Teaching audiences to view films actively
By Chlotrudis Independent Film Society
Rating: 4.25 cats
Director: Jeff Chang
Starring: Chen Bo-lin | Chiu Yang-Shiang | Kuo Xue-fu | Masuyama Yuki | Owodog | Vivian Hsu
Jason says: “This movie seems like it has no business being as good as it is – it’s a sweet, goofy thing that makes occasional ventures into crude adult territory, and the world of sentai action it’s set in demands
Read the review...By Chlotrudis Independent Film Society
Rating: 4.25 cats
Director: Kenji Uchida
Starring: Masato Sakai | Ryoko Hirosue | Toruyuki Kagawa | YosiYosi Arakawa
Jason says: “Imagine a hat containing many pieces of paper. Each one of those slips of paper has written upon it an offbeat comedy trope, and screenwriters start their work by grabbing a handful. KEY OF LIFE is an example
Read the review...By Chlotrudis Independent Film Society
Rating: 4.25 cats
Director: Miguel Gonçalves Mende
Jason says: “The time period covered by JOSÉ AND PILAR aligns, roughly, with the time it took Nobel Prize-winning writer José Saramago to bring his book The Elephant’s Journey from concept to release, and that sounds like a fairly dull
Read the review...By Chlotrudis Independent Film Society
Rating: 4.25 cats
Director: Pedro Almodóvar
Starring: Antonio Banderas | Antonio de la Torre | Carlos Areces | Cecilia Roth | Hugo Silva | Javier Cámara | Lola Dueñas | Paz Vega | Penélope Cruz | Raul Arevalo
Thom says: “Most ‘movie’ folks have been assiduous followers of the Spanish master Almodóvar since early in his career and I count myself among them although, honestly, I’ve rarely considered the possibility of him going to the TIP-TOP, mainly due
Read the review...By Chlotrudis Independent Film Society
Rating: 4.25 cats
Director: Dmitry Vasyukov | Werner Herzog
Jason says: “Werner Herzog is the name that will (and should) draw people to HAPPY PEOPLE: A YEAR IN THE TAIGA, although it’s likely that the other credited director, Dmitry Vasyukov, actually spent more time in Siberia gathering footage. However
Read the review...By Chlotrudis Independent Film Society
Rating: 4.25 cats
Director: James Franco
Starring: Ahna O'Reilly | Beth Grant | James Franco | Jim Parrack | Logan Marshall-Green | Tim Blake Nelson
Michael says: “Of all of William Faulkner’s catalog, I have only read The Sound and the Fury, but that is enough to tell me that James Franco successfully captures the tone and feel of Faulkner in his co-written adaptation of
Read the review...By Chlotrudis Independent Film Society
Rating: 4.25 cats
Director: Henry Saine
Starring: Abraham Benrubi | Barak Hardley | Beverly D'Angelo | Christian Pitre | Eve | Kevin McNally | Matthew Marsden
Jason says: “The world may be a ruined desert in BOUNTY KILLER, complete with the usual settlements built entirely out of wreckage, elaborately made-up bands of wandering savages, and the like, but it’s also one where the one percent have
Read the review...By Chlotrudis Independent Film Society
Rating: 4.25 cats
Director: Oriol Paulo
Starring: Aura Garrido | Belén Rueda | Cristina Plazas | Hugo Silva | Jose Coronado | Juan Pablo Shuk
Jason says: “THE BODY (EL CUERPO in Spanish) is the sort of thriller that to all appearances never lets the audience get too far behind – in fact, it often feels like the viewers are ahead of the characters. That
Read the review...By Chlotrudis Independent Film Society
Rating: 4.25 cats
Director: J.C. Chandor
Starring: Robert Redford
Jason says: “At times, ALL IS LOST presents itself as pure problem-solving porn: No speaking, no backstory, not necessarily even much of a sense that filmmaker J.C. Chandor has anything else on his mind besides just showing what’s happening to
Read the review...By Chlotrudis Independent Film Society
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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