#Independent Film Review

[ulkaralakbarova]

"Suze: A Heartwarming Journey of Empathy, Healing, and Unconditional Love - A Must-Watch Indie Film Gem"

Michaela Watkins (left) and Charlie Gillespie (right) in “Suze” ⭐⭐⭐⭐ Rating: 4 out of 5. Independent Cinema: A Spotlight on “Suze” As we consistently emphasize at http://www.moviemovesme.com, our primary aim is to shed light on, celebrate, and prioritize independent cinema. Some may question the downsides of big studio films. While such inquiries remain pertinent, it’s crucial to acknowledge…

[dgspeaks]

Capturing the Quiet Moments: A Review of "The Farewell" (2019)

In the vast landscape of cinema, few films capture the intimate intricacies of family and culture quite like Lulu Wang’s “The Farewell.” This independent gem, released in 2019, offers a poignant and deeply personal exploration of familial bonds, cultural clashes, and the universal struggle of saying goodbye. Through its delicate storytelling and authentic performances, “The Farewell” stands as a…

[anarchic-miscellany]

Review to follow, but: Rather than giving money to Hollywood, give your money to "Kneecap": the anarchic, debauched, drug fuelled punk ode to rebellion, independence, anti-authoritarianism, pushing back against gate keepers of culture, and fucking mayhem. All told through Irish hip hop. I'm a proud patriotic Irishman now. I have never been to Ireland.

[13lizardsinatrenchcoat]

Barbie (2023) is progressive enough to say "indigenous" but not progressive enough to avoid smallpox comparisons...

Also, weirdly obsessed with the idea of reverse misogyny and ken's feelings.

[secondhandself]

Birdy (1984) dir. Alan Parker

a young man who wishes he was a bird and his lovesick best friend grapple with the horrors of war and the troubles of conflicting views within a relationship. this sweet and unusual and honestly truly bizarre film has been one of my favorites ever since i watched it. matthew modine (stranger things) and nicolas cage (so many movies) deliver intriguing yet comfortingly plain performances. if you like war or slightly homoerotic movies from the 80s, this is for you. 8/10.

[fibula-rasa]

Favorite New-to-me Films—March ‘24

(listed in order pictured above, L to R)

READ on BELOW the JUMP!

Forbidden Fruit (1921)

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C.B. DeMille and Jeanie MacPherson’s second swing at this modernized Cinderella story about overcoming a bad husband, now with eye-popping fantasy sequences designed by Natacha Rambova. [Gif sets incoming!]

Mary Maddock (Agnes Ayres) does seamstress work and takes in laundry to support her layabout, no-goodnik husband. Her wealthy clients (Kathlyn Williams & Theodore Roberts) hatch a scheme to use a social event to settle a business deal with handsome young entrepreneur Nelson Rogers (Forrest Stanley). Mary accepts the job to keep Rogers occupied, with the unintended consequence of the two falling in love. When Mary’s husband makes a surprise appearance, the jig is up. But, after her husband’s chicanery has deadly consequences, Mary and Rogers are free to live happily ever after. CW: a pet bird is killed.

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The Woman King (2022)

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Giving an epic treatment to fitting subject matter, Gina Prince-Bythewood, Maria Bello, and Dana Stevens tell the story of the Agojie, a real-life group of warriors from the kingdom of Dahomey in West Africa, and General Nanisca (Viola Davis), a fictional leader of the warriors. The Woman King has a creative approach to history, to which a lot of critical attention has been paid—it’s certainly worth seeking education on relevant historical topics. 

That said, it was a gutsy and risky proposition to tell a story tied into the Transatlantic slave trade focused entirely on the West African and Portuguese side for an American (and English speaking) audience. Also, as an avid fan of Xena: Warrior Princess and the Eddas/sagas of Iceland and Scandinavia, I appreciated the filmmakers taking a legendary approach to this location and time period. In its deliberately extra-historical engagement with history, The Woman King also brought to mind for me Senegalese filmmaker Ousmane Sembène‘s Ceddo (1971), which I highly recommend. (Obviously the films have wildly different tones/styles tho!) 

