Excerpt: Simply put, this mind blowing, multi media stop motion animation is like nothing you have ever seen before… With their first feature length film, Cociña and León have broken new ground, combining the tale of the Three Little Pigs with psychological breakdown within the little known history of Colonia Dignidad.
Excerpt: A fascinatingly nightmarish depiction of María’s psychology as PTSD crushes her hope and Stockholm syndrome erases her capacity to [differentiate] friend [from] foe.
Excerpt: The Wolf House‘s experimental animation traps us in a constantly shifting nightmare dollhouse: Maria merges into and out of the walls, conjures human features for her pigs, and even the paintings on the walls can’t keep their shape for more than a second or two.
Excerpt: One Night in Miami still possesses all of the trappings necessary to reap armloads of awards, but underneath the preconceptions and headlines is an intimate story of four men. King creates a space where the characters are able to strip away their costumes of celebrity and delve into the far more human elements of life.
Excerpt: Four icons, four egos to match, one hotel room, and all night to lay it out there. Over 50 years later, these leaders still have something to say.
Excerpt: This is a powerful movie filled with extraordinary performances and masterful direction from Regina King. One Night in Miami… is one of the best films of 2020, one that shouldn’t be missed.
Excerpt: …that heavy sentence is made human…But Bradley and her editor Gabriel Rhodes’ impressionistic look at the Richardson family raises one too many question it fails to answer.
Excerpt: Despite it all, they held onto love. That’s what takes center stage during Garrett Bradley’s poignant snapshot of a family’s perseverance against long odds.
Excerpt: I was charmed by its characters, enamored by its filmmaking, and touched by its empathy. Few films in 2020 have warmed my heart as much as this has.
Excerpt: Director Lee Isaac Chung takes inspiration from his own upbringing. He extracts warm memories of growing up and presents them with honesty and heart for all the world to appreciate.
Excerpt: Minari [is packed] with layered metaphors, multiple focal points, and a dense environment full of examples every character can lean on to learn the error of their way.
Excerpt: Winslet is extraordinary here, every year of unappreciated hard work writ across her expression, her mannish way of walking the gait of a laborer…Lee’s fashioned a wonderful what-if examination of a little known historical figure
Excerpt: This is the kind of experience that inspires thoughtful critics to consult a thesaurus. One must interestingly describe an account with a more creative word than “boring.”
Excerpt: On its own merits the film is handsomely made with wonderful acting and a lived in environment. [But Lee] could have simply written [it] without using any real names.
Excerpt: Ammonite’ is a quiet, contemplative drama that consistently engaging and often affecting. Francis Lee crafts a poetic film that impresses with its poignant storytelling, stunning cinematography, and incredible performances delivered by the titanic talents of Kate Winslet and Saoirse Ronan at the forefront.
Excerpt: “Beanpole’s” most distinctive element is its use of color, Sergey Ivanov’s production design limiting its spectrum to the brilliant greens symbolizing life, rich golden ochers and muted reds.
Excerpt: They’re caught in a reactionary series of events that pushes them to go against every fiber of their beings if it means not becoming trapped in a corner alone.
Excerpt: The film explores death, blackmail, betrayal, catastrophic injury, illness, and women’s struggle to survive as second-class citizens in the course and aftermath of war. These are the grim veins mined in a powerful film that will compel your attention even as you fight the urge to turn away.
Excerpt: Beanpole es un crudo y complejo drama que observa el costo de la guerra a través de la afligida mirada de un par de mujeres que buscan rehacer su vida y encontrar un poco de esperanza en medio de la tragedia.
Excerpt: …the play’s controversial take on homosexual self-loathing doesn’t feel fresh or enlightening. There is no reflection; no revision. It is as if 50 years have gone by without a single original thought about how to tell this story beyond including flashes of penis.
Excerpt: With its good direction, the sharp script, and strong cast, ‘The Boys in the Band’ is brilliant, complex, touching and, let’s not forget, current.
Excerpt: There’s no doubt the chemistry that these men built together on stage, night after night, gives The Boys in the Band such an authentic, lived-in feel. As each character shows up to the birthday party, we feel an emotional (and sometimes physical) charge as they interact with one another. It doesn’t hurt that the acting talent involved is also incredibly strong.
Excerpt: the late Chadwick Boseman gives us something we’ve never seen before, breaking our hearts all over again not only with Levee’s character arc, but for what we have lost. Viola Davis, too, expands her repertoire as the bold, demanding diva…
Excerpt: Wolfe retains a lot of Wilson’s play’s theatricality in this cinematic rendition and it’s all to its immense strength. Davis and especially Boseman are on a whole other level.
Excerpt: I’m frustrated and grief-stricken that Chadwick Boseman is gone. Not only was he an incredible actor, but by all accounts, he was a generous, kind, and compassionate human being. This final role is a gift to all of us who admired his work. Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom is a gift to the craft of storytelling.
Excerpt: THE MIDNIGHT SKY’s familiarity of story and style has the feeling of leftovers as lifeless as the continual hangdog expression on Clooney’s face rather than of dynamic reinvention.
Excerpt: as moving as it can be, largely due to Clooney’s melancholy stoic resolve, Mark L. Smith’s (“The Revenant”) adaptation of Lily Brooks-Dalton’s novel ‘Good Morning, Midnight’ always feels like something we have experienced before.
Excerpt: Its vagueness regarding certain mechanics and plot logistics are frustrating, but I still found myself engrossed and moved by its emotional payoff.
Excerpt: We know when danger is coming and we know the tough choices necessary to overcome it, but the emotions are authentically devastating just the same.
Excerpt: Star and director George Clooney gets most of the close-ups, and he’s definitely ready for them. His expressive facial reactions to each crucial situation are quite impressive.
Excerpt: This is a film in two parts and while the earthbound, jazz fueled pieces soar, the Great Before is another in a series of candy-colored representation of those intangible things which make us human…
Excerpt: What follows is a case of body swap shenanigans, cat and mouse chases, and introspectively heartfelt ruminations on what it means to be alive.
Excerpt: A remarkable achievement that lifts up and celebrates the human spirit, ‘Soul’ ranks amongst Pixar’s best works and charters a life-affirming mission to the great beyond that’s sure to leave audiences peering deep within themselves.
Excerpt: That directors Pete Docter and Kemp Powers have been able to tell a story about human nature, death and music through a family film is worth admiring.
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