Colm Bairéad has given us a surprisingly unsentimental look at what shapes us as children in this Gaelic language exploration of a summer in the life of one neglected child.
Continue readingThe Quiet Girl (An Cailín Ciúin) (2022)
StandardCrimes of the Future (2022)
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I think I knew this was going to be overblown Cronenberg fan boy drivel but Kristen Stewart so I pushed on through to a 9.45pm fourth film of the day sold out screening. I was lulled occasionally by KStew and the always mesmerising Léa Seydoux and stuck it through to its trite ending.
Continue readingMy Old School (2022)
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Oh my heart! This inventive and engaging Scottish documentary about small town scammer ‘Brandon Lee’ is more a celebration of humanity than a salacious exposé.
Continue readingGodland (Vanskabte Land) (2022)
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It’s hard not to feel affected by this intense and beautiful historical drama set in late 19th century Iceland.
Continue readingWar Pony (2022)
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It’s worth lauding this film simply because of its collaborative creation with Hollywood heavyweight Riley Keough adding weight to what is essentially an authentic indigenous story.
Continue readingYou Won’t Be Alone (2022)
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It’s going to be hard to forget this dark fable by Australian Goran Stolevski (his very different Of An Age is also screening at MIFF). He’s not afraid to be daring, setting the story in 19th century Macedonia and centring it on a largely non-verbal girl.
Continue readingEverybody’s Oma (2022)
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I cried right through the end of this touching documentary that shines a light on the experience of hidden carers.
Continue readingWe Might As Well Be Dead (2022)
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A well-dressed couple and their child trek through a forest and enter a compound where a white tower block rises amidst verdant lawns and a manicured golf course. They are desperate for their residence application to be accepted in this dystopian world where everything outside the fence is, seemingly, dangerous.
Continue readingClara Sola (2021)
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A remarkable first feature (and Costa Rica’s Oscar submission), Nathalie Álvarez Mesén spins a lush and dark tale of the internal rage of a woman kept confined.
Continue readingThe Pawnshop (Lombard) (2022)
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Clips from the US ‘reality’ TV show Hard Core Pawn occasionally appear in my socials and its depiction of pawnshops is firmly rooted in the capitalist myth that those without somehow deserve their lot. The owners unapologetically buy low and sell high and aggressively eject the many grifters trying to con them with worthless or stolen junk. In Lukasz Kowalski’s empathetic observational documentary Lombard, we see poverty in all its forms in Poland’s largest pawnshop.
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