As you might imagine from the description, heavy CWs for violence (including SA), blood, and slavery.

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Why Change Your Wife? (1920)

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A month ago, I wouldn’t have believed you if you told me that I’d be putting not one but two DeMille movies on my new-to-me favorites list! I initially watched them as reference for the cosplay I mentioned in the last monthly round-up post, but ended up enjoying both! Often there are elements of DeMille’s films that hamper my ability to enjoy them fully, whether it’s goofy class politics (hello Saturday Night), racist depictions (hi The Woman God Forgot, which I also watched for the first time this past month), or that I simply rarely enjoy christian bible epics. 

That’s not to say Why Change Your Wife? is somehow perfect—it features pretty sexist attitudes. But, having learned a little bit about DeMille’s unconventional marriage, I see it less of a story of wives failing and more of a story about how two people who have a solid partnership can lose themselves when they lose each other. Here I’m referring to the first part of the film, before Swanson’s Beth and Meighan’s Robert get divorced. Beth isn’t being true to herself when she’s on her mental-improvement kick—there are sufficient details thrown in that show that she and Robert have drifted apart and she’s responding to it by morphing into a maiden aunt type. The film could’ve made Robert’s role in their marriage’s demise a little more overt, but I do think DeMille and screenwriters Olga Printzlau, Sada Cowan, and William DeMille must have been concerned about the American public’s response to a story that normalizes divorce in 1920. For context, we didn’t have no-fault divorce here in the US until the 1970s.

Anyway, why should you watch it? Gloria Swanson and Bebe Daniels offer fun and energetic characterizations as the two Mrs. Gordons, and they share a pretty wild fight scene. The costumes by Natacha Rambova are funky and interesting. The film features an absolutely adorable dog too! (If anyone recognizes the dog please LMK!) [Gif sets for this film are also on the way!]

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Intohimon vallassa (1947)

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Teuvo Tulio don’t miss. 

The heir to the biggest farm in the county, Aino (Regina Linnanheimo), is forced into an arranged marriage, but the man she really loves, Olavi (Kullervo Kalske), sticks around and becomes the town blacksmith. Years pass and Aino’s husband becomes an alcoholic and an abuser. Olavi keeps his distance as Aino’s marriage implodes in a particularly disturbing fashion. CW: domestic abuse, alcoholism, implied death of dog

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Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem (2023)

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Look at me watching more than one movie this year that was made in this century! Anyways, I’ve been a turtle fan as long as I can remember (photographic evidence below) and I love that the comics have been re-adapted so well in the last 15 or so years for younger generations. (The 2012 show is very cute btw, worth checking out especially if you have kids.)

This take features a unique and kinetic animation style with an accessible story touching on what makes someone an outcast and how both adults and kids can navigate that. Mutant Mayhem features probably my new favorite depictions of April and of Splinter. Also, even though the non-turtle characters are almost all celebrity voice actors, the voice acting quality is very high.

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Montana Moon (1930)

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Sweet romantic story with comedic elements about a millionaire’s willful daughter (Joan Crawford) who, fleeing an awkward situation on a train ride with her family, runs into a cowboy (Johnny Mack Brown). The two quickly fall in love and are married, but the newlyweds face challenges when the differences in their lifestyles come into sharp relief. I love Crawford’s costuming and styling in this and her performance elevates the material. There are extended sequences with classic country-western music tho, so if that grates on you, you might want to take a pass on this one.

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Leda – The Fantastic Adventure of Yohko (1985)

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Yoko Asagiri is a young girl struggling to confess her feelings to the boy she likes. She decides to confess via a song she composed herself, but the song turns out to be a key to another world. Yoko teams up with a talking dog and a tiny warrior girl with a giant robot to fight the villainous Zell, who wants to use Yoko’s song to conquer her world. The animation and designs are top-notch as is the music. I personally enjoyed all of the Oz vibes suffused throughout the OVA.

