Due to limited remote access on some of this year's most exclusive titles, the 2023 Cannes Film Festival has all but eluded us. Though I did not personally review any selections this year, I would like to highlight the work of Allison and our other writers as they devoted themselves to covering a small bundle … Continue reading Cannes 2023 Wrap-Up
Cannes 2023: All to Play For
★★★★ (Written by Intern, Wyatt Frantz) Family is almost never as simple as raising children until they go to college. Thinly veiled underneath this idealistic storyline is the turmoil and dysfunction that some fight against on a daily basis. For a film like All to Play For (originally titled, Rien à Perdre) that highlights the … Continue reading Cannes 2023: All to Play For
Cannes 2022: The Green Perfume
★★★ Leave it to Cannes to come out with a comedy as bizarre as Nicolas Pariser’s The Green Perfume! This French film frequently left me both puzzled and perplexed. After a mysterious murder occurs on stage during a performance of la Comédie-Française, Martin (Vincent Lacoste, Lost Illusions) comes under suspicion of being involved thanks to … Continue reading Cannes 2022: The Green Perfume
Cannes 2022: Butterfly Vision
★★★ (Written by Intern, Megan Davis) Butterfly Vision is a story not for the faint of heart, sullied by below-average execution. 29-year-old Ukrainian aerial reconnaissance expert Lilia (Marharyta Burkovska) returns home after being held prisoner by Russian separatists. In this time, she is raped by one of her captors and learns upon her return that … Continue reading Cannes 2022: Butterfly Vision
Film Review: Stillwater
★★★★ (Written by Allison Brown) Stillwater, a town in Oklahoma, serves as the locale of origin, as well as a key device in the climax, for this aptly titled movie from Focus Features. Written and directed by Tom McCarthy, the film offers up Bill Baker (Matt Damon) as an all-American, southern caricature (fitted with the … Continue reading Film Review: Stillwater
Cannes 2021: Bloody Oranges
Bloody Oranges is a strange and convoluted disaster that haphazardly sketches out multiple threads without tying them together. The French film from director Jean-Christophe Meurisse is fast-moving and dialogue-heavy. The tone, more confused than assured, is too chaotic and nonsensical to work. I think people will be surprised at not only the blatant disregard to … Continue reading Cannes 2021: Bloody Oranges
Cannes 2021: Bergman Island
★★★ Bergman Island features a movie-within-a-movie and makes a fatal error: the fake film is way more interesting than Bergman Island itself. This makes the whole affair feel incredibly uneven. It had me wishing that either the real life and script worlds were reversed, or that it was simply a straightforward portrayal of one or … Continue reading Cannes 2021: Bergman Island
Cannes 2021: Annette
★★★ The award for weirdest musical of the year goes to… Annette! Opening with a message imploring the audience to “keep silent and hold your breath till the end of the show”, Annette then busts out into a full-on throwback musical number entitled “May We Start.” That this sequence is the high point of the … Continue reading Cannes 2021: Annette
Cannes 2021: Zero Fucks Given
★★ (Written by Allison Brown) Zero Fucks Given (Rien à foutre), the debut feature of directing duo Julie Lecoustre and Emmanuel Marre, truly gives zero fucks about offering up a compelling story. Although there is some interesting commentary, it is depicted without flair or flourish. The French drama meanders slowly through a narrative chronicling the … Continue reading Cannes 2021: Zero Fucks Given
Cannes 2021: Medusa
★★ Medusa is quite possibly one of the strangest horror films I have ever watched, and I have seen a hell of a lot of them. It tries to follow in the footsteps of Luca Guadagnino’s Suspiria, the nearest movie tonally, but it does not come close to nailing the right level of both drama … Continue reading Cannes 2021: Medusa