Teaching audiences to view films actively
By Chlotrudis Independent Film Society
Rating: 3.75 cats
Director: Dick Maas
Starring: Caro Lenssen | Egbert Jan Weeber | Escha Tanihatu | Huub Stapel | Kees Boot | Madelief Blanken
Jason says: “Believe it or not, two movies came out in Europe where the real Santa Claus was a murderous supernatural monster. Finland’s RARE EXPORTS zipped through the festival circuit and appeared in the U.S. at the same time it
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Rating: 4 cats
Director: Aleksei Fedorchenko
Starring: Igor Sergeev | Yuliya Aug | Yurly Tsurilo
Jason says: “SILENT SOULS is an art-house movie, more obviously filled with more symbol than story; it’s deliberately oblique at times. In many cases, movies like that want more from their audiences than they’re willing to give, but this one
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Rating: 3.5 cats
Director: Benny Chan
Starring: Andy Lau | Bing Bai | Bingbing Fan | Jackie Chan | Nicholas Tse | Yu Xing
Jason says: “Benny Chan’s SHAOLIN is not a remake of any of the Shaw Brothers films that focused on that legendary temple and its monks (though only fifty-odd years gone at the time, Gordon Liu-starring movies like THE 36TH CHAMBER
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Rating: 3 cats
Director: Steve McQueen
Starring: Alex Manette | Carey Mulligan | James Badge Dale | Michael Fassbender | Nicole Beharie
Michael says: “Michael Fassbender plays Brandon, a successful businessman who lacks any meaningful relationships due to his sexual addiction. His carefully constructed life is thrown into turmoil when his sister Sissy (Mulligan) returns. Despite some high profile awards and some
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Rating: 3.6
Director: Michael Tully
Starring: Jim Willingham | Michael Tully | Onur Tukel | Rachel Korine | Robert Longstreet
Julie says: “Crazy good, darkish ? homegrown southern curio of a film. Interesting unfolding of events, several humorous moments, several bizarre moments, several poignant moments…in the end, sadly, I was left somewhat unsatisfied as if a piece or two to
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Rating: 4.6
Director: Asghar Farhadi
Starring: Ali-Asghar Shahbazi | Babak Karimi | Kimia Hosseini | Leila Hatami | Merila Zare'i | Payman Maadi | Sareh Bayat | Sarina Farhadi | Shahab Hosseini | Shirin Yazdanbakhsh | Sohibanoo Zolqadr
Ibad says: “I’m fully aware that when someone like myself has been really hyping up a certain picture for a while…and they finally see it…and it turns out, surprise!, they’re in love with it, it almost seems forced if not
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Rating: 4 cats
Director: Asif Kapadia
Diane says: “SENNA, a doc about Brazilian race car driver Ayrton Senna, is well-paced and has some pathos, but it isn’t very deep. One thing that makes it enjoyable is that Senna is awfully handsome. He was the pride of
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Rating: 2.125 cats
Director: Tommy Stovall
Starring: Beth Grant | Christopher Atkins | Frances Fisher | Matthew J. Williamson | Seth Peterson
Michael says: “Some strong performances and a naturally mystical setting can’t quite rise above a screenplay that is a little too new agey and coincidental to fully work as a film. Tammy (Fisher) is on her way to Phoenix to
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Rating: 3.75 cats
Director: James Felix McKenney
Starring: Angus Scrimm | Christine Spencer | Don Wood | Larry Fessenden | Reggie Bannister
Jason says: “I must admit – I’ve completely lost the ability to tell genuine evangelical Christianity from satire of the same. I say this not to disparage the people who find comfort and strength in their faith, just to point
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Rating: 5 cats
Director: Quentin Depieux
Starring: Jack Plotnick | Roxane Mesquida | Stephen Spinella | Wings Hauser
Jason says: “It’s natural to be a little wary of RUBBER. It’s a movie made by a French musician that takes place in America, with a gonzo concept and an experimental execution; just looking at the description, the odds of