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Tomatos Another Day (1934)

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Also known as “It Never Happened,” this is ostensibly a short film about a woman carrying on an affair and said affair being discovered by her husband. What Tomatos Another Day actually is is a send up of early talkies conceived and executed by independent filmmaker James Sibley Watson Jr. and collaborator Alec Wilder. If you’ve been around my blog for a while, you probably already know that I love Watson’s Fall of the House of Usher (1928) [Gifs/Stills]. However, I haven’t seen much else of his work! Thankfully, Eastman House has preserved and digitized a couple of his films and I plan on watching more soon. The link above has the short film with an introduction and outtakes!

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Past Lives (2023)

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Past Lives is a quiet but emotionally-rich love story by Celine Song that spans decades but also a single eventful week. I loved the way that the story was structured and how much the film relied on thoughtful pauses to communicate complicated emotions. The actors, Greta Lee, Teo Yoo, and John Magaro, all put in great work here. If you haven’t seen it yet, but plan to watch it, prepare to cry a bit.

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The Mind Reader (1933)

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Warren William plays a carny with a different gimmick for every town in the midwest. When the Depression affects his take, he and his cohorts, Frank (Alan Jenkins) and Sam (Clarence Muse), come up with a new scheme: fortune telling. As Chandra the Great, the crew start to rake it in, but when Chandra falls for an upright citizen (Constance Cummings), the scheme and their freedom is put in jeopardy.

I’m not accustomed to William playing this particular brand of sleazebag, but he really kills it as Chandra/Chandler/Munro. I appreciated how creative and adventurous the cinematography and editing is—not an especially common trait for pre-code films. I also made some still sets for the film!

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Honorable Mention: Hard to Handle (1933) [letterboxd | imdb]

This film gets honorable mention because while I didn’t think it was particularly good, a few call outs are deserved. The bad: the plot was unnecessarily convoluted and the recurring sequences with fat people were iffy at best. The better: Ruth Donnelly shines as the comedically base mother of Mary Brian and she even gets to do a bit of physical comedy. Donnelly, Brian, and Cagney have a nice chemistry together throughout. In terms of costuming, the matching outfits of Brian and Donnelly are funny, but made funnier by the sheer quantity of mother-daughter ensembles they wear. The neutral: the film is packed with topical Depression-era references: notably Florida investment swindles and trends like dance marathons and the grapefruit diet. All-in-all, the filmmakers could have done less and achieved more.

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The only big post I completed this month was a massive undertaking: Lost, but Not Forgotten: Omar Khayyam / A Lover’s Oath and a timeline for the film’s production and release.

Otherwise, I made themed gif and still sets from:

Torture Garden (1967)

The Marriage Circle (1924)

Le Altre (1969)

The Mind Reader (1933)

As for April, the cosplay I mentioned should be up very soon. If I have the time, both Lost, but Not Forgotten and How’d They Do That should have new installments posted and I have a few movies/shows on my themed gif/still agenda.

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[ogradyfilm]

Recently Viewed: Hundreds of Beavers

[The following review contains SPOILERS; YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED!]

Hundreds of Beavers isn��t just the best comedy released to the general public in 2024; it is also quite possibly the greatest live-action cartoon ever made.

Embracing the delicate art of slapstick with an unapologetic sincerity rarely glimpsed since the silent era, the film miraculously manages to sustain the gleefully anarchic tone of your typical Wile E. Coyote short for the entire duration of its feature length running time. It accomplishes this impressive feat by adopting a hybrid narrative structure. Although the plot primarily revolves around a relentless barrage of sight gags (most of which are variations on the theme of a bumbling fur trader and his ostensibly “adorable” prey repeatedly inflicting sadistic physical violence upon one another), it is not, in fact, strictly episodic; on the contrary, every detail, no matter how seemingly insignificant at first glance, is absolutely integral to the overarching story. The pair of woodland critters that resemble Sherlock Holmes and Watson, for example, aren’t merely an amusing one-off joke; they eventually play a substantial role during the third act. The absurdly chaotic climax, meanwhile, serves as a sort of final exam, testing the myriad skills that the protagonist has acquired throughout the preceding scenes. Even a humble trapping pit established way back in the tale's inciting incident (after which it was probably swiftly forgotten by the average viewer) pays off spectacularly later on—i.e., nearly an hour after its initial introduction!

