | Nicholas Varela | Will Devaughn
Kyle says: “The international premiere of ABERYA (meaning ‘malfunction’ in Tagalog) was one of five offerings of the New York Asian Film Festival in a series labeled ‘Manila Chronicles: The New Filipino Cinema.’ It is more interesting for its aims
Read the review...By Chlotrudis Independent Film Society
Rating: 4 cats
Director: Adam Wingard | Adrian Garcia Bogliano | Andrew Traucki | Angela Bettis | Banjong Pisanthanakun | Ben Wheatley | Bruno Forzani | Ernesto Díaz Espinoza | Hélène Cattet | Jake West | Jason Eisener | Jon Schnepp | Jorge Michel Grau | Kaare Andrews | Lee Hardcastle | Marcel Sarmiento | Mikael Wulff | Nacho Vigalondo | Noboru Iguchi | Simon Rumley | Srdjan Spasojevic | Thomas Cappelen Malling | Ti West | Timo Tjahjanto | Xavier Gens | Yoshihiro Nishimura | Yudai Yamaguchi
Starring: Darenzia | Greg De Cuir | Je$$ica | Kyra Zagorsky | Match | Peter Pedrero
Thom says: “The idea for this film is certainly clever enough and if tight enough reins had been applied it might well have been a classic but to choose 27 directors to make 26 short films, each choosing a letter
Read the review...By Chlotrudis Independent Film Society
Rating: 3.5 cats
Director: Thomas Gomez Durham
Starring: Alesandra Durham | Chris Laird | Ian Paul Freeth | Joel Bishop | Terence Goodman
Jason says: “Considering the colon in its title and the way that certain bits of the movie’s fantastical elements are not given a whole lot of explanation, I had 95ERS: ECHOES pegged as part of a larger franchise, maybe a
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Rating: 4.25 cats
Director: Michael Apted
Thom says: “Naturally, I’ve been expecting this treasure for awhile now. When in New York this past October I’d heard of its imminent release but since it has yet to open here in backwater San Francisco I thought it would
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Rating: 4.3 cats
Director: Morgan Neville
Jason says: “I kind of wish 20 FEET FROM STARDOM hadn’t just come out and said that the story of backup singers is the evolution of popular music over the last fifty years, from gospel-trained black voices pushing stiff WASPs
Read the review...By Chlotrudis Independent Film Society
Rating: 3.5 cats
Director: Dennis Iliadis
Starring: Ashley Hinshaw | Logan Miller | Natalie Hall | Rhys Wakefield
Kyle says: “One of the first things one might notice about +1 if one is inclined to read the credits, is that among the list of finance and production entities are two visual effects companies, suggesting that the tail may
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Rating: 4 cats
Director: Kathryn Bigelow
Starring: Harold Perrineau | James Gandolfini | Jason Clarke | Jennifer Ehle | Jeremy Strong | Jessica Chastain | Kyle Chandler | Mark Duplass
Diane says: “ZERO DARK THIRTY–the wonderful Kathryn Bigelow’s version of The Hunt for Osama bin Laden–is grueling and thrillerish. (Be forewarned about the trailers you might get on this one–some of them are really sick, e.g., THE CALL) It is
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Rating: 3.25
Director: Kareem Gray
Starring: Heather Okun | Jay Pricard | Jeff Hoferer | Joe Thackery | Jordan Spradley | Monica Peña | Tom Young
Jason says: “Nerds are, like most of the rest of humanity, kind of hypocrites. This movie’s main character probably tells anybody who ask him for computer advice not to open attachments from an unknown source, but you know what happens
Read the review...By Chlotrudis Independent Film Society
Rating: 3.9
Director: Lynn Shelton
Starring: Emily Blunt | Mark Duplass | Mike Birbiglia | Rosemarie DeWitt
Thom says: “On the anniversary of his brother’s death Jack (Duplass, ½ of the Duplass brothers, who had a film at TIFF as well) is present at a remembrance party, also attended by the fiancé (Iris, played by Blunt) of
