Aesop told fables with animals to teach about human nature. In the Torah we find a story of Balaam and his donkey in which the donkey sees what Balaam cannot. EO is the story of a donkey, but it is also a story about us. EO is Poland?s entry for Best International...
?I?m full of shit. Pray for me.? Godland, written and directed by Hlynur P?lmason, has an interesting ?inspired by? designation. We?re told that a box of old photographic plates was found in Iceland, and the story is inspired by those early photos. The story that...
?It?s white women?s niceness that is killing us all.? A group of women sit around a dining room table to break bread and talk. But it won?t be an easy or pleasant conversation. That is because it will strive to be an honest conversation about race in America....
Death comes to us all throughout our lives. It can be frightening. It can be a time of sharing love. It can also be one of the most intimate times in people?s lives. In Last Flight Home, documentarian Ondi Timoner turns her camera on her family during the final days...
What do you do if the government forbids you from making films? If you are Iranian filmmaker Jafar Panahi, you make films about not being able to make films. The most recent of these films is No Bear. Sadly, it may be the last for some time. In 2010, Panahi was...
The AFI Conservatory is one of the premier film schools in the world. Its alumni/ae are always represented in each year?s Oscar nominations. As part of AFIFest, there are a number of programs to showcase the short films of recent graduates. It could well be that some...
Why is there still genocide? Supposedly the nations of the world have said ?Never again.? And yet, it continues in so many places while the world stands by and watches?often wringing our hands nervously. Israeli documentarian Dror Moreh?s The Corridors of Power offers...
?Let?s go get . . . rich from that dying old bitch.? Avarice is the driving force in Dean Craig?s dark comedy, The Estate. Greed is a common enough motive in comedies. We can all easily identify with it at some level. That may be why it?s included in the Seven Deadly...
I am always happy to take part in AFIFest. AFIFest 2022 is set to begin, running November 2nd-6th, 2022. It is the first time since 2019 that it will be a fully in-person festival. (In 2020, it was entirely virtual, and 2021 was a hybrid festival.) It is wonderful...