Nick Rocco Scalia

Rounding can be a tough film and one that puts its viewers through a lot, but the investment is well worth it.

Streetlight Harmonies manages to conjure up some compelling and highly evocative vignettes.

Respectable in both intentions and execution, this is the kind of film that sneaks up on you and leaves a lasting impression. Like our man himself, it shouldn’t be overlooked.

Try as I might, I can’t quite shake nor stop thinking about The Giant, and that makes me believe Raboy’s done something very, very right, here – even if you might have to squint a bit to see it.

Hammer has the mechanics of a hard-edged noir thriller, which work startlingly well, but it’s clear that Sparkes’s heart, and therefore the film’s, is centered on the distressed familial relationships.

The overall experience of The Grand Bizarre is, in a lot of ways, an extremely eye-opening one. It forces a viewer to consider how complicated and incredible every single stitch of a rug, or a scarf, or a dishtowel actually is, and how easily it is to overlook that fact.

For a while, the film’s elegant art-horror vibe is quite compelling, leaving the ancient secret societies and demonic entities that it hints at tantalizingly off-screen and just out of Rose’s grasp. Unfortunately, though, the film begins to stumble late in its second act, its well set-up mystery devolving into a contrived sort of video-game logic.

The directorial choices, from the minimal use of music for dramatic embellishment to the innovative split-screen technique used to blur the identities of individuals in courthouse footage, are spot-on throughout.

It’s not that Euphoria lacks good intentions or comes off as superficial in its treatment of death and dying. It’s just that there’s so much potential for grace or humor or despair or horror inherent in its premise. It’s sad to see so much of that thematic territory go so thoroughly, if politely, unexplored.

Although Hepi admits that he still has a lot of questions regarding his late mother – and his audience is bound to have theirs, as well – he’s nevertheless put together a stirring, deeply personal, and hard-hitting profile that goes a long way toward illuminating and immortalizing Mita’s contributions to Maori culture and world cinema as a whole.

Rottentail is a disappointment, overall, and even forgiving viewers are likely to hop off the bunny trail long before the closing credits roll.

This is a unique, well-acted, handsomely produced movie, overall, the kind of thoughtful and wholesome, high-concept drama that you don’t see much, anymore.

1st Summoning‘s final act plays like one of the better-quality segments from the V/H/S franchise, and it suggests that this filmmaking team might have been better represented by an all-killer-no-filler short subject rather than a feature.

The film is never less than entertaining, and it’s easy enough to get caught up in its roller-coaster narrative and impressive recreation of mid-century Texas, but its makers occasionally struggle to get a handle on their protagonist and the attendant themes of ambition, failure, and stubborn perseverance that he represents.

When a movie does so much right – it’s unique and visually arresting and, at times, legitimately moving and surprisingly scary – it’s hard not to wish for something more complete, something that fully and entirely connects.

Hellsgård and writer Olivia Vieweg have crafted a morbidly beautiful, uniquely character-focused, and decidedly feminine take on familiar apocalyptic tropes, and while it doesn’t always entirely deliver on a narrative or visceral level, Endzeit – Ever After emotional resonance – and the singularity of its worldview – is undeniable.

Nyoni’s handling of tone is astoundingly careful, and because of it, I Am Not a Witch is a truly unique and stirring experience.

It’s unfortunate that The Swan doesn’t fully catch fire as a family drama or a rites-of-passage story, but a film with such a rich and finely honed sense of place is one that nevertheless deserves to be seen.