x. review: Elias Merhige

"Film directors are really [modern-day] bards and poets, and as a director, you are put in charge of what society sees at the periphery of its vision. At the periphery of society’s vision, society sees these ghosts. But when they try to turn and fix their eyes upon them, those ghosts disappear. What the filmmaker does is take those ghosts and turn them into dramatic images that can be shared and explored. At it’s best, filmmaking…

323. review: Claire Denis
Filmclub 5.: Watched with Steve Garden, Daniel Misota, Edrick, Mateowah and Calvin Jacob

I think the central motif of this Claire Denis film is not the body, but the brain. The brain and the search. Where desire is nesting. In a key scene of the film, Vincent Gallo imitates a zombie, a brain-dead man, among the gargoyles of Notre Dame, which represent demons, and in another important scene, June says to him, begs him, "Talk to…

367. review: Albert Serra and the 'Long Live the Bull'

The tense gaze of an animal in the arena, unaware of its fate. The tense gaze of a man in his car, preparing to kill. The arena's sand; the colourful embroidery of the traje de luces; blood; foaming mouths; suffering; and more blood. Death. That's the whole film. When the famous Catalan director Albert Serra was asked what Peruvian bullfighter Andrés Roca Rey thought of the film, he replied somewhat…

366. review: Luke Gilford

I thought that National Anthem would instantly become an divisive indie cult film, predestined by the subject matter (kinda trans heaven at the foot of the red cliffs), the aesthetically pleasing pop cinematography of photographer Luke Gilford and the soundtrack, which mainly features Perfume Genius and Elvis songs. I thought we were going to argue about it here, like the 'I saw the TV Glow' film or Emilia Perez. I could not have been more wrong.…

293. review: Wim Wenders

So sorry, but I think that Wim Wenders' new film 'Perfect Days' is one of the biggest disappointments of this year, despite its heartwarming story. It follows the life and barely variable daily routine of a happy, very happy Japanese toilet cleaner in Tokyo. The ageing man begins each day by looking up at the sky and smiling. Then he gets into his car and plays Wenders' favourite retro playlist from a cassette player, shamelessly consuming…

269. review: Christopher Nolan

There is something symbolic in the fact that in the American Movie About the Birth of the Nuclear Bomb, in the Great Confrontation, the victims of Hiroshima and Nagasaki are reflected in Oppenheimer's face only in the form of a horrified grimace. So much for the literal confrontation.

Doesn't it bother anyone that there isn't a single Japanese person or frame of Japanese footage in this American story of the destruction of two cities and hundreds…