Drama

Kelebeğin Rüyası (The Butterfly’s Dream)

By Divina Sethi Kelebeğin Rüyası (The Butterfly’s Dream) is a 2013 Turkish romantic drama. It is based on the tragic true story of  struggling poets Muzaffer Tayyip Uslu and Rüştü Onurx, played by (the gorgeous) Kivanc Tatlitug (Kuzey Guney, Ask i memnu, Kurt Seyit ve Sura) and Mert Firat (The Water Diviner, Baska Dilde Ask) […]

Kelebeğin Rüyası (The Butterfly’s Dream)
Festivals&Academy

Foreign Film Fridays: “Close” (Belgium, 2022)

Close (2022) is a Belgian drama film from writer-director Lukas Dhont. It stars Eden Dambrine and Gustav De Waele as two best friends who begin to drift apart when their classmates begin to question how intimate they’ve become with one another. It debuted at the 2022 Cannes Film Festival, where it tied for the Grand […]

Foreign Film Fridays: “Close” (Belgium, 2022)
Festivals&Academy

Women Talking

In a remote religious community, the women have finally had enough. Enough of what? The men. And their violence. Their savage beatings. Rape. No one is safe from them, not even their own little children. So a group of women gather in a hay loft to discuss what to do about it. Do they do […]

Women Talking
Documentary

Navalny: An Ongoing Thriller

By C.J. Hirschfield (January 17, 2023) Two years ago, an extraordinary documentary on Russian opposition party leader Alexei Navalny was recorded. The film has just been released; he has not. Having been charged with everything from fraud to having created an extremist group “with the purpose of inciting hatred toward officials and oligarchs,” he currently […]

Navalny: An Ongoing Thriller
Music

Dresdner Philharmonie auf der Leinwand

Das Orchester wird im Kinofilm “TÁR” zum Hollywood-Star Es ist das Must See dieses Jahres! Die Dresdner Philharmonie in der Rolle der Berliner Philharmoniker im Hollywood-Streifen “TÁR”. Der Film mit Cate Blanchett und Nina Hoss in den Hauptrollen (Foto: Screenshot) läuft seit Donnerstag (2.3.) auch in den deutschen Kinos. Er erzählt die Geschichte der Dirigentin […]

Dresdner Philharmonie auf der Leinwand
Drama

The Whale

It’s a movie that you’ll be happy to get up and walk away from, simply for the astounding freedom of being able to get up and walk. Darren Aronofsky’s film, The Whale, takes morbid obesity to its most realistic, destructive level. It’s cringy, it’s sad, it’s unyielding, but more than anything it’s honest. With a […]

The Whale
Dark Comedy

Ship of fools: ‘Triangle of Sadness’

Listening to a Russian oligarch and an American luxury yacht captain drunkenly exchange clichés about socialism versus capitalism over the ship’s PA system strikes me as farce without tragedy — and the joke is that it’s Woody Harrelson as the captain whose aggressive about socialism and the Russian who sounds like an OAN reporter. Good […]

Ship of fools: ‘Triangle of Sadness’
Dark Comedy

Triangle of Sadness

Ruben Östlund’s Triangle of Sadness is a hilariously tragic social commentary like I’ve never seen before. In three acts, it centers on a young couple of British models, Carl (Harris Dickinson) and Yaya (Charlbi Dean). The opening scene shows us male models in a documentary setting, being interviewed and asked among many questions, how they […]

Triangle of Sadness
Movie Reviews

Finding the Lost Boys

My university was in the small town of Socorro, New Mexico. We had one small theater called the Loma, which usually showed movies a few months after their release. In the autumn of 1987, I went with a group of friends to see the Joel Schumacher film, The Lost Boys, starring Kiefer Sutherland, Jason Patric, […]

Finding the Lost Boys
Movie Reviews

Oscar Best Films

Many of us have read posts and articles pertaining to predictions and rankings. Because of BAFTA and SAG results, most claim to know how Oscar night will pan out tonight for the winner of Best Film. Why do the classic winners seem so much better than winners in recent years? How far back do you […]

Oscar Best Films