Excellent horror tale that burrowed under my skin early on and stayed there after the credits rolled. Great performances and a wicked tone distinguish this unnerving Irish-language folk horror and create a waking nightmare that slowly eats the protagonist - and the viewer - alive.
Highly recommended for fans of slow-burn, atmospheric horror. Aislinn Clarke is definitely a director to watch.
Fierce, hypnotic, and one of my favorites from the eighties. Eric Bogosian is incredible, both on camera and on the page, as he adapts his stage play through the lens of a remarkably restrained Oliver Stone. It's riveting throughout, as Bogosian's razor-sharp performance takes us on a journey of loneliness and disillusionment, staring into the abyss of "entertainment" and "audience" and finding that it has no bottom. Prescient and provocative, this is a movie I frequently find myself recommending. It doesn't get the flowers it deserves.
This 10-part, 18-hour series is, in my opinion, the greatest documentary ever made.
I make a point to try to watch this once a year, an hour or so at a time, broken up over many weeks. It is immersive and thorough, benefitting fully from the hindsight of history as it painstakingly chronicles one of the most tragic follies in American foreign policy.
From the ignored foreshadowing of 's attempted occupation in the century prior, to the dawning realization of…
WOW - absolutely loved this. Terrific performances, some truly jaw-dropping music sequences (that first one at the juke t is an all-timer), and the vampires are just a metaphorical wrapper for a story about racial and cultural identity, appropriation, and legacy. I thought the film was very, very good as the credits started to roll, but the mid-credit sequence elevated it to absolute greatness for me, and fully completed the emotional arc of the whole movie. Felt really bad for…
The third film in our Park Chan-wook screening series at the Flanaplex, and the second of his unofficial "Vengeance Trilogy," OLDBOY blew the roof off last night.
I consider the Vengeance Trilogy to be one of the most significant works of art in the medium. There isn't much to be said about OLDBOY that hasn't already been said - it is a harrowing, brilliant, adrenalized entry in Park's extraordinary filmography, and tends to be most people's introduction to the filmmaker.…
The second film in our Park Chan-wook screening series at the Flanaplex, and the first of his unofficial "Vengeance Trilogy," SYMPATHY FOR MR. VENGEANCE finds the brilliant filmmaker at perhaps his bleakest.
I consider the Vengeance Trilogy to be one of the most significant works of art in the medium, and this movie hits different when considered the first act of a three-part opus.
By itself, it is a ruthlessly efficient morality play that pits its central characters against each…
Jesse Eisenberg writes, directs and stars in this gentle, lovely slice of life that sees two cousins on a heritage tour of holocaust sites in Poland. Kieran Culkin is excellent, and it feels at times like both Eisenberg and Culkin aren't so much acting as simply mining their authentic selves. These characters and actors blend so seamlessly that I couldn't tell if it was an example of extraordinary acting, or just brilliant casting. It's likely both.
This is a humble…
Our next screening series at the Flanaplex is focused on the work of my favorite living filmmaker, Park Chan-wook.
Considered by most (including Park) to be his first real feature (he made two others prior to this that were essentially disowned), J.S.A. tells the story of a shooting at the DMZ outposts between North and South Korea. A neutral investigator is brought in to get to the truth of the incident before it ignites a war, and finds the survivors…
One of my absolutely favorites of 2024.
I absolutely loved this movie. Centered on the real-life Rehabilitation Through the Arts program at Sing Sing prison, the movie tells the story of several inmates and the impact that RTA has on them.
Performances by Coleman Domingo and Paul Raci are fantastic, as are those by the ing cast, particularly Clarence "Divine Eye" Maclin and Jon-Adrian "JJ" Velazquez, who are actual alumni of the program. Maclin is spectacular, and the realization of…
Last night we finished our Sergio Leone screening series with his magnum opus, ONCE UPON A TIME IN AMERICA. Rahul Kohli curated and presented our Leone screenings, which started last summer with A FIST FULL OF DOLLARS, FOR A FEW DOLLARS MORE, THE GOOD THE BAD & THE UGLY, ONCE UPON A TIME IN THE WEST, and ended last night with this film, Leone's final work and - I think - his masterpiece.
The story behind the film is a fascinating…
Very cool. Beautiful animation, simple but involving story. Each little vignette offers a subtle message about empathy, cooperation, tenacity, and connection, all accomplished without a spoken word. It's a lovely little poem about adapting to the unexpected struggles of life, and how none of us can do that alone.
And you really get emotionally invested in that cat.