While I wouldn’t say there was a glut of horror films released this year, we did get a solid number of really great entries, a few of which garnered universal appeal, breaking conventions of the genre. The following list is my top
Yesterday saw the publication of what I believed to be the standout male performances from 2017 while today’s list is a rundown of the most impressive female performances of the year. And, much like yesterday’s list, this overview will also feature a number of omissions for various reasons, mainly my inability to see certain films. Cynthia Nixon in Terence Davies’ A Quiet Passion comes to mind and one that I have seen show up on several lists.
As always, I’m sure there are a number of performances missing from my list due to the simple fact that I have yet to see them, performances such as Timothée Chalamet’s role in Call Me by Your Name or Gary Oldham’s portrayal of Winston Churchill in Darkest Hour. I’m sure that these two specific performances, along with others not mentioned here, will be discussed and praised sufficiently that their lack of inclusion will be overlooked.
Film Comment has released their top films of 2017, with Josh and Benny Safdie‘s Good Time taking the number one spot. The number two and three spots went to Terence Davies‘ A Quiet Passion and Olivier Assayas‘ Personal Shopper respectively.
Alex Huston Fischer and Rachel Wolther‘s delightfully odd musical comedy Snowy Bing Bongs Across The North Star Combat Zone is now available to stream for free via: Topic. The film stars The Cocoon Central Dance Team (Eleanore Pienta, Tallie Medel, and Sunita Mani)
I’ve had the privilege of attending quite a few Rooftop Films events in New York over the last few years and if you haven’t had the opportunity to see any yourself or are unaware of what Rooftop Films is,
Among the dozens of individual top ten lists I read each year, there are only two that cause me to seek out each movie I haven’t already seen- Quentin Tarantino and John Waters. Today, Mr. Waters’ list for 2017 has been revealed
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Tension abounds in writer/director Theodore Collatos’s latest feature, Tormenting the Hen, as nearly every discussion and/or interaction is laced with potential avenues providing offense and/or judgments, even the more inconspicuous and trivial subjects up for discussion harbor the possibility of illuminating surprising truths and viewpoints. With his script, Collatos has crafted a proverbial minefield for his characters to navigate, one that is laden with opportunities to weaponize any and all words and the hazards of crafting conclusions about others with incomplete information.
This week’s Kickstart Sunday pick comes to us from director Eleanore Pienta and her upcoming comedic short Ada. Shot on glorious super 16mm, this film stars Pienta as an unlikable competitive walker who has an unfortunate run-in with a hose.
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In his debut, Cameron Bruce Nelson has managed to present an effective portrait of humility in slow burn, a case study on the matter of adaptability as the nature of Sal’s situation remains in a constant state of flux, trying in earnest to readjust until finally realizing that he may not belong or be able to make do as nature decisively states its dominance emphatically. A bittersweet tale occupying the margins of the in between, in between the dusk of unrealized, cast off dreams and the threshold of promise and new beginnings.
This week’s Kickstart Sunday pick comes to us from director Usama Alshaibi and his upcoming 6th feature, Boy From War. This animated memoir will take a look at Alshaibi’s youth escaping Iraq and growing up in Iowa’s punk scene in
Having recently screened at this year’s New York Film Festival, John Wilson‘s latest short form documentary, The Road to Magnasanti is available to stream through his Vimeo channel. If you’re familiar with Wilson’s work you’ll have an idea of what to expect
This week’s Kickstart Sunday pick comes to us from Nic Fforde and Giulia Watson and their upcoming short film Ralph Styles Ultra. This short film takes place inside a ’70s cigarette ad where after the commercial ends the lives of the
The critics at the Cahiers Du Cinema had a practice in the first decades of the magazine to let admirers of a given director review that director’s films. The thought was to give those with the best chance of seeing a film’s
One of my favorite shorts from this year is Christopher Good‘s comedy Brad Cuts Loose. It was featured in a Kickstart Sunday way back in March of 2016 and Kevin reviewed it a year later when it came out, scoring
In this entertaining and oddly timely short film, director Andrew Laurich tells the story of an unlikely assassin who heads back in time to take down Hitler in A Study in Tyranny. Equal parts comedy and think piece, this well-shot
