Category: Female Filmmakers
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Lady Macbeth: No, not that one
I caught a preview of Lady Macbeth at the Watershed, Bristol, accompanied by a Q&A by director William Oldroyd. The film releases to UK cinemas on April 28. She’s not that Lady Macbeth. Not the famous one. Not the, ‘Out, damned spot!’ and the ‘Come, you spirits/ that tend on mortal thoughts, unsex me here,/…
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Raw: I just realised, it’s probably about vegetarianism too…
Holy shit. Holy shit y’all. Holy shit. Raw is Julia Ducournau’s first feature. It’s the sort of first feature people dream of making. The sort of debut that means something. It’s a French language film the screened in the UK with the standard Universal Pictures ident at the lead, that don’t just happen here. Not…
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Smurfs: The Lost Village – Some sexist narratives ain’t worth reclaiming
I learned after watching that Smurfs: The Lost Village is unrelated to those other recent Smurfs movies. I just figured it was a sequel. It feels so much like a sequel. Maybe you really need to be aware of The Smurfs as a cultural product to get the full buy in here, the film don’t…
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Free Fire: A competent film about incompetent people
Take how fast and kinetic you imagine Free Fire to be and then half it, and maybe half it again once you’ve done that. Despite being a film about witty gangsters and their high level arms deal, the film is shockingly dedicated to the reality of their incompetence. Seems to take place about an average…
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Certain Women: A film with resolve
If Certain Women feels empty it is almost certainly by design. What better way to ring in Women’s History month than with this collection of stories regarding the diminishing effect the patriarchy has in the modern age? Kelly Reichardt is one of modern cinema’s leading formalists, exploring the place of women in society within her…
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The Fits: What’s a haunted house without the ghost
I’m not sure what to make of The Fits. I think that’s okay, it’s the first feature film by Anna Rose Holmer, and it’s clearly trying to cover a lot of ground. It’s exploring belonging and gender presentation and coming of age as a black girl. It’s a delicate balancing act for the most part…
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Toni Erdmann
There is no reason why Toni Erdmann should work. It’s a near three hour long comedy conducted in German and English and Romanian in which everyone’s primary concern appears to be conducting a business transition that would involve the outsourcing of hundreds of local jobs. Our lead, Winfried Conradi, is the father of the consultant…
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A United Kingdom
I don’t usually notice technical editing in a film. I know technicals are the wrong word for this, there’s artistry to be found in colour and compositing and audio mixing. But for want of a better term, we’ll stick with that. A United Kingdom has some of the most distracting choices in the regard I’ve…
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Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them
Would that the title were more accurate. The only ‘Fantastic Beast’ to be found in the film is Colin Farrell. Because damn; there exists a theoretical point in time where that man starts becoming less handsome. Or a time when he goes for a look so stupid it ruins him forever. Like when Ethan Hawke…
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Bridget Jones’s Baby
Bridget is back! And really, she ain’t changed all that much. Well, she’s older; but she’s still pretty much the same Bridget that we know and love. Which is kinda a great thing. The easy (lazy) approach to this material would be the horror of an aging Bridget, falling out of step in an ever…
A Grand Quiet 