contact-742-500835 Reviews

Woe (2020)

... very well crafted smart film.

[10/10 · 10 June 2021]

Woe written and directed by Matthew Goodhue is a very well crafted smart film. Mr. Goodhue's choice and style to build a story around a very common situation in a very "un-common" way is brilliant filmmaking. Woe is sharp-well casted-and finds a way to stay with you long after the final credits.

-Oaxaca FilmFest.

The Ribbon (2019)

The Ribbon is a spectacular journey for all ...

[10/10 · 25 January 2021]

Polla-Ilariya Kozino' animated short The Ribbon is a spectacular journey for all one's senses. Smart animation blended with an intelligent story line grounded in a strong score. The film captures you from the first frame and holds you in suspended "animation" until the final credits. A sure fire hit on the global festival circuit. -Oaxaca FilmFest

Exploring the Pacific Northwest (2019)

important and Smart

[10/10 · 25 January 2021]

Ian Anthony Nelson's Exploring the Pacific Northwest is critical, important and smart filmmaking. His visual eye is a master class in cinematography. -Oaxaca FilmFest

Silêncio - Vozes de Lisboa (2020)

Beautiful Filmmaking

[10/10 · 6 January 2021]

Céline Coste Carlisle and Judit Kalmár team up to bring us Silêncio - Vozes de Lisboa (Silêncio - Voices of Lisbon) a well crafted documentary from Portugal. The cinematography and the music are entrancing. However, it is the characters and the story line that will really connect with audiences around the globe. The methodology used to transform Ivone and Marta's lives to film is done with such grace and elegance. Simultaneously having us-the audience-examine how the ever changing world will eventually impact our own lives. Beautiful filmmaking.

Oaxaca FilmFest

Three Brothers Two (2020)

POWERFUL

[10/10 · 6 January 2021]

Three Brothers Two is POWERFUL! Director Craig Moore brings a must see film to the festival circuit. A strong script with captivating characters and a riveting story line pulls us in from the opening and keeps us mesmerized till the end. A sure hit on the global festival circuit. -Oaxaca FilmFest

Within (X) (2018)

... draws you in from the first frame

[10/10 · 5 January 2021]

Writer Director Matteo Ciotola delivers something very special with his Italian short Come è entrato (Within). Within, draws you in from the first frame. Young Mr. Ciotola's choice to take an experimental path in telling his story is smart filmmaking and his visual eye is a master class in cinematography. Within, is sure to be a hit on the international festival circuit. -Oaxaca FilmFest

All Over Again (2017)

ALL OVER AGAIN is a short-film about a man who finds inspiration in looking back at his own choices and regaining his talents once again.

[10/10 · 1 August 2018]

When we first meet Gregory (Joseph Fuoco) he's at his home office trying to play his old guitar, but something is not right, he can't focus, he can't get the strings to compose the notes that in the past would have emerged with ease. Something is getting in the way and it's frustrating for Greg. Greg attends the Bus Stop Café, a bohemian music and poetry club where he gets to see others on stage while he sits with his friend Kenny and enjoys the talents of his fellow artists, except of course that when people suggest that Greg should get on stage and play his guitar he keeps passing on the offer. Greg has been happily married for years with his wife, Victoria (Constance Reschey) and they have a son, Adam (Mahdi Shadji) who is bound for college. While Greg seems to be content with his life, every time he attempts to play his guitar he keeps getting flashbacks of the moment everything changed for him, a moment that perhaps is the reason as to why he isn't able to play again.

ALL OVER AGAIN is a character study and an examination of creative block, for some this condition may seem as a minimal affliction, but in reality creative crippling is an endlessly frustrating state of mind. While the condition may not be medical or something that could be cured through common medicine, it is still an ordeal for those whose living depends of their creativity, whether it is music, writing or painting. In Greg's case he's unable to play his guitar (although we don't know for how long this has been happening) and every time he attempts to do so the strings just won't respond to his fingers, or perhaps his fingers won't respond to the strings. Greg keeps going to the café perhaps searching for inspiration, looking at others who can tap into their creative skills and talents and simply play, it's not self-torture but sometimes Greg seems to be trying to find in others what he has lost. Back at home, Greg lives a happy existence along with his wife and son, he seems to have been living a good life, his wife is loving and supporting and their son has grown into a formidable young man who is on his way to a successful stint in college. As we see in flashbacks, Greg used to play his guitar with ease when he was young, playing for his wife and on his own. But everything changed once Victoria got pregnant and it appears that while Greg was happy with the news, his life changed forever. We don't know for sure, but it is implied that Greg probably had to leave a career as a musician in order to support his new family. Greg does not recent this, nor he is bitter about it, but it does reflect in his inability to play his guitar. So, now that Greg has successfully supported his family through the years and has also proven to himself that he made the right choice, with this peace of mind, his guitar skills come back and he is now inspired by his family to play and sing again. Many films concentrate on people who are at the beginning of their careers, young and full of dreams and vitality, but we seldom see the point of view of someone who is much more mature and older who attempts to return to their passion and re-ignite their dreams. Greg is not portrayed as a bitter resentful man, on the contrary, he is a good husband and he never takes his frustration out on his loved ones, precisely because they are his loved ones. In any other film, Greg would have been portrayed as someone who either had a drinking problem to drawn his sorrow or someone who was alienated from his family due to his artistic depression. But this is not that character, Greg is a man's man. He made a choice, he made the best out of it and never turned back in regret, and now that he can look back at his life and be satisfied with his choices, he can pick up his guitar once more and go at it. It's meant to inspire people like Greg who put their dreams on hold in order to take responsibility to realize that it's really never too late to begin ALL OVER AGAIN.

Joseph McGovern's short film debut is focused on its story and its characters, it's not pretentious work but rather a straightforward folk tale about something that many people can relate to, not just from a creative point of view but also for those who are probably at a stage in their lives where they are looking back at their choices and asking themselves if they did the right thing and whom sacrificed something they were passionate about in order to be responsible. In this regard, McGovern makes an assured debut and statement where he wants to tell people in that situation that yes, taking responsibility and making the best out of it can be just as fulfilling as chasing one's dreams. McGovern's actor's direction is also on point; props have to go to his main performer Joseph Fuoco as Greg. Fuoco transmits the quiet frustration in Greg as he tries to pick up his guitar and his failure to concentrate without going into fits, he goes instead for a subdued and sensible representation of such a complex state of mind, much more internalized and personal, rather than explosive and flashy. Fuoco transmits an almost Zen calm from Greg, which is part of his personality. You can see this man knows he can still get back on the saddle, but he has to figure out exactly what keeps him from focusing. It's an interesting character arc that is uncomplicated, while it is psychological it doesn't dabble into deep complicated characterizations of the human mind, rather it goes for an easier explanation for Greg's state of mind, it only required for him to search his feeling in order to get to root source of the problem. It's this simplicity and uncomplicated minimalist approach to its subject that fits so well with Greg's folk music. Much like its main character, this film picks up its themes and shows them so well because it knows itself so well.

Jimbo (I) (2016)

Part messed-up coming-of age story, part neo-noir/western hybrid.

[10/10 · 3 May 2018]

JIMBO (Ian Lerch) is a quiet, troubled sixteen year old kid who works as a getaway driver for his unbalanced father; a Psychotic criminal known as "El Tigron" (James Seaman) and his lover Lolli (Megan Rippey) who are on a bank robbing spree. As they arrive to the town where their new mark is, Jimbo notices a high end prostitute named Kelly (Sylvia Cochinski) who distracts him and makes him almost blow the robbery when he unsuccessfully tries to talk to her, leaving his position as getaway driver. The trio manages to get away with a good amount of money, despite Jimbo's distractions. They arrive at a place in the middle of nowhere where El Tigron and Lolli stop to celebrate. After years of bullying, Jimbo snaps and decides to take what he believes is rightfully his and return to claim his price; Kelly.

JIMBO is a harsh crime story, but also a harsher coming-of-age tale of a kid who is awakening to manhood despite being constantly crushed by his abusive father. El Tigron lives his life as an outlaw, spewing tough guy anti-establishment phrases and believing his own crap, he even has stickers INSIDE the car (wouldn't want to give-away his true intentions to the world by posting them outside) with rebellious mottos, fully convinced that he is a rebel and outlaw, even going so far as to ditching cellphones as if they were shackles that kept him from freedom. The cast informs us of the back-stories of each character. We know just by looking at them that Jimbo's mother has either left them or passed away, El Tigron likes to feel like a tough guy, by keeping someone weaker like Jimbo under his thumb, despite the fact that he doesn't seem to tolerate nor want the kid around, except as a getaway driver (one we even doubt is effective at driving) Lolli is almost as young as Jimbo, she dresses up almost like a little girl. She's a runaway, someone who found in the much older El Tigron what she couldn't find in her real father. In a way, she doesn't take Jimbo's spot as her "stepmom" but more like a stepsister, one who clearly rejoices in knowing that she's preferred by El Tigron's affections over Jimbo and not just because she gives him sex and validates his tough-macho act, but because she's a better pupil and partner than Jimbo is when it comes to crime. She's both surrogate daughter and lover, and someone much more capable at violence and crime than Jimbo is, she's always riding Shotgun while Jimbo sits in the back, like babies do. Jimbo's sexuality is also the main catalyst for his rebellion against El Tigron. Sex is all around him, in his dreams, right in front of him between El Tigron and Lolli, in magazines, even when he pumps gasoline. To Jimbo sex equals power, El Tigron may be a terrible role model, but he's still the one that Jimbo gets. He sees in him a man who takes what he wants and haves what he wants. Jimbo has an almost prophetic dream, the road leads to a naked woman, to sex, and it is his destiny. When he sees Kelly it becomes clear, fulfilling the prophecy of his dreams, she's where the road must lead to, where power leads to. Once the robbery goes down, he defies El Tigron, clumsily, but still a step in the right direction for him, he abandons his father and his surrogate sister/competitor and rides like in his dream to meet Kelly, to buy her and become his own man, to become El Tigron. Unfortunately, another man takes Kelly for himself. Oh, well, perhaps another time, then.

