Teaching audiences to view films actively
By Chlotrudis Independent Film Society
Rating: 5 cats
Director: Wong Kar-Wai
Starring: Maggie Cheung | TonyLeung
Diane says: IN THE MOOD FOR LOVE, directed by Wong Kar-Wai, is the story of two Hong Kong neighbors who seek solace in each other because their spouses are absent. I loved the look of this movie: lots of deep
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Rating: 2.3
Director: Christine Lahti
Starring: Albert Brooks | John Goodman | Leelee Sobieski | Michael McKean
Kevin says: “First and foremost–Leelee Sobieski gives one of the year’s strongest performances in this film. She is absolutely stunning, and is now my favorite young actress. I recommend going out to see this film just to watch her performance
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Rating: 1 cat
Director: Wim Wenders
Starring: Amanda Plummer | Bud Cort | Gloria Stuart | Jeremy Davies | Jimmy Smitts | Mel Gibson | Milla Jovovich | Peter Stormare | Tim Roth
Laura says: “Taken from a story idea by Bono and directed by Wim Wenders, THE MILLION DOLLAR HOTEL is really a mess of a movie. The cast includes Mel Gibson as an FBI man hired by a billionaire to investigate
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Rating: 4.25 cats
Director: Christopher Nolan
Starring: Carrie Ann Moss | Guy Pearce | Joe Pantoliano
Diane says: “Trent is right: there’s plenty of comedy if you’re willing to laugh. I’m not sure I’ve figured out yet all that the writer would have me figure out. My thought now is that MEMENTO used a really good
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Rating: 3.5 cats
Director: Andrucha Waddington
Starring: Lima Duarte | Luis Carlos Vasconcelos | Regina Casé | Stenio Garcia
Howard says: “What a beautiful film! I will definitely be nominating this one for cinematography. All the beautiful earth tones. OY! Regina Case was excellent as Darlene, a woman who basically finds everything she needs from a man in three
Read the review...Matter of Taste, A (France; 90min.) directed by: Bernard Rappstarring: Bernard Giraudeau; Jean-Pierre Lorit; Florence Thomassin Kevin says: “Deeply layered film that reminded me of WITH A FRIEND LIKE HARRY…. A young man played by Jean-Pierre Lorit is hired
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Rating: 3.2 cats
Director: Sally Potter
Starring: Cate Blanchett | Christina Ricci | John Turturro | Johnny Depp
Kevin says: “An interesting but extremely sporadic film. Ricci’s character is not strongly written, and her performance shows it. Cate Blanchett steals all of her scenes. Beautiful imagery can’t quite make up for a spotty script, and Johnny Depp should
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Director: Marleen Gorris
Starring: Emily Watson | Geraldine James | John Turturro | Stuart Wilson
Diane says: “Based on Nabokov’s novel, this is a story of a Russian chess genius who is inept in every other sphere of life, except for winning the love of a young compatriot whom he meets at an Italian resort
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Rating: 3.5 cats
Ellen says: “This contains a slight spoiler unless you are familiar with the recent (last 30 – 40 years) history of the Congo in which case I won’t say anything that will stun you. The film is the story of
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Rating: 4 cats
Director: Lea Pool
Starring: Jessica Paré | Mischa Barton | Piper Perabo
Michael says: “LOST AND DELIRIOUS is the first English language feature from French Canadian Lea Pool (director of SET ME FREE which won last year’s Best Actress Award). This emotionally high strung tale deals with lives and loves of Mary,
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Rating: 2.5 cats
Director: Griffin Dunne
Starring: Daniel London | Griffin Dunne | Laura Kirk | Nat DeWolf
Laura says: “Lisa Picard (cowriter Laura Kirk) is on the cusp, with a ‘small but significant’ role in ‘A Phone Call for Help,’ an upcoming TV movie starring Melissa Gilbert and past notoriety for a sexy Chex commercial that resulted
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Rating: 3.5 cats
Director: Michael Cuesta
Starring: Adam LeFevre | Billy Kay | Brian Cox | Bruce Altman | James Costa | Marcia DeBonis | Paul Franklin Dano | Tony Donnelly | Walter Masterson
Bob says: “L.I.E., at its base, is a pretty standard rites of passage story: a young boy considers his life and what he wants to become, or senses himself becoming, within a context that involves one absent parent, another who
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Rating: 3 cats
Director: Volker Schlöndorff
Starring: Alexander Beyer | Bibiana Beglau | Harald Schrott | Martin Wuttke | Nadja Uhl | Richard Kropf
Diane says: “A terrorist trying to destroy the capitalism of West Germany in the 1970s has her identity changed three times over ten years by the East German government and has to come to terms with living under communism. Great
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Rating: 3.5 cats
Director: Danis Tanovic
Starring: Branko Djuric | Filip Sovagovic | Georges Siatidis | Rene Bitorajac
Diane says: “NO MAN’S LAND is more important as a war film than great as a film in general, despite the raves. It’s an indictment particularly of UN peacekeeping forces, and of the absurdities of civil war, here between Bosnians
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Director: Joe Mantegna
Starring: Charles Durning | Dennis Leary | J.J. Johnson | Peter Falk | Robert Forster | Tony Mamet
Diane says: “Mamet’s play directed by Mantegna. Too static for me to say it’s great, but great for character studies. Excellent acting. Mamet’s younger brother plays the grad student shipping out as a crew member on a cargo ship plying
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Director: Kristian Levring
Starring: Brion James | Bruce Davison | Chris Walker | David Bradley | David Calder | Janet McTeer | Jennifer Jason Leigh | Lia Williams | Miles Anderson | Romane Bohringer | Vusi Kunene
Nathaniel says: “A group of international tourists on a bus ride through the deserts of Africa end up hundreds of miles off route and stranded in the middle of nowhere. While trying to survive the brutal conditions and limited food
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Rating: 2.75
Director: Joel Hopkins
Starring: Hippolyte Girardot | James Wilby | Natalia Verbeke | Tunde Adebimpe
Michael says: “I caught this sweet but flawed first indie feature yesterday, on the strength of a fabulously, groovy trailer. In the end, I feel the trailer was better than the film, but there was a lot to like about
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Rating: 3.5 cats
Director: Patrice Chéreau
Starring: Alastair Galbraith | Kerry Fox | Marianne Faithful | Mark Rylance | Philippe Calvario | Susannah Harker | Timothy Spall
Diane says: “Finely tuned perfs by leads Rylance and Fox (her ANGEL AT MY TABLE is in my top five ever) and Spall (the Mikado in TOPSY TURVY) as the cuckolded husband. A couple who meet weekly for anonymous sex–it
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Rating: 3.5 cats
Director: Paul Cox
Starring: Charles "Bud" Tingwell | Julia Blake | Terry Norris
Ellen says: “I saw this wonderful Australian/Belgian film at the Kendall this afternoon. Once again, I am reminded that only the foreign cinema would make a film about 70-year-olds having a romantic relationship. The lead actress is quite beautiful, in
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Rating: 4.25 cats
Director: Terence Davies
Starring: Dan Akroyd | Eleanor Bron | Gillian Armstrong | Laura Linney
Howard says: “At the end of the 1800’s, women were still powerless to be independent and were at the whims of social society. In fact, a woman’s reputation was easily destroyed by the power brokering of other women who only
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