All posts by Alex Brannan

All Movie Reviews, Halloween Horror, Horror, Like It, Long Reviews (>400 Words)

Sheitan (2006) Movie Review

This review of Kim Chapiron’s Sheitan is part of the New French Extremity Retrospective series.

The abrupt open to Sheitan is an utter delight. The first image is a closeup on a man’s shocked face. He asks if we’re ready. There is indistinct noise, perhaps in protest, from outside of the frame. He asks again. Then, he begins scratching a turntable, and we are introduced to a rowdy night club that presents us with the energy of the film. Text appears on the screen that reads: “Do not forgive them, for they know what they do.”

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In this night club are three men who are quickly thrown out for one of their transgressions against patrons. The transgressor, Bart (Olivier Barthelemy), has some issues with anger and sexual aggression toward women (and apparently bad breath).

Before being kicked out, however, they meet Eve (Roxane Mesquida), who invites the three men and Yasmine (Leila Bekhti) to her eccentric home in the country, which is filled with Continue reading Sheitan (2006) Movie Review →

All Movie Reviews, Halloween Horror, Horror, Leave it, Long Reviews (>400 Words)

Calvaire (The Ordeal) (2005) Movie Review

This review of Fabrice du Welz’ Calvaire is part of the New French Extremity Retrospective series.

Marc Stevens (Laurent Lucas) is a singer. He wows crowds at retirement homes, but he wants to make it big. On the road to a big Christmas gig, his car breaks down in the woods. A man (Jean-Luc Couchard) in search for his dog leads Marc to an isolated inn run by a man named Bartel (Jackie Berroyer).

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Bartel appears an honest, genial innkeeper. In the morning, he tows Marc’s van to the inn and helps to repair it. But he also Continue reading Calvaire (The Ordeal) (2005) Movie Review →

All Movie Reviews, Like It, Long Reviews (>400 Words), Sci-Fi/Fantasy

Blade Runner 2049 (2017) Movie Review

Caution: This review makes mention of two key plot points of Blade Runner 2049 that may be construed as “spoilers,” even though both are pieces of plot information that are introduced early on in the film. Either way, Denis Villeneuve reportedly asked critics not to reveal any plot points of the film, so I guess you’ve been warned.

It has been 35 years since Ridley Scott’s Blade Runner, a dystopian urban image of a world in which people are hired to hunt down and “retire” artificial beings known as Replicants. Based on, if only in its philosophical quandaries, Philip K. Dick’s novel Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?, the film questioned where the line between humanity and artificiality is.

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The script of Blade Runner 2049 from Hampton Fancher and Michael Green continues this existential exploration. The film, directed by Denis Villeneuve, whose cinematic visions have only grown in terms of visuals and heady ideas, follows a new Blade Runner code-named K (Ryan Gosling) as he stumbles upon Continue reading Blade Runner 2049 (2017) Movie Review →

All Movie Reviews, Drama, Long Reviews (>400 Words), Love It

Teorema (Theorem) (1968) Movie Review

“Maybe he will let himself be seduced, and we will reap our vengeance on him.”

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Much has been said about “pure cinema,” the cinematic approach of formalism to accomplish narrative and thematic goals. Classical Hollywood cinema brought with it a brand of cohesiveness in storytelling, an emphasis of plot over image (in most cases) that has made pure cinema more of an anomaly than a true practice.

Pier Paolo Pasolini’s drastically quiet Teorema could be considered an exercise in pure cinema. There are, purportedly, less than 1,000 words spoken in the entire film. This story of a young man coming into an affluent household and seducing every Continue reading Teorema (Theorem) (1968) Movie Review →

All Movie Reviews, Drama, Leave it, Long Reviews (>400 Words)

Twentynine Palms (2003) Movie Review

This review of Bruno Dumont’s Twentynine Palms is part of the New French Extremity Retrospective series.

Bruno Dumont’s Twentynine Palms begins unassuming and unsuspecting, with two lovers (David Wissack and Katerina Golubeva) riding down the California highway. It then continues unassuming for the next hour.

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He is an American photographer, and she is a Russian immigrant. They speak different languages, yet they seem to Continue reading Twentynine Palms (2003) Movie Review →

All Movie Reviews, Halloween Horror, Horror, Leave it, Long Reviews (>400 Words)

The Houses October Built 2 (2017) Movie Review

Should I start off conversation on The Houses October Built 2 by addressing the logical miscalculations of its very first scene, the cold open which picks up where the first film left off. Last we saw of Brandy (Brandy Schaefer) she was buried alive in a shallow grave, screaming for her life. Now, we find her back in the trunk were she was before being buried in a coffin, being dropped off on the side of the road by the Blue Skeleton haunt crew.

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So, did she fall unconscious again before the masked men took her out of the coffin? Are they magicians? Or was their an awkward moment where they unburied her and dragged her screaming back to the trunk? That would be a bit anti-climactic.

The Houses October Built 2 follows the same formula as the first film, in which the crew of haunted house thrill-seekers travel to Continue reading The Houses October Built 2 (2017) Movie Review →

All Movie Reviews, Drama, Halloween Horror, Leave it, Long Reviews (>400 Words)

Sombre (1998) Movie Review

This review of Philippe Grandrieux’s Sombre is part of the New French Extremity Retrospective series.

Sombre is a film that is best described as “rattled.”

The film returns most often to two locations: the home where Jean (Marc Barbe) brings women to kill them and the car that he takes to either dump their bodies or watch the Tour de France.

In both locations the camera is often bouncing around on tight shots of the action. The camera is so tight and frantically moving, in fact, that it is often impossible to discern exactly what act is being carried out and to whom.

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This process of understanding what is happening is not helped by scenes that appear to be shot with natural light at night (at the very least, there is the absence of a three-point lighting system), making these scenes hard to Continue reading Sombre (1998) Movie Review →

All Movie Reviews, Halloween Horror, Horror, Leave it, Long Reviews (>400 Words)

The Houses October Built (2014) Movie Review

The found footage horror film The Houses October Built begins with documentary archival footage and inter-titles that describe how dangerous haunted house attractions can be.

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This intro is appropriate, given that the film is a restructuring of a 2011 documentary film by the same filmmakers. It is seemingly impossible to find a copy of this documentary, so one can only assume that Continue reading The Houses October Built (2014) Movie Review →

All Movie Reviews, Drama, Like It, Long Reviews (>400 Words)

Battle of the Sexes (2017) Movie Review

Battle of the Sexes, in name and historical story, appears to be a feminist film, and in a sense it is. Mostly, though, it is merely a safe movie about a feminist figure.

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The crux of the film is the tennis match between self-proclaimed chauvinist Bobby Riggs (Steve Carell) and #1 women’s tennis player Billie Jean King (Emma Stone), but the action begins with Continue reading Battle of the Sexes (2017) Movie Review →

Action/Thriller, All Movie Reviews, Comedy, Like It, Long Reviews (>400 Words)

American Made (2017) Movie Review

One thing that American Made is not is moral. Whether it is political, however, is a different question entirely.

The Doug Liman-directed, Gary Spinelli-penned film tells the pseudo-real life story of pilot Barry Seal (Tom Cruise), who is tapped by the CIA and, eventually, the Pablo Escobar drug cartel, to run product between the U.S. and Nicaragua in the early 1980s.

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The film weaves the conspiratorial story of excess and escalating stakes through Cruise’s charming persona, which feels Continue reading American Made (2017) Movie Review →