Boasting imaginative mixed-media visuals (incorporating puppetry, CGI, and intentionally crude hand-drawn animation), delightfully frenetic fight choreography, an outstanding lead performance by Ryland Brickson Cole Tews (which combines the exaggerated mannerisms of Jim Carrey, the paradoxical mischievous pathos of Chaplin’s Little Tramp, and the “rubber hose” style of character design popularized by Max Fleischer), and genuinely gorgeous black-and-white cinematography, Hundreds of Beavers is a feast for the eyes as well as the funny bone. Immaculately crafted and unabashedly immature in equal measure (toilet humor abounds), it is a wholly unique experience. “Masterpiece” is too inadequate a descriptor; this cannot be properly classified or categorized as anything less than an essential, genre-redefining work.

[filmcourage]

Film Distribution Is Easy... Marketing Is Hard - Jon Reiss

Watch the video interview on YouTube here.

[cinephilesadeqi]

Movie Analysis and Review: "Detachment" (2011)

Synopsis:“Detachment,” directed by Tony Kaye, delves into the life of Henry Barthes (Adrien Brody), a substitute teacher who avoids emotional connections, constantly moving from one district to another. Placed in a public school filled with apathy among students and disinterested parents, Henry inadvertently becomes a role model to his disaffected students and forms a unique bond with a teenage…

[thishadoscarbuzz]

268 - Shattered Glass (with Richard Lawson!)

Hayden Christensen arrived seemingly out of nowhere to land the role of pre-Vader Anakin Skywalker, becoming one of Hollywood's hottest stars overnight and largely untested as a screen presence. After a respected turn in Life As A House (see previous episode!), the Attack of the Clones reviews soured audiences on this brand new star. The very next year, he gave a terrific performance in Shattered Glass as journalist Stephen Glass who famously fabricated stories for The New Republic. But awards bodies overlooked Christensen's work and instead nominated the rising Peter Sarsgaard as Glass' pseudo-rival Chuck Lane.

This episode, we talk about the Entertainment Weekly It List that was Christensen's first debut post-Star Wars casting and his return to the franchise. We also talk about director/writer Billy Ray, Sarsgaard's near nomination here, and journalism movies that were successful with Oscar.

Topics also include working with fact checkers, college group watch television, and the 2003 Independent Spirit Awards.

Links:

The 2003 Academy Awards

Vulture Movies Fantasy League

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[thatgeekwiththeclipons]

Happy 54th Birthday to filmmaker Kevin Smith! ^__^

[the-celluloid-correspondent]

Ghostlight: Healing Through the Power of Theatre.

When a construction worker unexpectedly joins a local theater’s production of Romeo and Juliet, the drama onstage starts to mirror his own life.

Grief is a strange thing. It is a powerful force that will either tear us apart or allow us to find inner peace. But our path to coming to terms with it is a long and winding road that will lead to somewhere unknown. Ghostlight tackles the uncertainty…

[againstdying]

If the movie, In a Violent Nature, blew chunks, what movie would you recommend people watch instead? Horror movie wise.

hiii im not a horror expert or anything but i have a couple recs :)

i loveddd braindead (1992) for awesome nasty gory grossness and its fun and exciting and silly. definitely recommend watching with friends if you can

thanksgiving (2023) has a really stupid plot but it's a good slasher and successfully grossed me out a couple times so extra points for that

christmas evil (1980) (starring fiona apple's dad, of all people) surprised me with how much i liked it, it's not super gory if i remember right but it's definitely entertaining

barbarian (2022) if you haven't seen it it's best to go in blind but its so good and really funny at times but it's also genuinely unsettling

house of wax (2004) is also really fun even though it has terrible reviews there are some really cool effects (though i watched it a couple years ago and dont remember it too well)

[sayxit]

Fantastic Planet by Roger Corman (poster)

[artistsonthelam]

Just watched Late Night with the Devil and loved it. That analog horror 🤌 And it's 97% on Rotten Tomatoes!