Read the review...By Chlotrudis Independent Film Society
Rating: 3.25
Director: Oh Young-doo
Starring: Bae Yong-geun | Choi Song-hyeon | Ha Eun-jeong | Hong Young-geun
Jason says: “I must admit that I wasn’t a fan of Oh Young-doo’s first feature, INVASION OF ALIEN BIKINI, but it showed enough promise to make me curious about what he came up with next; it also won a bit
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Rating: 4.5 cats
Director: Andrea Arnold
Starring: Amy Wren | James Howson | Kaya Scodelario | Nicola Burley | Oliver Milburn | Paul Hilton | Steve Evets
Thom says: “Here’s a wild & woolly, down & dirty reading of the classic Emily Bronte novel. www.us.imdb.com lists some 16 versions of the tragic romance so there was no real compelling reason for this new adaptation; nonetheless Arnold has
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Rating: 3 cats
Director: Pawel Pawlikowski
Starring: Delphine Chuillot | Ethan Hawke | Joanna Kulig | Kristin Scott Thomas | Samir Guesmi
Bruce says: “It has been seven years since MY SUMMER OF LOVE, so to say the THE WOMAN IN THE FIFTH was eagerly anticipated is an understatement. Although an entirely different type of film, comparisons to MIDNIGHT IN PARIS are
Read the review...By Chlotrudis Independent Film Society
Rating: 2 cats
Director: Kim Gok | Kim Sun
Starring: Choi Ah-ra | Ham Eun-jung | Hwang Woo Seul-hye | Jin Se-yeon | Kim May Doni | Pyeon Jung-su
Jason says: “A girl-group horror movie isn’t really a bad idea at all: You’ve got pretty girls, who are highly competitive by nature to fuel any issues between them, and a bunch of settings and situations where people could be
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Rating: 2.5 cats
Director: Rosser Goodman
Starring: David Wilson Page | Fay DeWitt | Jennifer Elise Cox | Joel Rush | Julie Goldman | Kate Flannery | Tyler Poelle
Thom says: “Corey appears to have it all: a wildly successful career, a caring, fun, naughty, bitchy sister, and a younger, adorable, gorgeous partner but when he wants to take his relationship to a more committed level the boyfriend freaks
Read the review...By Chlotrudis Independent Film Society
Rating: 3.9
Director: Lynne Ramsay
Starring: Ashley Gerasimovich | Ezra Miller | Jasper Newell | John C. Reilly | Rock Duer | Tilda Swinton
Jason says: “At no point during WE NEED TO TALK ABOUT KEVIN are the words of the title actually spoken, but it’s not like it would have made a difference if they were. There’s just nothing you can do about
Read the review...By Chlotrudis Independent Film Society
Rating: 3 cats
Director: David Ayer
Starring: America Ferrera | Anna Kendrick | Frank Grillo | Jake Gyllenhaal | Michael Peña | Natalie Martinez | Zone
Thom says: “Gyllenhaal brought me to this buddy cop drama that used that too-oft-used new film technique of using hand-held cameras for film footage. Has this worked well anywhere except for [REC]2. Brian Taylor & Mike Zavala are best friends
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Rating: 3 cats
Director: Te-Sheng Wei
Starring: Chi-Wei Cheng | Da-Ching | Jun'ichi Haruta | Lin Ching-Tai | Masanobu Andô | Umin Boya
Jason says: “No matter the cultures involved, movies like WARRIORS OF THE RAINBOW: SEEDIQ BALE follow a certain tragic pattern: Conquest, valiant rebellion, inevitable clampdown. Here, the invaders are the Japanese, the natives are Taiwan’s Seediq people, and the way
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Rating: 4 cats
Director: Shunichiro Miki
Starring: Furni Nikaido | Rinko Kikuchi | Yoji Tanaka | Yoshiyuki Morishita
Jason says: “Understand this: THE WARPED FOREST isn’t a sequel to FUNKY FOREST: THE FIRST CONTACT (the famously trippy film director/co-writer Shunichiro Miki made with Katsuhito Ishii and Hajime Ishimine); it’s a movie Miki made out of the ideas that
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