JIMBO is excellently crafted on a pure technical level. This is a level of polish that all short-narratives should strive for if they wish to be noticed. And JIMBO is the kind of work that gets talent noticed, both in front and behind the camera. Excellent casting all around, with each member of the cast giving standout performances, from Ian Lerch as the titular character, he projects Jimbo's conflicted thoughts, his self-doubt, shame and frustration and the stutter caused by him reaching boiling point. James Seaman as "El Tigron" is a delightful bully, sleazy and cruel. Megan Therese Rippey as Lolli projects sex and a volatile personality that shouldn't be underestimated when it comes to violence, and Sylvia Kochinski comes off as icy and mysterious, the unattainable object of Jimbo's desires. Talent behind the camera is top notch as director Rodrigo Zanforlin directs with confidence, his assured hand blends his noir and western influences creating a fully believable world of harshness that is merciless to the weak. Guigo Foggiatto and Leco Moura's cinematography is sweaty, scorching hot and dry, it fits the desolation of this dusty, sun-drenched world and serving its themes. The camera work captures the emptiness of the spaces as a reflection of Jimbo's own sense of neglect. Excellent work all around.

To the Flame (2017)

TO THE FLAME is a study in the irresistible fascination with documenting lurid material as well as glorifying strange and often dangerous characters into celebrity status.

[10/10 · 13 February 2018]

Kyle (Ari Brand) has been unsuccessful so far in finding a fascinating subject for a documentary for his film class at his community college. He's been filming boring and uninteresting people so far, members of his community until one day he finds a strange couple formed by wheelchair bound Barb (Shirleyann Kaladajian) and intense psycho Dick (Alex Webb) Kyle enlists the help of fellow film students Penny (Jasmine Carmichael) who becomes Kyle's romantic interest and his Best friend Sam (Maul Donte Davis). The weird couple is obviously attractive from an interest point of view as they are both fascinating despite being obviously strange, however it is Dick who gives the strongest vibe that there may be something beyond just weirdness and eccentricity when it comes to these two, something probably more shady and dangerous than Kyle would like to admit. However, despite the obvious signs that Kyle should get away from the couple as fast as he can, his fascination for them keeps him coming back for more. If Kyle doesn't get away from Barb and Dick, he will burn like a moth does when attracted to THE FLAME.

It is almost a cliché that in thrillers or horror films where there's obviously something wrong going on, characters make strange and often stupid choices like staying at the haunted house or approaching strange people who give clear signs of danger. However, in Alex Webb's thriller TO THE FLAME there is a very good reason for Kyle to plunge himself into peril despite the obvious warning signs the couple that has become the focus of his documentary give away. Kyle is an aimless young man attending community college and he's given an assignment to interview people in his town, which is a boring and tranquil place, but also a dead end. Kyle is stuck interviewing chinchilla farmers and coming home to an empty fridge. At class, he hears his professor speak of the myth of Achilles, the great warrior of myth who fought at Troy, who was given a choice: Forsake war and live a mundane life and become forgotten, or head to Troy and achieve glory and immortality. His opportunity arrives when he finds Barb and Dick, a strange couple living in seclusion and keeping to themselves. Barb is welcoming to Kyle and takes to the idea of his documentary, while Kyle is far more aggressive and unwilling to participate. Kyle finds in the couple the perfect subject for his documentary, but also the first glimmer of uniqueness and excitement in his boring and unassuming town. Dick is basically a walking "Warning!" sign, but much like Achilles, Kyle realizes that it is this very danger that will give him a chance at glory, even if he burns in the process. As for Dick, he eventually gives into being filmed by Kyle, he may have tried to keep to himself and not call attention, but his narcissism (part of his psychopathy) pushes him to open himself up to the camera. All psychopaths claim for attention, and he has now someone who gives that attention to him, Dick even has a box that makes cheering sounds when he opens it like a music box. Dick knows that he should allow Kyle to film him (he becomes particularly violent when Kyle uploads a video of him on the internet) as he could be recognized, but the sensation of validation becomes intoxicating and forgets his discipline. The title refers to the mortal attraction of moths to flames, moths cannot help the attraction, and they simply head into the burning light. Both Kyle and Dick are moths, each attracted to the light that emanates from each other, but unlike moths who have no consciousness of their acts, Dick and Kyle are aware of the inherent danger that they both represent. The things that they offer to each other are irresistible: excitement and attention. In this regard, TO THE FLAME becomes a parable of the way that content creators are constantly trying to find the most sensational subject they can find while simultaneously validating and glorifying deranged people into celebrity status. The relation between documentary maker and subject is one of mutual attraction, it becomes irresistible, and also for the audience as Kyle's fellow classmates become glued to the screen anytime they witness new footage of Dick's strange shenanigans.

Alex Webb's TO THE FLAME is darkly comedic thriller that balances its uncomfortable humor with suspense and thrills, the script always stays on point and never deviates from its main subject. Ari Brand plays Kyle with a boyish and unassuming charm whose ambition and desire to leave his small town behind gets the best of him, he can't escape Barb and Dick's orbit anymore nor does he want to, the material he gets from them is too good, but there may also be a personal reason for him to investigate the coupe further. Shirleyann Kaladjian plays the wheelchair bound Barb with more restrain, doing a more disciplined job at hiding the cracks in her psyche, yet her psyche is as damaged as her physique. Jasmine Carmichael's Penny is the one character who keeps her sensitive core and can see right through Barb and Dick's madness, but she's also seeing how Kyle is becoming more and more detached from reality while she stays grounded. Pulling double duties as both Director and actor is Alex Webb himself who plays Dick. The film wouldn't work if Barb and Dick weren't truly fascinating and worthy of being obsessed with, but Dick is a magnetic character who commands attention, he's weird in a way that could be just unassumingly eccentric or unhinged and lethal. Webb provides Dick with an imposing physique who easily outmatches Kyle's smaller and weaker frame. He's sometimes charming and paternal to Kyle but when the switch is on he becomes a wrecking ball. Dick is simultaneously the antagonist and the comic relief as his behavior goes from hilarious to unnerving in a matter of seconds, he is unpredictable at all moments. TO THE FLAME works because its characters make the wrong choices for very understandable reasons.

Eyes and Prize (2018)

EYES AND PRIZE is darker than BLACK MIRROR in its brutal commentary on internet celebrity culture, surveillance and power dynamics.

[10/10 · 24 January 2018]

Four strangers arrive one by one at an apartment, the apartment is actually a customized set fully equipped with cameras, lighting equipment and everything necessary for them to live for the next weeks. All four participants believe they have been chosen to star in a new reality online show with the promise of a prize if they make it all the way through. At first they try to ease into their roles as reality internet stars, but they begin to realize that something is off, and that the reason they may not be there for the entertainment of the masses.

With its commentary on reality TV shows, online celebrity culture, the dark web and voyeurism, Oliver Cane's EYES AND PRIZE is like the BLACK MIRROR episode that Charlie Brooker didn't thought of. Each of the four participants enter the set believing that they are about to become participants of an online show, where they will live together for the next weeks (or months) and see what happens. The premise of such shows go back to MTV's THE REAL WORLD where the cast was comprised of young gen-x strangers who would live under the same roof, they personalities carefully curated knowing that they would eventually crate drama among each other, making for an entertaining view, the formula was later copied and rehashed countless times until it met its ultimate incarnation in BIG BROTHER a show that made reference to George Orwell's totalitarian regime in his visionary and (sadly) relevant masterpiece 1984, due to the array of cameras watching every move of the participants who would live under the same roof, but unlike "The Real World" where the cast could go out of the house, here, they had to remain indoors until they got kicked out due to failing to complete a task. EYES AND PRIZE takes many of these familiar elements from reality TV and makes an upgrade to online streaming. TV isn't as relevant as it used to be (only ten years ago) and now streaming is taking the lead in people's screens. What hasn't changed tough is the desire from the public to see people from the safety distance of a screen, watching their every move, voyeurism in the era of the internet is far more prevalent than ever. EYES AND PRIZE takes a darker turn, as its plot unfolds to reveal that not all is as it seems for the four strangers. The twist comes early on, rather than towards the end. Without revealing much, the four strangers are participants to a show, this is true, however the nature of the show is far more macabre than they expect. Some of them like Marcus (Jackson Bews) and James (Nick Blakeley) are quite hesitant to accept what is going on around them, skeptical of the decisions made by the "producers" and what the point of the show is, while Ron (Gerard Mcdermott) and Abbi (Alanna Flynn) are more than on-board with the adventurous nature of their situation. In truth, there's way too much that we could discuss, but we would have to spoil some of the surprises this film has under its sleeve, however we can assure that it gets dark really quickly. There's some elements in the film that beyond taking notes from reality shows and the cult around them, there's a little bit of Chan Wook Park's OLDBOY in it, at least the parts where its protagonist is kept in captivity and isolation, it is this isolation and being completely cut-off from the rest of the world that makes for the most fascinating aspects of the film, as each participant deals with boredom, lack of supplies and the sinking feeling that they may never come out of the apartment ever. It's these sequences that show the decay of the human spirit under the constant gaze of a guardian that bring the film into almost horror territory. Seeing each participant slowly lose their minds and their health and the decay their bodies and the apartment go through, make for powerful commentary on the nature of internet celebrity culture, we basically see the same thing in any of those shows, but society keeps it somewhat civil, or as civil as it can, but without the security that society brings, these shows could turn much, much darker.

