Tributary Stu
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Berlinale Review: Here (2023)
Here is a moment in time, the proverbial here and now, which is the most blissful place to exist in. It’s mischievously elusive, of course, but Bas Devos somehow manages to capture its essence in this movie, that has all the chances of growing on you and showing you true North. Read more
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Berlinale Review: Passages (2023)
The movie transcends type and finds the truth in its relationships, it dotes on and suffers with its protagonists in a manner that does feel intimate, both emotionally and physically. Sachs has congealed this inherently melodramatic story into one of stoic commitment to ourselves, of finding and cherishing our individuality, both within and outside of… Read more
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Berlinale Review: Sages-Femmes (2023)
Léa Fehner’s movie is an ode to the dedication of this mostly female staff, that rises above chronic underfunding, being overworked and managing complex situations, both professionally and personally. Read more
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Movies of the Week #8 (2023)
Close (2022): One of this year’s contenders for Best International Picture at the Oscars, Lukas Dhont’s testament to childhood friendships and their frailty is heartwarming and heartbreaking at the same time. Two young teenage boys have their relationship tested by your usual high-school pressures and while we get a surface understanding of it, the movie… Read more
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Berlinale Review: Între Revoluţii (2023)
As the title denotes, this movie by Vlad Petri is set between two revolutions – the one in Iran in 1979 and the one in Romania ten years later. Our struggle for change is a constant one, that slices through history horizontally and vertically – meaning, through society, but also between individuals. Între revoluţii (en.… Read more
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Berlinale Review: Mammalia (2023)
It’s enough to give the trailer for Mammalia a quick watch in order to get a sense of what an otherworldly experience it is going to be. This is Sebastian Mihailescu’s second feature and it highlights the Romanian director as a remarkable experimentalist. The plot is straightforward – a man goes looking for his partner,… Read more
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Movies of the Week #7 (2023)
L’inferno (1911): I’m noticing a pattern – when I do watch a movie made a hundred years ago or more, it’s the technical ambitions that impress me the most. Dante’s Inferno feels like cinema, it’s daring, effects heavy and visually imposing. I’ve never read the Divine Comedy, but following Virgil and Dante into the depths… Read more
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Movies of the Week #6 (2023)
Kurz und Schmerzlos (1998): Fatih Akin’s feature debut is the kind of friendship/mafia movie that felt thematically relevant in the 90s and 00s. Three criminally inclined pals of differing origins in multi-culti Hamburg struggle to find a meaningful way through life, living on the edge of wrongdoing and love (how does that joke go, a… Read more
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Movies of the Week #5 (2023)
Unrelated (2007): While still pussyfooting about The Souvenir: Part II, I dug deep and found myself watching Joanna Hogg’s debut feature film. As an added bonus, this also happens to be the non-TV debut of Tom Hiddleston. The movie tells of forty-something Anna (Kathryn Worth), who is struggling with mid-life things while on holiday in… Read more
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Movies of the Week #4 (2023)
Wheel of Fortune and Fantasy (2021): Hamaguchi directed two big Japanese movies released 2021, this and the Oscar winner for best international picture, Drive My Car. For whatever reason, WoFaF came up first on my watchlist and so I indulged myself with the three kinda-romantic shorts about, as the trailer puts it, coincidence and imagination.… Read more
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Taximetriști (2023)
It was an eventful few months for fans of Romanian movies, with a bunch of releases that proved varied not only in genre, but also in quality. Taximetriști falls plum in the middle quality-wise, B.T. Olteanu’s movie surprising in its serious tone – I admit, the trailer misled me to believe this will be a… Read more
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Movies of the Week #3 (2023)
Das Cabinet des Dr. Caligari (1920): One of my goals this year is to fill some of my big cinematic knowledge gaps, starting with bona fide classics, particularly from the first half of last the 1900s. Robert Wiene’s Caligari, even seen outside context, immediately feels like a clever movie, whose plot might be familiar to… Read more
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