Teaching audiences to view films actively
By Chlotrudis Independent Film Society
Rating: 3.75 cats
Director: Eugene Jarecki
Laura says: “Journalist Christopher Hitchens, who has famously tackled such public figures as Mother Teresa, wrote a book, The Trial of Henry Kissinger, proposing that the former U.S. Secretary of State and Nobel Peace Prize winner is a war criminal.
Read the review...By Chlotrudis Independent Film Society
Rating: 3.7 cats
Director: Laurent Cantet
Starring: Aurélien Recoing | Jean-Pierre Mangeot | Karin Viard | Serge Livrozet
Diane says: “TIME OUT (L’EMPLOI DU TEMPS), directed by Laurent Cantet, is about a manager who is fired and can’t bring himself to let his family know. Vincent drives around with his cell phone, pretending to his wife that he
Read the review...By Chlotrudis Independent Film Society
Rating: 4 cats
Director: Ming-liang | Tsai
Starring: Kang-sheng Lee | Shiang-chyi Chen | Yi-ching Lu
Michael says: “The story unfolds ever so slowly, and the pace doesn’t change throughout the nearly 2-hour running time, but is punctuated by sudden scenes of bizarre hilarity. WHAT TIME IS IT THERE? follows the lives of three people who
Read the review...By Chlotrudis Independent Film Society
Rating: 4.3 cats
Director: Jill Sprecher
Starring: Alan Arkin | Amy Irving | Barbara Sukowa | Clea DuVall | John Turturro | Matthew McConaughhey | Rob McElhenney | Tia Texada
Hilary says: “I find myself in the minority concerning 13 CONVERSATIONS. Although I liked the organization of the story in its MEMENTO-like reverse structure) and it had several strong performers, I never got into the story. The entire time I
Read the review...By Chlotrudis Independent Film Society
Rating: 3 cats
Director: Hal Hartley
Starring: Baltasar Kormákur | Bill Sage | Helen Mirren | James Urbaniak | Julie Christie | Robert John Burke | Sarah Polley
Michael says: “I have been eagerly anticipating this film because it featured three of my favorite movie types… Hal Hartley, Sarah Polley and Helen Mirren. “Buzz around this new film had been rather negative… largely, I think, due to the
Read the review...By Chlotrudis Independent Film Society
Rating: 3.5 cats
Director: Lynn Hershmon-Lessman
Starring: James Urbaniak | Jeremy Davies | Karen Black | Thomas Jay Ryan | Tilda Swinton
Michael says: “What better way to finish off the terrific movie weekend at the Boston International Festival of Women’s Cinema than a science fiction fling with the incomparable Tilda Swinton playing geeky scientist Rosetta Stone, and her three clones, Ruby,
Read the review...By Chlotrudis Independent Film Society
Rating: 4 cats
Director: Pedro Almodóvar
Starring: Dario Grandinetti | Javier Cámara | Leonor Watling | Rosario Flores
Michael says: “A group of us saw Pedro Almodovar’s sublime TALK TO HER last night. That Spanish director’s eye for creating exquisite visual portraits using the language of film just keeps growing. Each scene is so carefully crafted, and his
Read the review...By Chlotrudis Independent Film Society
Rating: 3 cats
Director: Gary Winick
Starring: Aaron Stanford | Bebe Neuwirth | John Ritter | Sigourney Weaver
Clinton says: “There certainly was a lot of buzz at Sundance on this feature, helped of course by the newsmaking 4 million dollar purchase by Miramax, but this comedy left me terribly dry and even a little ticked off. Oscar
Read the review...By Chlotrudis Independent Film Society
Rating: 3.75 cats
Director: Robert J. Siegel
Starring: Jamie Harrold | Jennifer Dundas | Joelle Carter | Lauren Ambrose
Diane says: “SWIMMING brought back childhood memories of a week at Myrtle Beach on a family vacation–in the rain. My strongest memory is of being hit in the head by a beach ball thrown by a drunken man. But back
Read the review...By Chlotrudis Independent Film Society
Rating: 2.3
Director: John Sayles
Starring: Angela Bassett | Edie Falco | Jane Alexander | Mary Alice | Ralph Waite | Timothy Hutton