Oliver Cane has written and directed a modern horror fable that is begins visually bland, copying the blandness of reality TV shows and their over lit sets, however this is a choice made on purpose as the film wants to fool you. There's even a hint that this may be a comedy at first, but it slowly begins to unravel when you begin noticing the details scattered throughout the set. However, his directorial flourishes come in the form of long takes that zoom in and out and float around the apartment with masterful control. This is a micro-budget film, yet it smartly makes use of a single location, the set like the characters is ever evolving which keeps it from being stale. As the mental and physical deterioration of the characters manifests, it does so with the apartment. It's a simple change, but powerful and effective as we see this well organized and mundane set transform into a nightmare dungeon where the characters are put into an agonizing trial. Cane's script makes great use of potential situations that may arise from isolation and lack of everyday resources we give for granted. There's another set, one that could count as a spoiler, but it is the place where the characters are being watched, it is scattered with details of the evolution of voyeurism, from binoculars to telescopes, they all let us know everything we need to know about the people behind this, Cane milks the cow dry, doing as much as he can with what he's been given. The performances are also spot-on, with Jackson Bews as the skeptical and rebellious Marcus, the one who puts a little bit more thought into why he is where he is. Nick Blakeley as James makes for an enigmatic and unhinged performances as his character unravels further and further, Allanna Flynn as Abbi begins as a girl happy to participate in an online show, never giving a thought as to what is in store for her, but her part is deceptively tricky as she's the one who shows the worse signs of deterioration as the film progresses, and Gerard Mcdermott as Ron, the eldest of the four turns a jovial and almost maniacally optimistic turn, where he is the one participant who is the happiest to be there, but his happiness falls somewhere more along the lines of denial. Overall, EYES AND PRIZE is terrific commentary on power over others, others, online shows and internet celebrity culture.

Chill (I) (2016)

CHILL presents us with a fascinating mixture of heart and science. Of how technology revolutionizes the concept of motherhood and family.

[10/10 · 24 January 2018]

Jennifer Frappier is an actor, softball player and festival producer living in the height of her active professional life, however, thoughts of family have made her take the decision to extend her fertility by freezing her eggs. Jennifer takes us through her journey, first by getting to know her and her family background as well as her hopes of having the same chances of having the experience of having a family of her own and then through a more medical and technical approach where we see the science behind egg-freezing in full display. Frappier crafts a documentary that is a mixture of heart and science or more like science in the service of the heart.

Women are often thought to prevent pregnancy or to delay it, especially in our day and age where women are focusing on themselves, their careers and professions. Generally, people used to be have children at a younger age, forty or fifty years ago people in their twenties would marry and have children and form families of numerous children, which was the norm but not anymore. In CHILL we follow Jennifer, a woman who is laser focused in her career and newly single after a long relationship, she decides to freeze her eggs when the thought of missing out on having a family of her own the way her parents and grandparents did overwhelms her. Despite the fact that women postpone having children to focus on their careers, their biology doesn't extend the same courtesy and the chances of being fertile diminish with age. Women sometimes have to choose between their professional goals and raising a family, but not anymore, for technology gives women the chance to hold on to hope thanks to innovative procedures in egg conservation. The process as depicted in the short doc is very technical; a series of shots are administered, containing hormones that will produce the desired changes and maximize the egg count. The injections are taken within a month along with ultrasounds so as to see if the desired egg count has been achieved. After enough eggs are available, the removal procedure begins, a surgery that removes the eggs and then places them into an innovative deep freeze that has removed the freeze crystals which used to tear through the tissue, the eggs do get slightly damaged and it is possible that not all of them will be fertile, but this is why there injections where necessary to overhaul the number of eggs and have a better percentage of success. As technical as these parts are, this is truly a about family and the possibility of family. This is really what it's all about: family, Jennifer Frappier introduces us to the why by presenting her family to us, the people that means the most, the people who raise her and helped shape her into the person she is today. Jennifer presents us not just with an interesting documentary about advanced procedures, but also about how women through technology are becoming truly empowered over their bodies and their choices. They can choose to postpone pregnancy and now they can also prolong their fertility and not have their own biology punish them for the choices they make, they are in control now and it is a powerful thing. Another interesting thing about the documentary is that all the Doctors and scientists who are presented in the documentary are females, these are women who have learned and mastered these procedures and techniques in the service of a cause that they understand better than anyone. There's a sense of sisterhood in how the procedure is performed on Jennifer, how they talk to each other on a whole other level of understanding among them. Sure, a male Doctor would have been just as careful and thoughtful when applying these techniques, but there's a whole other dimension of meaning that this technique achieves when it is all-female. It's truly a thing to behold, how women can say when and how, their bodies would be almost a foreign biological entity with no regard to their needs, all bodies are like that, the disconnect between mind and biology and how we as humans sometimes have no control over the way owe function. Technology and science have become the key to master our own biology and in the case of women they have now a way to say to their own biological ticking clocks "hang on a second". Despite all these breakthroughs, one thing will remain the same; family. Families will continue to grow, Jennifer will have a chance to have a family of her own, and she can choose to be a single mom or wait for the right partner, it's all about choice and that's what empowerment is about.

Jennifer Frappier's documentary is short and not technically sophisticated, by this we mean that it's not a short documentary concerned with form, but rather with function. The purpose is not to dazzle with film-making techniques and polished cinematography, but to learn and to share. We learn about the science, which for some (including this reviewer) came off as a surprise, you may have heard of the procedure, but to see how advanced it is and how efficient it has become is another thing. The process is fascinating, and Jennifer presents it in a very easily digestible and comprehensible way that doesn't hold people by the hand, but rather makes it more intuitive. We learn not through exposition but by seeing it, show, don't tell in full motion. The sharing part comes from Frappier herself opening up to us the way she does. While this is a very private matter and a life-changing decision, Frappier opens up and we can see all the vulnerability, the doubts and fears but also the hope, the strength and a sense of humor about the whole thing, which makes her both a skilled documentarian and an amicable subject to follow. The documentary only portrays the initial process, the removal and freezing of the eggs. We hope that one day we can see the follow-up with Frappier as a mom having completed her journey.

Clean Colored Wire (2017)

CLEAN COLORED WIRE is a meta-narrative that explores the relationship between people and film as a symbiosis

[10/10 · 8 January 2018]

Paul Kael (Kola Krauze) is a jaded film-critic who is on the verge of losing his job after writing an overwhelmingly negative review that compromises the publication he works for. As an ultimatum he's sent to review an advance screening of the film "The Most Important Film Ever Made". As soon as Kael enters the cinema he is also thrown into a parallel dimension where film becomes a waking nightmare and finds the very truth he's been negating himself to see in every film he's ever reviewed.

CLEAN COLORED WIRE is an exercise in meta-narrative and a close examination of the relationship between the audience and the film, film critics and filmmakers and filmmakers and their work. We have witnessed the "Breaking of the fourth wall" in many films, from Oliver Hardy to Groucho Marx, Woody Allen in Annie Hall and Matthew Broderick in Ferris Buller's Day Off. However, the meta-narrative of CLEAN COLORED WIRE is closer to Alejandro Jodorowsky's THE HOLLY MOUNTAIN and its closing shots. As we begin the film, we meet Paul Kael as played by Kola Krauze. Paul is your typical jaded film-critic, he is given an advanced screener in DVD form of Ludving Gür's latest film "Disappearance" which the film critic reviews in his underwear and Eraserhead shirt. First, Paul no longer bothers to attend screenings at the cinema (or Movie Theater for the yanks) and he approaches film criticism as a task he can't be bothered with even dressing for, some may say there's nothing wrong with watching movies in your pajamas, but this signifies the complete and total detachment to with which Paul approaches film. Paul completely savages Gür's film in his review, however, his review is masquerading as a passionate rant, for in reality it reads as the most common and unimaginative type of film review we can all come across in any "respectable" film magazine. Gür reads the review and it stings him at a molecular level, after all, his film is an extension of his being. Paul's antics get him in hot water with his boss and he's no longer afforded the commodities and privileges of being provided advanced DVDs of upcoming films, he must return to watching film on the big screen with an audience. In our day and age, it is increasingly common that films are being consumed not by getting up and heading to "the movie house", but now we are in an age where academy voters choose the films they will nominate by being provided DVD screeners of films that are sent directly to their homes (they are busy people, surely they have no time to see films, despite the fact that they work in the film business) worse even, as physical media is becoming a new inconvenience and films are now being streamed not just to your TV (which is now shaped like a movie Widescreen) but sadly directly to a phone or a tablet. Paul attends the screening of the aptly titled THE MOST IMPORTANT MOVIE EVER MADE, which almost every film that is marketed for the commercial sector is sold as, people don't go to the movies to experience human stories anymore, people go to attend big events, something to justify getting up from the coach and driving to the multiplex, if it's a smaller film, any of the streaming services will do, but in order to actually go to see a film, it must be sold as the event of the year, the film to end all films. Hyperbole aside, he must review this film but he's now sharing space along with that most inconvenient of hive-minds: the audience. People has stopped attending films at the movie theater in grand part because audiences just don't know how to behave anymore. While it is true that film should be experienced in the big screen as it is meant, the experience has been hampered by people using their smart-phones and people who bring their babies and small children to what is sometimes an adult-only affair. What Paul witnesses on the screen is mostly a pretentious art-film, as a man (the filmmaker) puts his statement directly to the audience, without any effort for subtlety, or perhaps this is only Paul's perception. The audience may have seen a film, that while blunt, was still enjoyable, but Paul is so jaded that instead of watching stories he sees the filmmaker's intentions in full display as if the filmmaker was speaking directly to him. Gür's intentions are no different, he goes gets to far more elaborate lengths to make his point across, his short film is the modern un-romanticized film experience: critics are jaded, audiences don't care, filmmakers have forgotten to be subtle and people are ultimately living in a film of their own and when they die it all fades to black without any credits rolling, no applause from the audience.

Ludving Gür is a very young filmmaker with an already impressive body of work of short films under his belt. The young filmmaker carries his influences on plain sight: Lynch and his labyrinthine psychological trappings, Nicholas Winding Relfn and his neon drenched cinematography, Gaspar Noé's audacity and willingness to make the audience uncomfortable and Alejandro Jodorowsky's blunt surrealism in service of the truth. He doesn't carry these influences as a means to say "see... I watch real films" but more as in "see... I'm in a complicated relationship with film", it's not just flashing cinematic credentials for the sake of points, but rather weaponizing his influences and making it part of his film arsenal which eventually becomes his own language. This is a film about film, but it's also about how film doesn't exist without an audience, without filmmakers, without critics. Film has lost something because audiences have lost their way, they don't know how to approach film anymore, and this in turn affects films themselves. What happens within the screen is a result of what happens outside the screen, but it's also true that what happens within the screen will influence the world outside, changing lives forever. Yes, every film, even this one could be title THE MOST IMPORTANT FILM EVER MADE.

