A really, really good film. A biopic of the work of Nise de Silviera, a Brazilian psychiatrist and mental health care reformer. A heartbreaking but ultimately uplifting film about how seeing the humanity in others is profoundly healing.
The Club is about a group of fuck-up priests and their housekeeper living in this piece of shit town in the middle of nowhere, like a serious version of Father Ted. Their contented peace is shattered when a priest’s victim shows up, not with the weeping and wailing of idealised victimhood, but with the anger…
I wanted to see this coz pretty much every film is made in New Zealand but how many have you seen actually set there? Especially pre-colonial? For that reason, a by-the-numbers boy-avenged-his-father plot remains engaging because it’s in the larger framework of a world we never see. Very much enjoyed it.
The Cut is about Nazaret, a survivor of the Armenian genocide. Grim, unsurprisingly. A good movie to compliment Theeb, because the world Theeb walks out into is the world of Nazaret.
A film about a concentration camp survivor changed beyond recognition by her experiences, trying to relive her past or maybe even just trying to recognise herself by getting others to recognise her. Odd tone.
Best movie of the festival I’ve seen so far. Psychedelic sci-fi about copyright and consciousness, switching between animation and live action. Simply, it’s a surreal fairytale, ideal for those that enjoyed something like Spirited Away. But the plot’s springboard is more about the idea of marketable fantasy, not celloid but chemical, a sort of lo-fi…
A slow-burning Western set in an Australian Aboriginal community, in which every scene seethes with threat but plays out subtle and slow. Excellent if you like something like No Country For Old Men.
A really good film about a maid, the family she works for and their little shit of a boy, and how they weather the financial crisis of 1997. Touching and tinged with humour, recommend!
Immediately wanna watch it again, only this time with my mum, and the whole of my book group. Who would have thought a film about a little girl buying a bike would be so compelling?