Author, Journalist, Nerd
Brady Skye’s Beyond the Ruins is at its best when it stops looking at the Maya as history and starts looking at them as people. That distinction is basically the entire point of the documentary. Skye begins with the kind of fascination a lot of tourists bring to the Yucatan…
Vivian Kerr’s Séance starring Scottie Thompson, Conor Paolo, Jilon VanOver, and Vivian Kerr, opens with tragedy. A child drowns, and right away the movie establishes grief as the thing hanging over everything that follows. Years later, Emma Strand (Thompson) is back near the seaside with her second husband, Albert (Paolo)…
She Listens Alone starts with a decent hook and a real sense of dread. Sabrina (Alivia Levie) spends her days staring at a screen, listening to clients dump their fears, … Continue Reading ‘She Listens Alone’ Review: Therapy, Obsession, and a Whole Lot of Bad Decisions
Los Angeles is packed with people and somehow still makes loneliness ridiculously easy. That contradiction sits at the center of Ishan Parikh’s People & Things, a relationship drama following four … Continue Reading ‘People & Things’ Review: Everybody Wants Connection
Vakhtang Gorgasali, is an AI-generated historical film from Levani Shalolashvili where the watching experience is less about learning and more about endurance.
Terry Blade’s short film My Gender Is Black, discusses gender norms for Black men showing experimental ways in which, Black men of all shapes, sizes, and hues exist in joy through music, dance, and personal history. The film opens up with Christian Chigbolu discussing how he’s always known he is trans.
Director Marcellus Cox opens latest Oscar-qualifying short film Liquor Bank with the kind of apartment that tells you everything before a word of dialogue is said. Eddie (Antwone Barnes) wakes up surrounded by beer bottles. His mirror looks like it hasn’t seen Windex in a fiscal quarter. Then he takes…
Set in 1990s Compton, the proof-of-concept short reimagines Macbeth as an aspiring rapper moving through a world of record labels, street power, ego, and ambition. Mac (Kennedy) receives a massive gold chain from Skid Row Records CEO Duncan (Russell Hornsby), while Lady M (Candice Renee), herself a former rapper…
Remi R.M. Moses’ Hindsight gave me nostalgic vibes for my first ride. The film made me realize, that when I got my first car suddenly everybody who never had anywhere to be has somewhere to be as long as you’re driving.
You know what, for the mess that is American Troll, there is a worthwhile documentary somewhere inside the Saturnin Kondratiew’s documentary. The problem is that the movie is so busy feeling sorry for comedians instead of making a genuine statement about censorship.The film chronicles Canadian comic Mike Ward’s decade-long legal battle in…
Ro (Lauren Caster) is a dancer whose life is quietly going to hell.
She bombs an audition for a yeast infection commercial, loses her dance-teaching job because she is chronically late, has an older boyfriend who seems halfway checked out, and is watching the career she built in the city slowly evaporate.
Michael Shoob’s Road to Everywhere begins with a question disguised as small talk. In 1994 Los Angeles, cab driver Jason Schuyler (Whip Hubley) tries chatting with Rachel, a passenger who … Continue Reading ‘Road To Everywhere’ Review: A Long Road That Could Use A Shorter Trip
There is something admirable about watching a filmmaker swing much bigger than the budget probably allows. Johnny Yong Bosch does exactly that with Spades, his feature directorial debut, a bloody action-revenge thriller that feels like The Crow or Ghost Rider stripped down to street level. It is messy, overlong, and occasionally held back…
Love under Franco’s regime was never going to be simple. For women, for queer people, for anyone who fell outside the rigid expectations of conservative Spanish society, desire itself could become an act of rebellion. Mario Garza’s Censurada understands that immediately. Its premise is exciting and original…
Courtney Marsh’s Where Did the Adults Go? is built around a very simple idea: three adult siblings return to their late parents’ summer home and immediately revert back into children. That part works.The problem is almost everything surrounding it. Cynthia (Carey Cox) arrives at the house with more than grief.
I hurt my foot real bad in November 2024. Sprained tendons take a long time to heal. I wore a foot boot, and walked on crutches for three weeks. I … Continue Reading ‘6,000 Waiting’ Review: A Humanizing Look at Disability Rights That Deserves More Time