Burn the Place you Hide (2016)

The quintessential musical genius story, but it is also a tale of how mental illness affects not just the artist and his art but also the people around him.

[10/10 · 28 December 2017]

BURN THE PLACE YOU HIDE sheds light into the life and works of Norwegian Musician Thomas Hansen, AKA Saint Thomas. Told chronologically, from his early childhood and early beginnings in music to his touring and creative process, Richard Knight's documentary is told from the point of view of friends and family, loved ones and collaborators, those who knew Hansen as a friend and as family, as musical creative force and tortured genius, as a loving person and as a complex and difficult individual. This is the story of all musicians who struggle with the weight of mental illness embodied into a single entity.

John Cusack pondered in the film adaptation of HIGH FIDELITY: "What came first? The music or the misery?" the tortured genius has been an indelible part of music history throughout the ages. There's been a well-documented co-relation between creativity and mental illness, of depression and geniality. When listening to Thomas Hansen's work there is no doubt that he was a musical genius and beyond. However, an undeniable truth lies beneath it all: you can't write and perform music as powerful and touching as his without deep internal struggle of his own. Thomas Hansen was born one Friday the 13th of 1976, as if fated to have the strangest of luck. Thomas was gifted, no doubt with a potent musical talent, melodies would be generated as if he was an antenna picking signals from the air, materializing music from nothing. Hansen was without a doubt the prototypical difficult front man, always uncompromising, he would speak his mind on an open mic in the middle of a gig, and sometimes he would even get into heated discussions about equipment and instrument maintenance with his band mates in the middle of a song or he would turn his back to an unresponsive audience, busier talking among themselves than listening to his music. We see this man, from his humble beginnings and later into his humble success, but one thing remains constant: his music. This reviewer had never heard of Saint Thomas before, but for the purpose of this review I listened to all his available discography, from his first album "I'm Coming Home" to "There's Only One of Me" and every single song is to know what it was like to be him. So we have these two fronts from where we get to know the man: this documentary and his music. Through the Documentary we get to know how people saw him, as a great friend who was sometimes exceedingly difficult to deal with and as a musician with an outstanding talent, consumed with depression, a short temper and mental illness that would drive him to act on his impulses, which would push away the people around him. His music on the other hand is a mix of Alt-Country and Folk and his lyrics were pure and honest (brutally honest at times) always saying what he meant to say through music. Hansen was a man who was not as good talking and communicating with others off-stage, but if you wanted to know what he felt and what his thoughts were his songs would reveal much of him, intimately and deeply, baring it all. Saint Thomas never quite achieved "super-star" status, he was fairly popular in Europe, but niche enough to remain somewhat of a "discovery" for anyone searching for something new and melodic. Hansen's story is not that different from other musicians like him, blessed with enormous talent yet burdened with a mental condition that would get in the way of their happiness and their potential. BURN THE PLACE YOU HIDE is also part of the lyrics of one of his songs, it may refer to the act of getting rid of his mental problems, the place where his true self hides. The disruptive and alienating actions that Hansen would do as a result of quitting his medication would bring about an alternate persona that would act against his best interests. Like his friends and family say: it wasn't him, it wasn't his fault. His true self was hiding beneath a persona that would suppress the best in him, and yet without this difficulties, would his music had been the same? Nobody knows and nobody cares, all they care about is that a dear friend is gone too soon. In the end Hansen leaves a legacy behind, music that will be discovered for generations to come, but his family and friends are left with the memory of an amazing and outstanding complex individual.

Richard Knight has almost unlimited access to the key people in Hansen's life. His documentary is wonderfully constructed journey though the life and times of Thomas, from his early childhood to his TV and concert appearances. The archival footage is extensive, the video technology changes through different time periods as we see this film in chronological order. The amount of material recorded is astonishing, it's almost as if Hansen knew that one day all of this hours of recordings would be put together this way. The interviews are the backbone of the film, as we are told first-hand accounts from Thomas' family, his girlfriend, band mates and friends. They all paint a fair, endearing and difficult portrayal of the man, always with a glint of longing to see him again, and also reminiscing of just how difficult he could be at times. This paints not an idealized portrayal of the man, but an honest description of a man of flesh and blood, flawed and talented, fun and insufferable, lovable and excruciating. The film contains impeccable aerial shots of the snowy Norwegian locations, and the soundtrack is formed by Saint Thomas' most revealing songs, always peeling away at layers of where he was at in his life and the musical results of this. Knight's documentary may seem like a familiar story, but that is because he finds in Thomas Hansen the quintessential tortured musical genius story. Hansen's story is no different from Kurt Cobain, or Amy Winehouse, and he surely won't be the last, for the best and most talented musicians seem to come to this world with a single purpose: to leave behind as much great music as possible.

The Thirteenth (2017)

THE 13TH proudly stands next to THE WICKER MAN and KILL LIST as part of an eclectic club of British horror films.

[10/10 · 15 December 2017]

Christopher Shaw is a schoolteacher who grew up in foster care after his mother committed suicide when he was a child. Christopher is plagued with memories of that day, yet his mind suppresses the exact accounts. Christopher receives news that his father has passed away and that he must travel to a remote Greek island where his father lives his last days. Christopher is reluctant to do so, since he hasn't seen his father since he was a child. Christopher travels to the secluded island and immediately notices that there's something wrong with this place, as a strange plague has befallen the inhabitants of the island, prompting them to commit suicide without explanation. Christopher is approached by Stavroula, a mysterious young woman who helps him understand what his father was doing there. Apparently, Christopher's father was searching for an artifact that may hold the key to stopping the plague, as it turns out, Chris's mother was the very first victim all those years ago. However, what Chris finds is something far more horrifying than he could have ever imagined.

Judas Iscariot has been a figure of contempt in history, regarded as the ultimate traitor as he sold Jesus Christ in exchange for thirty silver coins, an act that has lived in infamy throughout generation and that has become synonymous with the act of selling someone out in exchange for a reward. Guilt-ridden, Judas hung himself but since he was cursed he could not die and was condemned to roam the earth. Centuries later, The National Geographic Society announced with much fanfare that they had found a lost 13th century religious text which they claimed was the gospel of Judas. At first, it was believed that this texts would finally vindicate the figure of Judas from traitor to martyr. Within this gospel it would be found that Judas didn't betray Jesus, but rather that Jesus betrayed Judas, where Jesus supposedly asked Judas to stage his treason and hand him over to the Romans. His reward? Being denied the entrance to heaven. However, according to April D. DeConick, a professor in Biblical Studies at Rice University and author of "The Thirteenth Apostle", the translation by The National Geographic Society was completely rushed and therefore wrong. Not only was Judas not a hero, but rather it was a Demon. One mistake was that Judas was referred to as a "Daimon" which was mistranslated to "spirit" in reality the word for spirit is "pneuma", in gnostic literature, "daimon" has always meant "demon". Specifically, Judas was a Demon known as the "Thirteenth", which in some gnostic traditions is known as "Ialdabaoth", the king of demons. Adding insult to injury, it is revealed within the text that by having Jesus betrayed by a Demon, it negates the purpose and salvation provided by the crucifixion as it was an offering to the Demons and not to God, making a mockery of the passion. THE 13TH plays with these ideas, as Christopher travels to a remote island that according to his father's findings was the place where Judas hung himself after betraying Jesus. However, his curse lives on and its motif repeats with each person that commits suicide in the island, a way of perpetuating the interminable cycle of taking his own life, only this time Judas shares it with others. Christopher's name is the Greek variant of Christóforos, which has its origins in the words "Christ" or "The Anointed". His repressed memories not only cloud the day of his mother's suicide, but also hide a treason that has been committed against him. Like Jesus before him, so has Christopher been sold by a person close to him.

Directed by Chris Hastings and written by Hastings, James Collins and Jack Rousseau, THE 13TH is a throwback to British horror films like THE WICKER MAN (the Robin Hardy original, not the Nic Cage "bee" movie) and in most recent year's films like KILL LIST. In these films, the protagonist is taken away from the chaotic normalcy that the urban sprawl provides and is lured to a remote location where the locals have different ways and customs and who seem to all be in on a massive secret. The protagonist is disoriented, trying to piece together the mystery as the local's behavior grows increasingly bizarre and suspicious, culminating in a revelation with terrible implications for the protagonist. In this regard, THE 13TH lives up to its premise, as we see Christopher Shaw (Played by a fresh-faced Kurtis Stacey) travel to a remote Greek Island plagues a string of suicides that may be connected to his late father's research. The locals seem hostile and hermetic towards the stranger, but he is later guided by Rebecca Grant's Stavroula, playing the part of the mysterious resident that may know more than she lets on with effective eeriness. Wookie Mayer plays Helen, a British psychiatrist that helps Chris dig out his repressed memories with more relatable normalcy, which still hides a deep knowledge of whatever is going on. Since THE 13TH plays very much like a WICKER MAN homage, we have an idea of more or less where it may go, however, there's a difference between knowing the path and walking it, and the road to the inevitable ending is filled with dread, nightmarish imagery and a compelling mystery that keeps us invested in finding the truth just as much as Chris does. While this is a modest production, it is not without quality. The Cinematography work by Felix Schmilinksy is superb, capturing the decay and ominous atmosphere of the Mediterranean island the film is being shot at. Chris Barber's production design helps craft some nightmarish imagery on a budget, creating some unsettling designs. The music score by Michael S. Bishop is as elegant as horror scores come, aided by superb sound design that fills the corners with hellish moaning and whispers that will get to your head. Overall, THE 13TH is a homage that manages to be an original thanks to its premise and its use of Gnostic theology.

One Mother's Fire: The Gail Minger Story (2016)

A compelling look at the fortitude and resilience that a mother shows in the face of loss, fueled by fire to make a change.

[10/10 · 11 December 2017]

ONE MOTHER'S FIRE: THE GAIL MINGER STORY delves into one mother's fight for truth and for change, as we follow Gail Minger's crusade for campus safety and her achievements on legislation and change.

