Portrait of a Lady on Fire (Céline Sciamma, 2019). Set near the close of the eighteenth century, Céline Sciamma’s achingly refined, French drama is about a female artist (Noémie Merlant) who is recruited to surreptitiously paint the portrait of a … Continue reading Then Playing — Portrait of a Lady on Fire; Judy; For Sama
Under the Silver Lake (David Robert Mitchell, 2019). No one quite knew what to do with writer-director David Robert Mitchell’s follow-up to the indie horror hit It Follows. A shaggy modern detective story, Under the Silver Lake plays like Robert … Continue reading Then Playing — Under the Silver Lake; Apollo 11; Joker
Hustlers (Lorene Scafaria, 2019). Based on a New York article, Lorene Scafaria’s Hustlers is like Magic Mike with a low-level heist drama applied like glittery eye shadow. A group of exotic dancers at a high-end New York club need to … Continue reading Then Playing — Hustlers; The Lighthouse; Shazam!
Love, Simon (Greg Berlanti, 2018). In adapting Becky Albertalli’s young adult novel Simon vs. the Homo Sapiens Agenda to the screen, director Greg Berlanti and his collaborators honor the story of a gay teenager coming into his own by structuring … Continue reading Then Playing — Love, Simon; Ad Astra; The Testament of Dr. Mabuse
Crawl (Alexandre Aja, 2019). To his credit, director Alexandre Aja clearly understands the lean and lowdown appeal of the premise to Crawl. With little fuss and effecticely shorthand character-building, Aja races headlong into the telling the story of a flooding … Continue reading Playing Catch-Up — Crawl; Her Smell; The Commuter
The Souvenir (Joanna Hogg, 2019). Drawing heavily from her own experiences, Joanna Hogg crafts a film that captures the slippery ways problematic relationships become prisons of the participants’ own making. A student filmmaker named Julie (Honor Swinton Byrne) falls into … Continue reading Playing Catch-Up — The Souvenir; Atlantics; Long Shot
The Fugitive (John Ford, 1947). This drama resulted from an innovation production mounted in Mexico. In collaboration with the country’s largest production facility and using a crew mostly made up of local residents, director John Ford relates the story of … Continue reading Playing Catch-Up — The Fugitive; Little; The Odd Couple
Early Summer (Yasujirō Ozu, 1951). The middle entry in the set known as Yasujirō Ozu’s “Noriko trilogy,” Early Summer settles in with a Japanese family and the acquaintances that move in and out of their sphere. The film is about … Continue reading Playing Catch-Up — Early Summer; Ex-Lady; So Big
Greta (Neil Jordan, 2019). Neil Jordan’s first feature film in six years is a trashy, inane thriller that’s miles removed from his best work. Except for the requisite appearance by Stephen Rea, it doesn’t even bear much resemblance to the … Continue reading Playing Catch-Up — Greta; A Warm December; Veronika Voss
Aquaman (James Wan, 2018). The relatively cinematic merits, or lack thereof, of Marvel Studios’ blockbuster epics has been a mostly mortifying public debate in recent weeks, evidently requiring every director of note to weigh in. While the fact that Martin … Continue reading Playing Catch-Up — Aquaman; Dolemite Is My Name; Green Room
Coffee for Two 