Bob says: “Ok, the film was decidedly more dialog-driven than visual, but that’s pretty much Sayles’ style. He’s very political and preachy, and he makes little or no effort to disguise that in his work. Because of that, his characters
Read the review...By Chlotrudis Independent Film Society
Rating: 2.25
Director: Todd Solondz
Starring: John Goodman | Mark Webber | Paul Giamatti | Selma Blair
Diane says: “For me, STORYTELLING was unfortunately upstaged by the trailer for HAPPINESS that preceded it. What a great movie! At each scene in the trailer, I thought, ‘That’s my favorite scene!’ And Philip Seymour Hoffman–fantastic! “It was wonderful and
Read the review...By Chlotrudis Independent Film Society
Rating: 4 cats
Director: Paul Justman
Laura says: “This documentary about the legendary Funk Brothers, who were the studio musicians for all of Motown’s Detroit era hits, was the one I expected to topple GIGANTIC off the top of my doc list, but it didn’t quite
Read the review...By Chlotrudis Independent Film Society
Rating: 4.5 cats
Director: Hayao Miyazaki
Starring: Daveigh Chase | Lauren Holly | Suzanne Pleshette
Howard says: “SPIRITED AWAY is the latest in a string of incredible animated films by Hayao Miyazaki, the most renowned animator in Japanese history and most say in the best in world. He takes a couple steps close to the
Read the review...By Chlotrudis Independent Film Society
Rating: 3.5 cats
Director: Nanni Moretti
Starring: Giuseppe Sanfelice | Jasmine Trinca | Laura Morante | Nanni Moretti
Ellen says: “It is tempting to compare THE SON’S ROOM to IN THE BEDROOM since the theme is a family dealing with the death of their teenage son, however, the way that this film elicits your emotions is very different.
Read the review...By Chlotrudis Independent Film Society
Rating: 3.5 cats
Director: Roy Andersson
Starring: Lars Nordh | Stefan Larsson | Sten Andersson | Torbjörn Fahlström
Michael says: “This bizarrely entrancing Swedish film is director Roy Andersson’s 8th, and his 1st since 1991! Working with a largely amateur cast, SONGS FROM THE SECOND FLOOR is a visually stunning, with strangely humorous moments… but what does it
Read the review...By Chlotrudis Independent Film Society
Rating: 4.75 cats
Director: Christopher Munch
Starring: Amy Madigan | Jacqueline Bisset | Martha Plimpton | Nick Stahl
Scot says: “I was blown away by this quiet little ‘family piece.’ “Middle-aged Frances (Jacqueline Bisset) is an out-of-work writer/reporter who once consoled lonely men in 1950s Florida both with her overnight radio show and her company. When she learns
Read the review...By Chlotrudis Independent Film Society
Rating: 4 cats
Director: Sarah Polley
Starring: Julian Richings | Kristen Thomson | Matthew Ferguson
Michael says: “I wanted to just say a few words about Sarah’s short film, I SHOUT LOVE. I felt it was quite an accomplished, entertaining, and effective effort from a novice director. Sarah did a terrific job merging the very
Read the review...By Chlotrudis Independent Film Society
Rating: 4.25 cats
Director: Steven Shainberg
Starring: James Spader | Jeremy Davies | Maggie Gyllenhaal
Clinton says: “A charming and quirky comedy about dominant/submissive relationships, and how they can lead to profound emotional connections. Gyllenhaal completely steals the film as Lee Holloway, a young woman just released from a mental institution, where she was hospitalized
Read the review...By Michael Colford
Rating: 3.5 cats
Director: Babak Payami
Starring: Cyrus Abidi | Nassim Abdi
Michael says: “Babak Payami’s SECRET BALLOT is an interesting Iranian film dealing with a nation’s population and its ability to change the way things work. A box is dropped from a helicopter to an army guard post where two soldiers
Read the review...By Chlotrudis Independent Film Society
Rating: 3.5 cats
Director: Rosanna Arquette
Michael says: “Rosanna Arquette interviews international actresses about growing older in the business and trying to have it all: career, love, family. At first I thought there would be too much about Arquette, and although the film is as much
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