It is unfortunate that sometimes purpose comes from tragedy. Some people find their calling in life without a major life-changing event having to happen for them to become advocates to a cause. Others, like Gail Minger, become crusaders out of a place of pain and a desire to spare other people that pain. One night, Minger went to sleep like any other night, when she receives a phone-call, her husband answers in the middle of the night and then they receives news that forever changed their lives. The college informed them that their son, Michael Minger, has perished in a fire at his dorm room. After grieving, came the questions: why did this happened? What could have happened to avoid this tragedy? How can we avoid these from ever happening again? As it happens, Murray State University's fire contingencies were archaic and antiquated. From faulty sprinklers to faulty fire alarms and nonexistent contingency procedures, not to mention that there had been already an arson reported at the same premises and the College covered it up. Minger's question brought to light a web of negligence and greed, she was driven not just to expose these corruption within Michael's college, but all colleges around America, holding them accountable for the safety of sons and daughters like hers that are sent away to college and placed in the hands of people who may not have their best interests at hand. Gail could have stayed quiet, allowed for things to take their course, but instead she took it upon herself to make sure that College dorms around the country would ensure their student's safety, not by asking nicely, she took it to the senate where legislation was passed to make these changes by law. Gail Minger has saved lives by taking college campuses to task when it comes to safety, other parents won't have to wake-up in the middle of the night to the terrible news that they won't see their child again. While this is primordially a tale of resilience in the face of insurmountable tragedy, this documentary is also a celebration of a mother's love and the life of a kid who had his whole life ahead of him. Through this film we also get to know Gail's son and what it meant for her to be his mother, Michael Minger was a college kid with a lovely voice who was on the autism spectrum, and yet, he was an active and exemplary student who never allowed his disability to stop him so as we can see, resilience is in the family. Michael's passing weighted on Gail, it almost broke her, but she found the strength to use her pain as fuel for another kind of fire, one that she would use to give her the will to make a difference. To this day, Gail honor's her son's legacy by rising awareness on college campuses nationwide. She has founded the Michael H. Minger foundation, rising safety standards and looking out particularly for students with disabilities and how the safety protocols can be modified for their needs. A true story of fortitude in the face of loss and tragedy.

Director Diana Nicolae has crafted a documentary that combines interviews and testimonies with dramatizations of the events that led to the tragic fire at Murray State campus. Focusing mainly on Gail Minger, as we hear from her own account who her son was, what those moments of anguish felt like when they got that phone-call and the subsequent quest for truth and the road that led her to the senate where stronger campus safety laws were passed with unanimous approval. Nicolae doesn't just point and shoot at interviews and testimonies, she also directs vivid dramatizations of the night of the fire, she doesn't just show a strong hand as a documentary filmmaker but also as a story-teller who provides these sequences with cinematic flair and an eye for emotional impact. The scenes never feel exploitative, they are simply here to get us into Gail's mindset, what she felt like on that night and what it must have been for Michael as the firefighters searched for him amidst the fire, in other words: what it feels to lose a child to negligence. Gail is a compelling narrator, but she's also a woman who is determined and who never backs down when she demanded answers and people refused to give her the truth. Nicolae and Minger team-up to create a documentary which purpose is not just to show us Minger's story, it is meant to make us realize that this could happen to us, and that we should be vigilant and demanding when it comes to college campus safety. We are Gail and we are Michael and we are the fourteen kids who were harmed on that night, and we should be safe within our college dorm-rooms and be able to graduate, and we shouldn't have to receive a phone-call in the middle of the night bearing terrible news and then expect us to shrug it off. At heart, Gail's story is a true example of American resilience, when Americans see that there's something wrong, or a wrong has befallen them, they take their pain and turn it to fuel and they spring to action and make a difference. Nicolae worked with Minger, crafting safety videos for college campuses, compelled by her story, Nicolae decided to craft this short documentary as a way to raise awareness but also as a homage to both Gail and Michael.

I Want for Nothing (2016)

I WANT FOR NOTHING is a vibrant and bizarre tale, expertly told through images that is impossible not to admire for its "show don't tell" skills.

[10/10 · 4 December 2017]

I WANT FOR NOTHING is a tale of magical-realism, taking place in a small town somewhere in modern day England. At heart it is a classic story of people wishing to obtain something, only to obtain that said something and proceed to ruin it, either by jealousy or self-sabotage. Daisy wishes she could overcome her crippling shyness and make friends, more than anything in the world. But when she actually does, not only does she have to learn what is like to actually interact with another person, but also begins to experience the complicated emotions that come along with friendship. When Daisy meets Jill, she's about to bail on her just like she always does whenever she encounters people. In her mind, she sees herself interacting with others, but in reality her body reacts in almost physically painful ways that keep her from ever being able to make the first step and actually even opening her mouth. When Jill solves Daisy's dilemma by providing her with a novel way to amplify her voice, Jill doesn't use her newfound voice to say anything nice, but rather indulges into a barrage of profanities that are both liberating and strangely also meant to keep Jill away. However, Jill finds Daisy's Tourette-like rants refreshing and they become fast friends. Daisy's wish has been fulfilled, she finally has a friend and one she can be herself with, as for Jill's wish, she's about to have it granted when later on, as they fool around, they're surprised to discover a strange and mysterious power - allowing them to taste other people's food without ever having to eat it. They set out around town, approaching people in order to try and sneakily taste their food. And here comes the part when the irony of having our wishes granted comes; Despite being friends with Jill, Daisy remains painfully shy and she can't quite get as close to people's food as she wishes to, however, Jill has no such problem and manages to get closer to people and fool them with her verbal dexterity. This causes a rift between both friends, for Daisy now experiments something that sometimes can come with friendship: Jealousy. Daisy becomes jealous with Jill's ability to speak to anybody, and so, she decides to get back at her friend where she knows it hurts: her bulimia. Daisy convinces Jill to taste people's food without ever taking a bite, and this begins to take a serious toll on her health. One woman gets to have finally have a friend, and her jealousy causes her to drive her away from her, while the other one wishes she could eat without getting fat, and gets more than she bargained for, to the point of endangering her life. Finding ourselves in a constant state of struggle, trying to obtain the things we wish for can bring purpose to our lives, but once we get what we wanted, our self-sabotaging nature causes us to destroy the dreams we craved so much. Such is the tragedy of western civilization, a way of life that gives us everything and yet keeps us unsatisfied at all times.

Directed by Keir Black, I WANT FOR NOTHING is a bizarre fantasy that is reminiscent of Jean Pierre-Jeunet films. Being sweet and crass, tender and revolting at the same time with a mischievous and fun glint in its eye. Black manages to tell his story on an almost purely visual level, only resorting to incidental dialogue here and there, but this is an expertly told story that employs images and editing to convey emotions and communicate its intentions without lengthy dialogue nor exposition. It is an example of "show don't tell" narrative. We imagine his film process must have been to story-board and plan every shot, for it all assembles logically, which is no small feat when talking about a narrative that is not exactly bound by logic. It may read contradictory, but this is a film about irony, after all. Keir doesn't explain why his characters are the way they are, he simply shows us what they do and what their respective wishes and fantasies are and then proceeds to put them to the test once they get what they wanted, almost as if experimenting with them. The film itself is fun, it's a curious and bizarre story that depends mostly of its vibrant score, filled with over-saturated colors and highly expressive leads in the form of Louise Mardenborough as Daisy and Catherine Manford as Jill. Mardenborough, plays Daisy almost mute, so her big expressive green eyes have to do much of the heavy lifting. Manford's manic and bubbling personality make for the perfect foil for Daisy. These two awkward yet magical women make no sense when separate, but together they are a perfect match (their friendship points at even deeper feelings) however, they are not immune to the darker side of the human heart; Daisy never knew she had it in her to feel Jealousy or envy because she had never had a friend nor interacted with people, although the hints where there all along every time she saw people mingling at the distance, secretly wanting what they had. Daisy saves Jill life in a scatological act of self-sacrifice, literally giving herself to Jill in order to save her. A selfless act indeed. This is an imaginative and original story, unpredictable and vibrant.

Noble Earth (2017)

NOBLE EARTH shows the allure of modern Italian nobility and peels at its seemingly perfect exterior to reveal the decay laying within.

[10/10 · 4 December 2017]

Emma (Daisy Bevan) is an Englishwoman of Italian descent who has arrived at Florence, Italy from New York. She had spent some time during her childhood in Italy, and own a house there. Emma meets Tancredi, an Italian noble and member of a high-society family. At first, Emma enjoys the privilege that comes with belonging to Tancredi's social circle; spending her days at the beach, enjoying decadent meals and the constant flow of wine, the parties and the servants, eventually becoming engaged with Tancredi. However, Emma slowly begins to realize that she is not entirely free and that her position within the family comes with certain expectation, which lead to pressure and the clash of her values against a decadent aristocracy that is wearing away while indulging in its own hedonism.

When we meet Emma, she visits a cemetery, one where the graves are quite ancient in appearance and also opulent in design (although almost everything in Italy is beautifully designed) we never quite know whose grave that is. Later, Emma meets Tancredi, a handsome and young Italian (like most Italians apparently) who happens to have the distinction of being a member of Italian aristocracy. Emma feels welcome at first, as she's introduced to the rest of the family and her relationship with Tancredi deepens, enjoying all the privileges that come with it in the process. However, this beautiful world she has entered begins to show cracks, something ugly lies beneath the surface of its seemingly exuberant perfection. Or as some may say it simple terms: "Too good to be true". Emma begins to slowly notice how these "noble" families are actually quite casual when it comes to misogynistic attitudes and racial slurs, followed by elitism and rampant bigotry. As if this wasn't enough, Emma begins to realize that there's certain things expected of her if she's to be part of this family. Tancredi's mother, Ludovica (Bettina Giovaninni) is an ever present and almost intrusive presence between Emma and Tancredi, somehow making things even more difficult for Emma by pressuring her with overbearing kindness at all times, and passive/aggressive remarks that insinuate that Emma is not just part of the family, but basically "owned" by them. At one point, Ludovica's favorite horse breaks-out from the stables, later as Emma walks alone at the estate's grounds, she encounters the horse. She connects with the creature, projecting her own captivity into the animal, understanding exactly how the horse feels and wishing she could do the same, just break free from them, at the point that she keeps her encounter with the animal a secret. If the pressure of belonging to this family wasn't enough, Emma has to contend with their political views as well as the way they treat migrants in dehumanizing ways. While the film never makes this point clear, we believe Emma is not just clashing with the reality behind modern Italian nobility due to her convictions as she's seen deeply affected by the way nobles treat and view people, for she's also being confronted with what is like to be a noble herself and seeing what that means to her. We can only speculate that the grave Emma visits, belongs to one of her Italian ancestors, perhaps a member of a noble family on his own and therefore making Emma a member of high society herself. Perhaps that's what she came to Italy for, to discover who she is and where she belongs to, but once she found what she was looking for and being confronted with what it really means to be noble in modern day Italy, perhaps left her deeply disappointed, not just with Tancredi and his family but also possibly with herself.

