Between all the movies, television shows and video games, I felt that the zombie genre was fully saturated and so I had no real interest in this film when it first came out. By the time I became aware of its hugely positive word of mouth reviews and tried to watch it, it had already fallen out of rotation at the cinemas. So here I am watching a popular movie months after its release.
Tom Ford is better known as a fashion designer, being at various times the creative director of Gucci and Yves Saint Laurent, but he seems to be developing a second career as a movie director in his free time. Nocturnal Animals is only the second film that he has made and it’s almost unfair how good it is given how far removed a director’s skills are from that of the fashion industry.
Director Jia Zhangke seems to be hot stuff in China at the moment. I’ve tried for ages to get a hold of a decent copy of the well known Still Life but it seems almost impossible. This one is a more recent release and duly made it onto the usual lists of the year’s most notable films. Unfortunately while I liked the director’s previous release A Touch of Sin, I found this one to be very mediocre.
After the awfulness of Jackie, it was delightful to watch the opening shots of Midnight Cowboy and immediately realize that this is the work of a competent director. I don’t recognize many titles from director John Schlesinger’s filmography but I certainly will be adding more of them to my usual list. When this film was made Dustin Hoffman was already a huge star due to the success of The Graduate but I believe that this is the first time I’ve watched Jon Voight in any serious film and I was blown away by how good he is here.
Whatever this film’s other merits, or lack thereof, you have to admit that its poster is distinctive and iconic. Reviews for this are a bit all over the place but in the end as its Rotten Tomatoes rating manages to hover around the 90% mark, I thought I’d give it a shot. Its director Pablo Larrain is a virtual unknown but it does have some serious names behind and particularly seems like it could be the ideal vehicle for Natalie Portman to transition to more mature roles.
As usual this was a pick gleaned from various critics’ lists of the world’s most notable films. I’m pleased that after only a few years of watching and writing about cinema seriously I’ve watched enough Brazilian films to actually have a general opinion of them. The Second Mother in particular conforms to the pattern I’ve noted previously about Brazilian films that while grounded in society relies too heavily on the feel-good factor to be a truly serious film.
This is a Japanese animated feature that, unusually, has at least some historical basis. Like many such projects, it’s an adaptation of a manga. The central character is Katsushika Ōi, nicknamed Sarusuberi, which is the Japanese title for the film. Her father is called Tetsuzo in the film but he is better known as the famed Japanese artist Katsushika Hokusai. Even if you think you don’t recognize this name, I guarantee that you only have to google some images of his paintings to realize how famous they are.