Category: Review
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‘Dark Star’ Hinted at What Was to Come
Serving as the feature-length debuts of both John Carpenter and Dan O’Bannon, the 1974 space comedy has several of the traits for which both filmmakers would come to be recognized.
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For ‘Belly,’ Looking Amazing is Nearly Enough
Music-video extraordinaire Hype Williams’ one and only feature film has long had a negative reputation for preferring style over substance. That’s not a bad thing.
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‘Her Private Hell’ is a Provocative Bore
Nicolas Winding Refn’s first feature-length project since 2016’s ‘The Neon Demon’ is too uninteresting to make you want to give too much air to the outrage it seems to half-anticipate.
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‘Hell’s Kitchen’ Makes You Appreciate Alicia Keys More
For 425: Inspired by the singer-songwriter’s early life, the Tony-winning play is doing a multi-day stint at Seattle’s Paramount Theatre this week.
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The Romanticized Alienation of ‘Fallen Angels’
Wong Kar-wai’s 1995 drama makes loneliness look improbably cool.
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‘Thief’ Nails Its Set Pieces
The 1981 drama’s rather elegiac narrative isn’t nearly as affecting as it should be, though.
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Working Girls
‘Broken Mirrors,’ Marleen Gorris’ 1984 follow-up to her still-transcendent feminist drama ‘A Question of Silence,’ expands on its predecessor’s themes while dramatically improving on its writer-director’s aesthetic command.
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‘Night Nurse’: Georgia Bernstein’s Atmospheric, Opaque Feature Debut
The filmmaker’s audacious, narratively undernourished new feature has, above all else, great style.
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‘Rock & Rule’ Could Use a Lot More Rock
As star-studded as this 1983 cartoon for adults’ soundtrack is, it features far fewer musical sequences than you’d expect.
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Found Connections
Donna Deitch’s ‘Desert Hearts’ was a breakthrough for lesbian representation in cinema. It also achieves another rarified thing: Characters who feel like they exist outside a screenplay’s bounds.
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‘Jackass: Best and Last’ Plays It Safe
The storied prank franchise’s purportedly final chapter only underscores how well 2022’s ‘Jackass Forever’ functioned as a finale.
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‘Funeral Parade of Roses’ is a Hypnotizing Swirl
Toshio Matsumoto’s 1969 movie is exhilaratingly unclassifiable.
Peterson Reviews 