NOBLE EARTH is directed by Ursula Grisham, who in her quest to realize her vision as truthfully and naturalistic as possible set her film in Florence, Italy shooting everything on-location and casting real local people as well as true members of nobility in an effort to grant the film as much verisimilitude as possible. The film is authentic in every sense of the word, capturing a world of superficiality and decadence that is seldom thought of today; modern day Italian nobility. Grisham shows these noble families as people who keep selling away their properties and valuables, sometimes for a good price and sometimes for a steal, all in the name of keeping a lavish life-style that allows them to preserve an image of opulence. Through the eyes of Emma, as played by Daisy Bevan, we see how they are content with doing nothing much besides eating amazing food, drinking copious amounts of wine, partying all night and spend their days at the beach, while also plotting their triumphant return as rightful rulers of Italy by entering into politics while dining among themselves. Grisham's work is through and detailed in presenting us with an experience that is both understandably alluring with privilege and oppressively toxic in its practices. Grisham is certainly a filmmaker to watch, for she manages to recreate experiences that feel personal and authentic through her lens. Speaking of which, cinematographer Kasper Wind Nielsen baths the screen in a naturalistic light, always keeping the film grounded in reality while also adding a stylistic visual flare that conveys Italy's obsession with aestheticism and design. The hauntingly ethereal score by Martin Velez sounds almost as if it came straight from Emma's own soul, almost as a quiet and repressed cry for help that reflects her internal conflict. Finally Daisy Bevan carries the film with her portrayal of a willing prisoner who's self-discovery arc is one that is played with as much restrain as she can, but with every discovery and disillusionment her calm and proper exterior slowly cracks until she rebels, almost like a storm that has been slowly growing within herself, until she can't take no more. These various elements constitute the strength of this project. Under no circumstances would I change any of these.

Let's Kill Grandpa This Christmas (2017)

Gianci captures the spirit of Christmas in an irreverent and off-beat way

[10/10 · 28 November 2017]

This irreverent Christmas black comedy has some very funny moments. From its witty introduction to the Grandpa at the opening, to the atypical wedding that closes it the film it never loses its wit. The characters defy the conventional typecasts for these sorts of film, lending the film a fresh and exciting feeling.

The central performance from James Wirt was impressive. He embodied the role of the useless doormat well, adopting mannerisms and affectations that all added to a convincing characterization. Similarly, his wife serves as a brilliantly boisterous contrast to her cuckolded spouse.

The film's editing was good. There were several playful cuts (the edit switching to the chopping axe for example) that kept the film engaging. The pace of the film was steady, sustaining interest throughout the 80 minutes. The dream sequence was particularly effective in this sense. Shots were framed well throughout and maintained an aesthetic coherence.

Sound editing sustained the feel of an ironic Christmas comedy, and the soundtrack was orchestrated with the visuals well.

The Lurking Man (2017)

THE LURKING MAN is a modern fairy-tale of redemption and new beginnings, even past one's moment of death.

[28 November 2017]

THE LURKING MAN reminds us of Neil Gaiman's SANDMAN, a masterpiece of graphic novels which employed mythology and an anthropomorphic representation of Death as means to explore life in the modern age. Brikisak and Rommel mix a harrowing addiction drama with a supernatural battle over a woman's soul which is more effective as a vehicle to tell a story about alcohol abuse and mental disorder than if this had been a straightforward narrative without the fantastical elements. In the "normal world" Cailean's life has been pretty rough, a story not unlike the one's we've heard of people struggling with sobriety: a history of sexual abuse as a child, broken home, divorce, custody battles, etc. But when the script transports Cailean from her mundane life into a supernatural realm, then the story becomes much grander in scope in ideas and becomes a mythological story akin to Faust. Who better than the Angel of Death to show Cailean what a mess her life has been up until the moment she's dying. In life, Cailean never allowed anyone to call her out on her mistakes and poor life decisions, but in death she has no option but to revisit every painful moment, and worse, she must see every painful moment as it truly was instead of what she convinced herself it was. Brikisak pulls double duty as she portrays Cailean herself, her performance is fearless as there's no ego, she fully commits in portraying this shell of a woman, broken beyond repair. Her struggle with her inner demons and the drink is a compelling a realistic approach to how painful such existence is. It's hard to empathize with her at times, but we do feel sympathy for her. This is not an easy performance to pull-off, she goes from being an emotional wreck, to abusive to finally seeking redemption and she's giving it her all every step of the way. Daniel Lench plays Sariel, the Angel of Death, imbuing this elemental force with a regal quality and creepiness augmented in great part thanks to fantastic creature design and make-up, which allows for Lench's expressions to show through, he comes off as a Nosferatu-like creature that skates the line between benign and malevolent, teasing and judging while also offering salvation. Frank Kruger as Cailean's ex-husband Wilson and Dorian Gregory as her new flame portray two very different men who are nevertheless concerned with her well-being despite being treated poorly by Cailean. Finally, Jentzen Ramirez as Cailean's paraplegic son Beau, amazes with a fantastic performance as he turns out to be quite the find.

To Be Saved (2020)

Derek and Vinny are like the reverse Cain and Abel, for these brothers battle over one saving the other from depression.

[10/10 · 28 November 2017]

A battle between brothers, a story as old as time. However, Derek and Vinny are the reverse Cain and Abel, for one is trying to save the other one's life against his own wishes. This is not the first time Derek has attempted suicide; he has tried it before going as far back as when he was thirteen. Derek has had to carry with him this inexplicable pain that only makes sense to him but baffles everyone else around him. Vinny can't seem to understand why his brother would want to end his own life, since from his own point of view Derek has everything he could ever want: a great job, loads of money and success all while Vinny himself has a shitty job (in his own words) and by all accounts he should be the one depressed instead. Derek's like a fish trying to swim out of a fishbowl and being constantly put back, he has one goal in mind and that's to end it all by whatever means necessary. Vinny just doesn't get it, to him his brother is now safe and "cured", to his eyes he only had a rough batch but now he's up and running and surely he won't attempt to end himself anymore, but he couldn't be any more wrong. Derek's almost like the Wile E. Coyote, if the Wile E. Coyote failed at trying to kill himself, his attempts are constantly thwarted and he becomes frustrated by his failure to soothe the pain with what he sees as mercy. Derek has his work cut out for himself, he feels it's his responsibility to keep his brother alive by constantly keeping vigil, making sure he doesn't try it again. Derek has tried different methods to achieve his ultimate goal, but he's constantly thwarted and his frustration begins to show, he knows that perhaps his prickly attitude will help push his brother away. But blood is still stronger and so Vinny stays even if it gets harder and harder to support his brother despite the constant abuse. And so, we arrive at a battle between these two brothers where one wants to safe the other and the other wants none of it. Medication has only made it worse, one pill to keep you away from the blues, but that pill makes you gain weight, which throws you back into depression and a new pill to further suppress the monster, but then you become impotent and makes you more depressed. It's like warfare that keeps feeding the flames and the fire will never get put-out. As for Vinny, we can see him try, he goes the distance with his brother, at first he tries to understand him but then he realizes that no one can understand what he's going through, he call him out, calls him selfish and entitled. And maybe Derek really is entitled, and some would say "just let him do it and get it over with", but we know Vinny is not going let go, no matter how hard his brother makes it for him, and Derek is not going to back-down until he finally wins by losing. Who'll win? To find out would be like finally knowing what happens when the immovable object meets the unstoppable force. But one things for sure, if Derek gets away with it, Depression gets to claim one more victim.

TO BE SAVED is written by Jeff Locker (who plays the suicidal Derek) and is directed by Brent Harvey who is himself an actor, which is something that shows as this is a short-film that is drama in its purest form. Some short films are displays of world-building skills by the filmmakers, or a showcase of a clever high concept that attempts to sell a feature length film. But then there's the more old-school filmmaking showcases, and this is an example of narrative at its most grounded and relatable. This film depicts a harrowing battle where the stakes are even larger than "saving the world", these stakes are personal and painful. It's as simple two actors and dialogue, yet there's few things as powerful as seeing two actors going at it, drawing us into their world through empathy and performances so searing that we feel we stumbled into a real argument between real brothers. TO BE SAVED manages to convey exactly how it feels to try to save someone who doesn't want to be saved. The exhaustion, the constant push and pull, how one party seems almost possessed and irrational by how much he or she wants to put an end to their own lives and the absolute fear and dread that comes with knowing that if we lower our guards for a second our loved one will be gone, and that we imagine the guilt awaiting us once they do so, because we know we could have kept them from doing so if we had done "more". But like this short-film shows us, doing "more" sometimes is futile, if the other person just doesn't want to keep on living. It's a tough watch, but then again that's why it succeeds, because its depiction of depression and unconditional love ring true. Brent Harvey uses his own training as an actor to help his cast inhabit these people and the result is a fantastic duel between performers. Locker does fantastic work portraying a man who seems almost possessed by a parasite that sucks the will to live out of him and compels him to be the worst version of himself, knowing that this is just one more method to finally get his brother to leave him alone so he can finish what he started, but then there's this pain that only he knows what it feels like. Peter Capella as Vinny is the selfless brother who will not give up when it comes to saving his brother, no matter how hard Derek makes it on him. He's his brother and he won't fail him."

