Posts Tagged ‘showbuzzdaily Sundance reviews’
 

 

SHOWBUZZDAILY Virtual Sundance Reviews: “R#J” & “A Glitch In the Matrix”

  R#J:  Every generation gets its Romeo & Juliet.  In Carey Williams’ R#J, the words of Shakespeare are only occasionally heard.  Instead, these extremely up-to-date Capulets and Montagues communicate almost ...
by Mitch Salem
 

 
 

ShowbuzzDaily Sundance 2022 Reviews: “Emily the Criminal” & “blood”

  EMILY THE CRIMINAL (no distrib):  John Patton Ford’s feature debut is a lean, gritty, accomplished thriller with a smashing star performance from Aubrey Plaza.  Plaza (who also produced) plays the titular Emily, ...
by Mitch Salem
 

 

 

SHOWBUZZDAILY Virtual Sundance Reviews: “On the Count of Three” & “Ma Belle, My Beauty”

  ON THE COUNT OF THREE:  There was a well-deserved Sundance screenwriting prize for Ari Katcher and Ryan Welch’s script for Jerrod Carmichael’s big-screen directing debut, which threads an almost impossible n...
by Mitch Salem
 

 
 

ShowbuzzDaily Sundance 2022 Reviews: “God’s Country” & “Phoenix Rising”

  GOD’S COUNTRY (no distrib):  A deliberative character study that’s also a thriller of sorts, anchored by one of the best performances of Thandiwe Newton’s career.  When two hunters (Joris Jarsky and Y...
by Mitch Salem
 

 

 

SHOWBUZZDAILY Sundance Film Festival Reviews: “State Of the Union” & “Fighting With My Family”

  STATE OF THE UNION (Sundance Channel):  The lines between narrative visual media continue to blur, and State Of the Union is an A-list talent contribution to a genre that doesn’t exactly exist yet.  It’s a ...
by Mitch Salem
 

 
 

SHOWBUZZDAILY Sundance Film Festival Reviews: “Official Secrets” & “Greener Grass”

  OFFICIAL SECRETS (IFC):  Film festivals have a way of creating unintended double features when thematically similar films are seen in close proximity, and it’s hard to watch Gavin Hood’s Official Secrets wit...
by Mitch Salem
 

 

 

SHOWBUZZDAILY Sundance Film Festival Reviews: “Brittany Runs A Marathon” & “Big Time Adolescence”

  BRITTANY RUNS A MARATHON (Amazon):  Paul Downs Colaizzo, previously a playwright, makes a remarkably assured film writing/directing debut with Brittany Runs a Marathon, which features a breakout star performance by Jill...
by Mitch Salem
 

 
 

SHOWBUZZDAILY Virtual Sundance Reviews: “Eight For Silver” & “The Sparks Brothers”

  EIGHT FOR SILVER:  Sean Ellis’s 19th century werewolf movie takes itself very seriously.  Ellis has extensively revised the usual mythology of the genre:  the full moon doesn’t figure into things, the were...
by Mitch Salem
 

 

 

SHOWBUZZDAILY Sundance Film Festival Reviews: “Miss Americana,” “Ironbark” & “Scare Me”

  MISS AMERICANA (Netflix – January 31):  There are certainly areas of Taylor Swift’s life that are carefully elided in MISS AMERICANA (her actor boyfriend’s face and name are absent, for example, and th...
by Mitch Salem
 

 
 

SHOWBUZZDAILY Virtual Sundance Reviews: “In the Earth” & “Knocking”

  IN THE EARTH (Neon):  After his foray into more commercial cinema with the Netflix remake of Rebecca that didn’t go very well, Ben Wheatley has returned to the stranger and more experimental style of his earlier f...
by Mitch Salem
 

 

 

ShowbuzzDaily Sundance 2022 Reviews: “892” & “After Yang”

  892 (no distrib):  John Boyega’s turbo-charged performance fuels this true story.  In 2017, when Brian Brown-Easley (Boyega) entered a Wells Fargo branch in a suburb of Atlanta and informed the teller that his ba...
by Mitch Salem
 

 
 

SHOWBUZZDAILY Sundance Film Reviews: “Promising Young Woman,” “Four Good Days” & “Zola”

  PROMISING YOUNG WOMAN (Focus/Universal – April 17):  Emerald Fennell’s feature-film writing/directing debut has antecedents as old as the 1973 TV-movie The Girl Most Likely To… (co-written by Joan Rive...
by Mitch Salem
 

 

 

SHOWBUZZDAILY Virtual Sundance Reviews: “Passing,” “Street Gang” & “Mass”

  PASSING:  The actress Rebecca Hall has taken a big swing in her writing/directing debut.  Her film Passing, based on the 1929 novel by Nella Larsen, embraces ambitious, difficult themes with sensitivity and expertise.�...
by Mitch Salem
 

 
 

ShowbuzzDaily Sundance 2022 Reviews: “Palm Trees and Power Lines,” “Am I OK?” and “Lucy and Desi”

  PALM TREES AND POWER LINES (no distrib):  Jamie Dack’s first feature film (from a script written with Audrey Findlay) means to unsettle, and it does.  17-year old Lea (Lily McInerny) is stuck in a dead-end Southe...
by Mitch Salem
 

 

 

SHOWBUZZDAILY Sundance Film Festival Reviews: “The Report” & “Them That Follow”

  THE REPORT (Amazon):  Scott Z. Burns’s political expose is important and engrossing, but it’s composed of so much exposition that it may have trouble finding a mainstream audience.  (Which made Amazon’...
by Mitch Salem