I recently had the opportunity to speak by phone with Fran?ois Girard, director of The Song of Names. The film is the story of Dovidl, a Jewish violin prodigy, who is fostered by a British family during World War II, and his foster brother Martin. Dovidl disappears on...
?What would you do if you were stuck in a place and every day was exactly the same?? Here in California we?ve been instructed to stay at home except for essential reasons. Kids are out of school. Some have online classes, some don?t. Churches are happening by online...
Inside the Rain strives to take us comedically into the experience of living with bi-polar disorder. College film student Ben (Aaron Fisher, who also wrote and directed) is new on campus. But he is a kind of walking version the DSM-5 diagnostic manual. He has OCD,...
?I?ve got to go to work. I have not got a choice.? We are told that if we work hard, we will find success. For many the ?gig economy? seems to be the way they can take control of their lives and find the financial success they need. Ken Loach?s film Sorry We Missed...
?Long ago, the world was full of wonder. It was adventurous, exciting and best of all, there was magic. And that magic helped all in need. But it wasn?t easy to master. And so the world found a simpler way to get by. Over time, magic faded away?.? Disney/Pixar?s...
I try not to mansplain things. But being a male reviewing Portrait of a Lady on Fire makes me feel as if I?m doing so. That is not to say that the film needs mansplaining. Writer director C?line Sciamma has crafted a wonderful story of women seeking love and...
I have heard Queen & Slim called a black Bonnie and Clyde (which references a line in the film) and a heterosexual Thelma & Louise. The latter is more apt, but neither really quite captures the way this film fuses the on-the-run trope with today?s cultural...
I recently had a chance to talk by phone with Andrew Heckler about his film Burden. The film recounts the story of a man (Mike Burden, played by Garrett Hedlund) who was heavily involved in the Ku Klux Klan. When he chose to leave the Klan, he was taken in by a black...
In a world where even cooking shows have been gamified, why not psychopathic murder? In Guns Akimbo, from director Jason Lei Howden, such is the world of SKIZM, a streaming underground game in which contestants advance to the next level by killing their opponent....