Ratcatcher (2016)

RATCATCHER mixes elegance and decay in this psychological mind-bender that will constantly make the audience question what they see

[10/10 · 24 November 2017]

An old man (Alfred Rosenblatt) finds a stray kid (Cristian Suarez) on the street and takes him home to shelter him. Once he does, strange things begin to happen, as the old man's mind begins to play tricks on him and begins to be plagued by visions of rats invading his house.

RATCATCHER shows us the mental breakdown that a man goes through after his wife dies, with parallels to The Pied Piper of Hamelin, a legend which dates back to the middle ages and which describe a piper who was a rat-catcher hired to lure the rats infesting the town with his magic pipe. When the citizens refuse to pay the piper, he retaliates by luring the children away just like he did with the rats. Fairy-tales in their original form (the German ones in particular) were quite harrowing and even nightmarish. RATCATCHER could be seen as a modern fairy-tale were an old man tries to cope with the death of his wife of many years by roaming the streets and finding stray children to offer shelter, while the man is not a piper per-SE he is definitely a musician. However, his mind (and our point of view) begin to twist as he begins to hallucinate rats invading his home while the children in his home begin to disappear. His Musophobia (fear of rats) manifests even through his dreams, as he often finds them invading his bed and covering his deceased wife. Rats are often associated with decay, depression and poverty. It is possible that the old man is suffering of disassociation as he relates rats to street children. The old man perceives the rats as real and the children as separate entities, but it is perhaps possible that to him they are one and the same. In this case the pied piper has lured both rats and children away from the streets and into his home. The old man even tries to catch the rats on tape, as proof that he is not hallucinating such things. Now, the relation between rats/street-children and his wife's death is quite vague, but it is certainly interlinked. On the one hand we believe that the old man does not want to be alone, after spending decades of his life married to the same woman, his isolation and loneliness begin to crack his psyche. Perhaps in an attempt to quench his loneliness after his wife's passing, he tries to fill the void by filling his house with children, but since these are street-children, they probably raid his home by eating all his food and causing damage to the property, and so, he perceives them as an invading plague, one he invited into his home himself.

RATCATCHER is Co-Written by Simon Hacker and Written/Directed by Korean filmmaker Gil Choi who focuses in creating an eerie and ominous mood which serves to portray a man's mental breakdown with a great eye for creating nightmarish imagery, all in the service of mind-bending story-telling. Our point of view is that of the old man and like him, we are constantly at the mercy of what our eyes are shown. Is not that the old man is an unreliable narrator, but rather that he is aware (like we are) that he can't trust his senses anymore and yet he can't do nothing about it. Choi relishes toying with both he old man and his audience, expertly manipulating his and our perception through disorienting editing which feeds us visual information, only to get the rug pulled beneath our feet and make us question the reality that we are shown. The short-film skates the line between straight narrative and experimental film, this due to having a careful mixture between a narrative grounded in reality and the surreal madness that begins to invade the mind of the main character and therefore the film's linear narrative begins to bend and crack before our own eyes. Choi manages to create a very accurate portrayal of what it must be to experience one losing grasp of what's real while trying to cope with grief. RATCATCHER is not so much concerned with a deep psychological study of the old man, so much as making us experiment through his point of view the dread of slowly losing one's mind. In this regard, RATCATCHER doesn't want to explain madness, but wants you to feel it, to know what is like to slowly begin to unravel and question what's fact and what's fiction and the inevitable dread of knowing that perhaps there's nothing one can do. This is an elegantly made psychological thriller, the beautiful production design accentuates the decay which the vermin brings when placed within the old man's beautiful brownstone property and its classic architectural interiors. The rats themselves become an omen of things that we suspect will happen (perhaps the old man does the same) and still reach its inevitable conclusion. The cinematography and sound mix both elegance and dread, and the eerie shots of empty streets and cold empty spaces serve to immerse us into the deep loneliness and despair that the old man experiments. Speaking of the old man himself, Alfred Rosenblatt creates a fantastical portrayal of a man on a downward spiral and very subtly shows us the cracks on his psyche as he gives into fear and paranoia. Overall, RATCATCHER is an excellent psychological-thriller that is concerned with sharing its madness with its audience rather than being distant and judgmental of his main character.

Life in Other Words (2017)

LIFE IN OTHER WORDS shows us how a traditional Bangladeshi family and what keeps them together after a tough day, told with wondrous cinematic flare and lots of heart.

[21 November 2017]

The Kabir's family bad day does not come from "bad luck" but stems from societal pressures which means that almost every day must be a bad day for them. Each member is facing insurmountable pressure due to certain expectations that are have become an unfair burden on them. Ronny has failed in school, a "medium English school" which means that his father must be paying exorbitant amounts for above average education, this causes Mr. Kabir to suffer of high pressure and probably has a stomach ulcer by now (He drinks magnesium milk) Mr. Kabir attributes the boy's school failure to laziness and an obsession with cricket (something that almost the whole family shares) and feels the kid has been failing on purpose, almost as a personal insult towards him. In reality, it's possible that Ronny's poor academic performance is due to undernourishment, since the family's economy can't quite cover the sufficient dietary requirements to help Ronny's performance. As for Ronny himself, he dreams of being a cricket player one day, but as he has failed on his academic studies, his cricket practices will be replaced with unfair amounts of studying. Simply put, this is too much stress for a young kid to bare, no wonder he seeks refuge in cricket fantasies, and his empty stomach doesn't help things either. Rennu, the eldest sister is being under-paid at work, facing a system that benefits nepotism and perpetuates inequality among genders, whatever she earns is not enough to help at home. Every day while riding the bus home she has to face groping and harassment by unknown men, she often fantasizes with retaliating in violent ways, but all she can do is simply internalize her anger and get home. Mr. and Mrs. Kabir married through an arrangement between their families, something that is customary in India, to their luck they are actually in love, however, Mr. Kabir family history is an example of families with numerous children, which add to the massive population growth problem as well as the lack of attention and focus that could be given to a single child. These situations paint a broad and condensed look at a traditional Indian family, the challenges they face every day and the mounting economic and societal pressures to which they are exposed. However, every day they keep marching on for they have something to rely on: family. The things that unite family, like an exciting game of cricket, cannot be underestimated. Cricket is part of Bangladesh's national identity, they take pride in being better players than the English (a country that colonized them many moons ago) winning Cricket Matches lifts the morale of an entire country, as an entire country jumps on their seats and when the match is won they run out into the streets celebrating their victory with fireworks. And not only that, but when the match is going on, the collective passion makes the family forget of their problems, Mr. Kabir suddenly forgets Ronny's scholar failures, Renu becomes empowered. It's these things that keep them going, but there's one more thing: Henna Ma manages to prepare dinner, a humble and improvised meal that still will nourish the family in body and spirit. This is the life of the Kabir family, in other words.

Abrar Athar directs a short-film that comes from life itself, he manages to distill his own family memories and in five minutes we are introduced to an entire family and their history in effective and skillfully narrative ways. While his style possesses the whimsy and quirkiness of a Wes Anderson, his film is less stylized and more grounded with a cinematic flare reminiscent of Fernando Meirelles, which results in a style all of his own. It's a mixture between the heightened and the grounded that meshes an idealized vision of family life with the harsh realities of everyday life under tough economic conditions. Athar's DP Tuhin Tamihul is instrumental in creating a lighting scheme that boasts the colors and emphasizes the heat, immersing us in the film. This is a film of excellent quality in every technical department: production design, editing and sound come together to deliver a stylish film that also has substance. The conflict each family member goes through is well developed and each character motivation is shown rather than explained, even with the presence of voice over narration is up to us to truly see what each family member is facing. Sure, perhaps these problems are relegated to this one day, but the reality of living in a family is that every day presents different challenges. So there's both conflict, but also hope and this film captures the unbreakable bond that comes when sharing the same passion for a sport or sitting together to share a home-cooked meal prepared with limited resources but lots of love. The entire cast is excellent, Mr. Kabir played by Masum Bashar is the typical dad who is blows up in anger one moment and is forgiving and warmly paternal the next. Ronny played by Mohammad Hridoy Hossain manages to convey the internalized stress that young students feel as well as his frustration with himself for failing school. Aanon Siddiqua plays Rennu, the eldest sister with a bubbling anger and dissatisfaction with the unfairness all around her, both at work and with a misogynistic society in general, while also being a good daughter to her parents and a supporting sister to his brother. And finally Henna Ma, played by Ferdousi Ahmed, she is mostly in the background, but she's must remain unbreakable and calm if she is to keep her family together. Athar's film is a love letter to the family unit, and to cricket as the morale booster for an entire nation that is wonderfully cinematic.

A Long Hot Summer in Palestine (2018)

Chronicles the events of those hard months in 2014, from a perspective that makes us value the fragility of freedom and peace.

[10/10 · 19 November 2017]

A LONG HOT SUMMER IN PALESTINE follows documentary filmmaker Norma Marcos as she travels to Palestine in order to shoot a film on the subject of women and daily life in the West Bank. It all goes as planned, but this was the year of 2014. While Norma gathers material for her documentary, the events that led to the War on Gaza began taking shape off screen.

The documentary immediately shifts from its initial intentions and purpose, and becomes a document on how Palestinians endure the aggression directed towards them by Israeli forces, and how different Palestinian people with normal lives try to cope with a war that weakens their economy and jeopardizes their attempts to organize and rebuild their country. A LONG HOT SUMMER IN PALESTINE is an example of documentary film-making that is forced by circumstances to change its initial agenda and point its lens towards new developments that occur around it. The initial plan was to make a film about different women and their daily lives in the West Bank; women such as a female race driver and a female mayor. However, as we are presented with scenes of daily life and traditions of the Palestine people, a dark cloud begins to loom in the background. We are shown idyllic scenes of weddings, teenagers singing to their favorite music and the preparation of the world's largest Katayef (The Guinness World Records). This is all a taste of what normal Palestinian life looks like, far from the outsider propaganda that tries to sell them as terrorists.