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Rating: 2 cats
Director: Gus Van Zant
Starring: Henry Hopper | Lusia Strus | Mia Wasikowska | Ryo Kase | Schuyler Fisk
Thom says: “Gus Van Sant has long been one of my favorite directors with his only real flop being EVEN COWGIRLS GET THE BLUES which he reportedly made during his period of being totally distraught after the tragic death of
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Rating: 3 cats
Director: Andrew Traucki
Starring: Adrienne Pickering | Damian Walshe-Howling | Gyton Grantley | Kieran Darcy-Smith | Zoe Naylor
Jason says: “Early on in THE REEF, a character looking at a wall full of sharks’ jaws is told not to worry, because one is far more likely to die of a bee sting than a shark attack. A part
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Rating: 4 cats
Director: Lucas Belvaux
Starring: Alex Descas | André Marcon | Anne Consigny | Françoise Fabian | Michel Voïta | Yvan Attal
Michael says: “I was excited to get the opportunity to see RAPT, the latest directorial effort from Chlotrudis Award winner (and past guest) Lucas Belvaux at the Boston French Film Festival this past weekend. RAPT is a political thriller starring
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Rating: 3 cats
Director: Marvin Kren
Starring: Anka Graczyk | Michael Fuith | Theo Trebs
Jason says: “RAMMBOCK is far enough outside what usually the parameters of what shows up on multiplex screens – a low-budget German horror movie so short that only an hour and fifteen minutes passes between the lights going down and
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Rating: 4 cats
Director: Caroline Bottaro
Starring: Alexandra Gentil | FrancisRenaud | Kevin Kline | Sandrine Bonnaire | Valérie Lagrange
Jason says: “There should be more chess movies, although there are probably more than I think because I just haven’t gotten around to seeing many (I remember Siskel & Ebert raving about FRESH, but I missed it). It’s a game
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Rating: 4 cats
Director: Wing-cheong Law
Starring: Anthony Wong Chau-sang | Candy Lo | Janice Man | Maggie Cheung Ho-Yee | Richie Ren
Jason says: “PUNISHED levels with the audience pretty quickly, opening with two scenes that don’t say everything but make it clear that this movie is less about resolutions than the process of getting there. Later on, it spells out just
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Rating: 1.5 cats
Director: Usama Alshaibi
Starring: Dejan Mircea | Manal Kara | Molly Plunk
Jason says: “Congratulations, Usama Alshaibi. You’ve managed to make spiritualism, Islamic mythology, and kinky sex boring in one brief eighty-minute feature. That’s quite an impressive accomplishment, considering that most of the movie doesn’t seem interested in accomplishing much of anything.
Read the review...By Chlotrudis Independent Film Society
Rating: 3.5 cats
Director: Francois Ozon
Starring: Catherine Deneuve | Fabrice Luchini | Gerard Depardieu | Judith Godrèche | Karin Viard
Thom says: “Earlier on in the beginning of his career Ozun showed he might well be on the way to become one of the great French directors but lately he seems to have lost his way. I was fascinated, while
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Rating: 4.5 cats
Director: Fred Cavayé
Starring: Claire Perot | Elena Anaya | Gérard Lanvin | Gilles Lellouche | Mireille Perrier | Roschdy Zem
Jason says: “POINT BLANK is not a French remake of the classic 1967 John Boorman flick that starred Lee Marvin; that would require being mean down to its very bones, and this one is a shade or two warmer than
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Rating: 4.5 cats
Director: Chang-dong Lee
Starring: Da-wit Lee | Hira Kim | Joeng-hie Yun | Nae-sang Ahn | Yong-taek Kim
Ibad says: “POETRY is a fascinating and often heartbreaking story focusing around an older woman desperate for fulfillment, vision, and control over her thoughts and memories. At the center of it is a behemoth of a performance by Jeong-he Yoon,
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