Check back over the course of the night to see who and what won in each category. Where applicable, green text denotes links to full reviews of the films. Bold denotes the winner in the category.
Tag Archives: 2017
Toni Erdmann (2016) Movie Review
A father’s (Peter Simonischek) desperate, juvenile attempts at reaching his over-worked white collar daughter (Sandra Huller) is the subject of Toni Erdmann. Dressing up in fake teeth and a wig, the father becomes the titular character, a fictional businessman who is occasionally a life coach and occasionally a German ambassador. He follows his daughter around, sending her work life in flux during a time where securing a client is pivotal.
Toni Erdmann is a film that boasts its Continue reading Toni Erdmann (2016) Movie Review
4.1 Miles (2016) Short Film Review
Over recent years, a massive influx of refugees trying to cross the water boundary between Turkey and Greece has caused chaos for the Coast Guard. They pull in hundreds of people per day. But they cannot possibly take everyone.
Life on these waters are depicted as harrowing. People are separated from their families. People slip into the water and drown. And all the while the Coast Guard Continue reading 4.1 Miles (2016) Short Film Review
The White Helmets (2016) Short Film Review
In Aleppo, Syria, air strikes are a daily occurrence. The city relies on a volunteer group called the White Helmets who act as first responders on the ground after these attacks.
The Netflix original documentary short film The White Helmets follows members of this organization. Through a mix of Continue reading The White Helmets (2016) Short Film Review
Academy Awards Predictions 2017 – Best Documentary Short Film
Ah, the plight of the documentary short subject! One theater in my state decided to air these five nominees, and they only chose one showtime: 11:15 am on Saturday and Sunday.
Let’s just say I couldn’t make it.
Luckily a few of these films are available on online platforms. Extremis and The White Helmets are available on Netflix. Joe’s Violin is available through the New Yorker here. With a handful of the five under my belt, let’s try and figure this category out.
Best Documentary Short Film:
Continue reading Academy Awards Predictions 2017 – Best Documentary Short Film
Extremis (2016) Short Film Review
Extremis, a documentary short film from Netflix, is the story of a hospital ICU. As much as the film paces and moves like a medical drama, it is distinctly and heart-wrenchingly real.
The film opens on a patient, breathing tube affixed, trying desperately just to communicate. The patient can’t write, nor make discernible letters in the air, and can barely point at letters on a sheet of paper. All the while the doctor is trying Continue reading Extremis (2016) Short Film Review
Joe’s Violin (2016) Short Film Review
“How long can you live with memories?”
This is one of the first lines of Joe’s Violin, coming from the eponymous Joseph Feingold. It is an expression of his carefree attitude about donating one of his most prized possessions: a violin. What Joe’s Violin aims to do, however, is supplant that throwaway notion with the creation of new memories.
Joe’s story is one of Holocaust tragedy. At the age of 17, in eastern Poland, Feingold was taken by the Russians and put into a Siberian labor camp. Of the few things he had after his time in the camp his violin becomes, in retrospect, a Continue reading Joe’s Violin (2016) Short Film Review
Weekend Box Office Predictions: 2/24-2/26
Oscar weekend sees the wide release of three new films. Two of these three, as far as I am concerned, have received zero marketing. These would be the films Rock Dog (um…) and Collide (…what?). The third film, also the widest new release of the weekend, is Jordan Peele’s much anticipated and well-reviewed Get Out. The horror film stars Daniel Kaluuya and Allison Williams and is likely to make a splash this weekend.
Returning to the fight are LEGO Batman, Fifty Shades Darker, and The Great Wall. The LEGO Batman Movie, having won the box office in its first two weekends, is likely to remain somewhere in the top three, although anything could happen.
Box Office Predictions: Weekend of 2/24
2017 Oscar Nominated Animated Shorts Breakdown Review
The Academy Awards are this Sunday, and as such it is fitting to take a look at one of the more overlooked categories: Best Animated Short Film. While the favorite to win is clearly Piper, although the short film categories always have a chance to hold an upset, it still is warranted to put a spotlight on all five films.
Borrowed Time
Borrowed Time is perhaps the Continue reading 2017 Oscar Nominated Animated Shorts Breakdown Review
Silent Nights (2016) Short Film Review
A Salvation Army volunteer (Malene Beltoft Olsen) struggling with an alcoholic mother (Vibeke Hastrup) and a homeless refugee (Prince Appiah) dealing with racism and an impoverished family in Ghana come together in Silent Nights, a short film whose title is a play on the somewhat irrelevant time of year in which the film takes place.
The film is a bitter examination of the underbelly with a sliver of a silver lining of heartfelt humanism. The doomed romance of the film is introduced as Continue reading Silent Nights (2016) Short Film Review
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