This is the summer of 2014, when three Israeli teenagers were abducted in the West Bank. Israel blames Hamas. Israel's next move was a military assault known as "Operation Brother's Keeper" which resulted in casualties, and arrests of Palestinians. These attacks included air strikes, ground invasions, overall repression and violence. We are shown the calm before the storm, while life for Palestinians is far from idyllic under Israeli occupation, they manage as best they can to try to lead normal lives, but the conflict in this part of the world is far more ancient and sadly it will most likely continue towards the future. As a filmmaker, Norma Marcos realizes that the events surrounding her visit to her land cannot be ignored; she must change gears and begin to modify her initial plan. The initial story would still have been powerful, but the circumstances now dictate the course the documentary must go. Life during that summer changed for many, while simultaneously remaining the same as it has been for centuries in that region. The events showed the world that Israel is committing atrocious acts without anyone standing up to them. The camera shows Palestinian West Bank solidarity with Gaza, as well as how Palestinians are not allowed to roam freely through their land without permission from the Israelis. As we keep visiting zones in Palestine and their people, we keep hearing the shells exploding in the distance, and in one of the most beautiful and poignant sequences in the documentary, we are shown a cat sheltering her kittens as she nourishes them. The sound of bombardment makes the kittens seek protection and comfort beneath their mother. This scene is representative of what many went through during this Summer; people trying to live their lives as normal as possible while simultaneously having to protect themselves from the fires of war.

Ms. Marcos could have easily removed the rushes intended for the original project. Instead, what she does is keep this material, while gradually warning us that things are about to change drastically in Palestine and Gaza. The reason for keeping the original material is to show us how people's lives and plans change overnight when faced with the threat of war. We can go through our day as we normally do, unaware that in the distance there is a series of events we are unaware of, that will shape the destiny of our country and fellow people. The second thing that Ms. Marcos does is to simply show Palestinians as people just minding their own business, going through their daily lives and simply wishing to be free without Israel breathing down their necks. We meet artists, business owners, and religious leaders. These are not terrorists, but regular people who unfortunately have become the punching bag of a country that has forgotten what it is like to be persecuted and harassed at every turn.

Norma Marcos narrates the documentary herself. Her voice and cadence is full of sorrow, it sounds tired yet hopeful and unbroken. She shows the beauty of Palestine, the calm and warm days under the summer sun, juxtaposed with stock images of violent confrontation in the streets as well as a remarkable night sequence where the dark sky if filled with the unnatural thunder of exploding shells. It shows us a Palestine that is beautiful in spite of being broken up by checkpoints and walls. This is a documentary that expresses both sorrow and beauty, hope and despair. It ends on a sad note, but still manages to keep hope for a future when Palestinians will be finally free to live their lives just like we are shown in the tranquil segments of this film; without violence entering the frame to disrupt their lives. For those of us who are only observing this conflict from other parts of the world, it is also a reminder of how we must never take for granted our freedom, peace and tranquility. These various elements constitute the strength of this project.

Black Man (2017)

An intriguing and enigmatic film that pulls you into its mysteries with the gravitational pull of a black-hole. Multiple views required.

[10/10 · 17 November 2017]

Alex (Jaho Guma) is a young architect who is dating Nayade (Julinda Emiri) after meeting her at a bar. They seem to be made for each other, and Nayade decides to introduce Alex to her brother Noel (Klevis Bega) a live-wire of a man with an intense personality that tags along with the couple wherever they go. As time passes, Noel and Alex begin to become closer as friends, but there's something about Noel that is not quite right. Meanwhile, a mysterious lunatic is on the prowl.

This is a film that has to be seen more than once to truly begin to discover its secrets. There's a lot of sleight of hand going on here, a lot hints as to what's really going on. Because once the first reveals begin to shed light on what we saw during the running-time of the film, the final sequence comes to once again change everything we knew about the film. BLACK MAN is directed with by Gentian Selo, and his film is powerfully enigmatic. This film reminds us of works like Denis Villeneuve's ENEMY, David Fincher's FIGHT CLUB and even Richard Kelly's DONNIE DARKO. We would need two reviews to truly tap into the amount of themes and subjects this film explores. There's duality aspect going on here as Noel and Alex represent polar extremes, their personalities and body appearances are opposites and yet they become a duo that makes logical sense. There's a study in masculinity, in how Noel is an example of an "Alpha Male" as he's an overconfident womanizer and Alex is more of a "Beta Male" who follows Noel's lead. And then there's a metaphysical aspect to the film, where it appears as if time itself was fragmented, the editing here works to displace time and makes us focus on scenes as at first we perceive these time jumps and cuts in a disorienting way, but then we begin to realize that time is not flowing naturally, it's playing tricks on us and our attention must be on the film at all times. And then, there's the ending, which we won't spoil, but even when it appears to come out of nowhere, it has always been hinted that is was going to happen. Watching the film again, the clues are there in Noel's existential musings. The secret weapon behind this film is its flawless casting. Jaho Guma is spot-on as Alex, he possesses an Elijah Wood quality to him that makes him the "good guy" who eventually reveals his flaws, a good natured personality who serves as a contrast, he's not passive but he's simply witnessing a whirlwind before him. Julinda Emiri as Nayade is a strong female character that knows her brother well, and knows at least one part of his secret. And finally, the tactical nuclear weapon that is Klevis Bega as Noel. Bega is an absolute force of nature here, looking like a cross between 90's Michael Wincott and James Franco, his smile and energy are overpowering and his charm only serves to hide his darkest secrets, secrets unknown even to him. Good guy or bad guy, we think we know and then maybe we know, but he delivers a knock-out performance as he's also charges with delivering lengthy existential monologues that don't seem rehearsed, but as if his mind were generating on the spot.

Anarchist: Azad (I) (2017)

AZAD is a film that expresses the tensions raised by current political events, making this one of the most ambitious low-budget efforts of recent times.

[10/10 · 17 November 2017]

Azad has returned home to Pakistan, after defecting from a covert government agency that targets minorities under orders of the new presidential administration of the US. Azad struggles with his own guilt as he carries with him painful memories of being a minority himself in the employ of bigots in the past. Now, the world is quickly moving towards new order and Azad holds the key to the future, unless his former retainers find him first.

The world is in constant change, we know this and have made our peace with this concept since the beginning. But after the presidential election of 2016, it seems as if something has truly broken after a man who ran a campaign based on bigotry and rampant nationalism won the election. There has always been racial and religious tensions in the US, it's the way things have always been, but there was always a sense that people were trying to move forward and not backwards, that there was a sense of trying to work things out and that eventually people would reach a common understanding. However, the new president has ensured that the country has moved backwards, and that behavior that was known to be abhorrent by the mainstream and the common person, is now accepted and even glorified. Hate groups that used to be hidden and speak in whispers are now openly in the out and brandishing their racial and nationalistic agendas. The president has emboldened these groups, and more so than the president himself is his chief strategist who has a clear vision for an America without minorities and closed borders. It's minorities such as Hispanics, Muslims and Blacks that have become the main targets of these groups and a hard-left that has tried to deny that there's such a things as "white privilege" or that preserving confederate monuments has anything to do with slavery, we live in a time when the news media is under attacked by being labeled as "fake news". Not to mention, the fear of being detained and deported (in the best of cases) or simply detained and be labeled as an enemy of the state without a fair trial and thrown into a triple-max prison somewhere. Such tensions are explored in AZAD (the Film) and expressed with genuine worry and concern for a world where white supremacy reigns unchecked and can operate without consequences or boundaries. It's not like we haven't seen the world fall into chaos before, but this chaos comes after a time when people believed there was a glimmer of hope, that people perhaps had left racism and bigotry behind after electing the first black president. Now, it seems as if all these things that belong in a sewer that contain the worst of humanity have come afloat and have taken over. The people who represent the "Alt-Right" show their faces in the mainstream media, they walk around without fear, they have modified their look to become more acceptable, and they are now invited to speak (although it is their constitutional right to do so) on TV and other media outlets, but they used to do so with a collective sense that this mentality was something to be ashamed of, now, it is something that is even welcomed or even justified by some. AZAD (the film) captures the inherent worries and fears that are present in our times, and presents a near future scenario that plays as a warning, for we can't permit the hatred to keep on growing or else the visions shown in this film will become a reality.

AZAD is a passion project through and through. This film was made with a shoe-string budget, and first time filmmaker Farasath Khan has made a film almost all on his own. The point here is for the artist to express himself, and express he does. It is often said that in tumultuous times, art becomes more powerful. Here, art becomes a compulsive necessity as Khan has clearly been inspired by resent events to pick-up a camera, grab his friends and make a film with whatever resources he has at hand in order to express his fears, anger, ideas and hopes. This is the work of a man who was compelled to tell a story, a man who wasn't a filmmaker but that by necessity simply became one. In this, his first film, Kahn directs, acts and performs a multitude of duties that turn him into an orchestra of a single player. While Khan is joined by a cast of supporting actors, he also plays a multitude of roles himself, if he couldn't find someone else who could play the role, he would do it on his own. To say that AZAD is an overtly ambitious first effort is an understatement; Khan makes what is basically a Muslim Jason Bourne political thriller with an impossibly prohibitive budget, and he still manages to convey his ideas clearly and with a clear vision of what he wanted to do. AZAD is not just ambitious in scope, but also in ideas. Khan uses his political thriller to tackle heavy themes such as religious hypocrisy, suppression of freedom of speech, racism, terrorism, the rise of the Alt-Right and new world order conspiracies that could become true one day. This is the work of a man possessed by the necessity to create. Art often comes from the most difficult and dark times, for a man who wasn't a filmmaker or that had formal film-making skills, he took a camera and told his story the way he meant to. It is also refreshing to see a political thriller from a Muslim point of view rather than the typical one-sided American narrative. A clear example that every story has different valid points of view. Overall, AZAD proves that it's not necessary to have a bloated budget to make a film, that it only takes drive and passion to express ideas through action on the screen.