Directed by Jang Jae-hyun, Exhuma follows shamans, Hwa-rim (played by Kim Go-eun) and Bong-gil (played by Lim Dong-hyun), who have been called to the Parks, a Korean American family in LA experiencing unrest among their firstborns. Through their investigation, Hwa-rim and Bong-gil discover that this family is being haunted by one of their ancestors and decide that they must move…
Directed by DK Welchman & Hugh Welchman, The Peasants is based on Wladyslaw Reymont’s novel of the same name. Set in early 20th Century Poland, the story follows the Jagna (Kamila Urvedowska), the most beautiful and charming woman in the village of Lipce. When she marries Maciej Boryna, a weathy widower (and the village’s ‘First Farmer’), she does…
Even if our memory filters our past, the truth cannot be changed. In Memory, Sylvia (Jessica Chastain) is a social worker who lives with her teenage daughter, Anna (Brooke Timber). A victim of abuse who has struggled with addiction, Sylvia is now 13 years sober and has managed to rebuild her life. However, after a high…
Origin, written and directed by Ava DuVernay, is based on the book Caste: The Origin of our Discontents, and on the life of its author, Isabel Wilkerson. After the murder of Trayvon Martin in 2012, Pulitzer Prize winning writer, Isabel Wilkerson, is prompted by a colleague to write a piece about his death. She is hesitant…
Racial issues aren’t funny. But the way that we engage it as a culture can be laughable. In American Fiction, Thelonius ‘Monk’ Ellison (Jeffrey Wright) is a well-respected professor of English literature but he is struggling to leave his mark on the literary world himself. His latest novel has failed to catch on with publicists who…
The Boy and the Heron is written and directed by Hayao Miyazaki and produced by Studio Ghibli. At the beginning of the film, Mahito loses his Mum in a drastic fire. A year after this, he and his father move from Tokyo to the countryside to live with his new stepmother, Natsuko, who is pregnant. Mahito isn’t…
Fame can be a nightmare. In Dream Scenario, Paul Matthews (Nicolas Cage) is a family man and tenured professor who cares about his students and their education. Fumbling through middle age, he’s respectable, honourable and… barely noticeable to those around him. Suddenly, Matthews finds himself at the centre of controversy when he randomly appears in people’s…
Sometimes, it’s the biggest losers that teach you how to win. Set in 2001, Next Goal Wins tells the follows coach Thomas Rongen (Michael Fassbender), a disgraced soccer coach who finds his career in jeopardy after (another) outburst on the field. In an effort to deal with him, his superiors transfer him to coach in American Samoa,…
Rustin, directed by George C. Wolfe, and written by Julian Breece and Dustin Lance Black, is a biographical film about civil rights activist, Bayard Rustin, and his role in the organization of the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom in 1963. At the beginning of the film, a conference that Bayard (played by Colman…
Sometimes, the path to winning is a bumpy road. In Quiz Show, Anne (Awkwafina) is a straight-laced and brilliant woman who’s struggling to make friends at work. Living alone with her dog, her greatest joy in life is watching her favourite quiz show on television. Although uninspiring, Anne’s life is in order… until further drama with…
