In my twenties, I spent two summers in Asia and Europe, documenting the work of Christian missionaries abroad. My idealism soon gave way to bone-crunching realism. Most of the missionaries I filmed expressed a carefulness to their approach, talking at length about their ministry being Read More …
“I still don’t understand the play.” So muses Augie Steenbeck (Jason Schwartzman) multiple times through Wes Anderson’s story of a televised production of a fictitious play about death, grief, acting, “brainiac” children, alien invasion, military oversight, first romances, seasoned affairs, art, and storytelling itself. Prior Read More …
“How do you live?” is the fundamental question posed by Hayao Miyazaki’s The Boy and the Heron. It’s the question posed to Mahito Maki, the angry 12-year-old boy at the film’s centre. Having recently lost his mother in a fire in Tokyo during World War II, Read More …
I never thought I would identify with Barbie. As a little girl, I disavowed the doll and any potential ‘girly-girl’ association by telling people I owned Stacie’s 3-in-1 Bunk Bed and Barbie’s ‘So Much to Do!’ Kitchen set solely because I was a miniature enthusiast. Read More …
Celine Song’s directorial debut Past Lives has the kind of confidence that one would expectfrom a seasoned filmmaker deep into their career. The narrative is built around the concept of in-yun, which is essentially the belief that the relationships built amongst people are ultimately the Read More …
Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret. is essential viewing because an unexamined faith is not a wellspring of beliefs, but a list on inclinations inscribed on a wet napkin. Following Abby Ryder Fortson (Ant-Man; A Dog’s Journey) as Margaret, the daughter of a Jewish man (Bennie Sadie — Read More …
Killers of the Flower Moon lays plain yet another appalling chapter of American history. The Reign of Terror in the 1920s saw the Osage people murdered by white people who felt the wealth from oil was their God-given right as the superior race. Apparently, they Read More …
The absolutely brilliant Paul Giamatti plays Paul Hunham, a cantankerous, foul-mouthed prep-school teacher, who is somewhat forced into taking care of a bunch of misfit students during winter break in Alexander Payne’s newest masterpiece The Holdovers. The film, which also stars Dominic Sessa as Angus Tully, Read More …
“You don’t get to commit the sin, then have us all feel sorry for you that it had consequences,” Kitty Oppenheimer reprimands her husband Robert midway through 2023’s Oppenheimer. For most of the film, J. Robert Oppenheimer leads the Manhattan Project without reserve, arguing the necessity Read More …
F for Fake is ostensibly a film about Elmyr de Hory, an art forger who produced paintings soseemingly authentic that they fooled the best art critics in the West. His paintings, director Orson Welles claims, are still featured in certain unnamed museums. The film also Read More …