Foreign

“SUNDOWN” Set within the sizzling confines of Acapulco, Mexico. Director Michel Franco, sustained by a momentous performance by Tim Roth, questions man’s dominance over his choices and subsequent consequences. THREE & ½ STARS “LOVE, CHARLIE: THE RISE AND FALL OF CHEF CHARLIE TROTTER” Director Rebecca Halpern’s dissection of Trotter’s escalation from childhood to eminence is a “must see” triumph; Shakespearean …

“THE LAST DUEL” Following the Rashomon Syndrome, viewers must decide which of the three scenarios is closest to the truth; glorious filmmaking and superior acting cement one’s attention for its over two hour duration. Director Ridley Scott focuses on an actual, occurrence in 14th century France: Marguerite, (Jodi Comer, sublime “damsel in distress”) the wife of Knight Jean de Carrouges …

THE POWER OF THE DOG Director Jane Campion (“The Piano”, 1993) scores radiantly, intelligently with her adaptation of Thomas Savage’s novel of the same name: Benedict Cumberbatch soars as erudite, brutal, misanthropic rancher “Phil Burbank”; his brother “George” depicted with refined docility by Jesse Plemons, valiantly strives to soften Phil’s grotesque persona; Kristen Dunst, simmers as George’s wife “Rose”, a …

In the embryonic stages of the 57th Chicago International Film Festival, I can predict it will surpass all expectations because of the astute prescience of Artistic Director Mimi Plauche and Managing Director Vivian Teng. Viewed to date: “Lingui, The Sacred Bonds”. (French: English Subtitles) Director Mahamat-Saleh Haroun focuses on the restricted lives of Muslim women living in Chad; abortion is …

Having recently returned from a sojourn in Iceland, where the seasons were still vying for supremacy and man is perpetually subjected to nature’s whim, domination; sheep govern the landscape, their floppy ears tagged with marked ownership; two-legged creatures are rarely sighted and these furry mammals roam with impunity. “Lamb” is eerily strange, mystical and powerfully potent; co-writer and director Valdimar …

I can say in all truthfulness that this is the ugliest film I have ever seen, totally lacking in any redemptive attributes, with the exception of a couple dance sequences; director Julia Ducournau’s (“Raw”) harrowing, bleak, frightening imagination plummets to its bottommost circle, besting Dante’s “Paradise Lost”; protagonist, “Alexia/Adrien” (androgynous, Agatha Rousselle) has a titanium (“Titane”) plate in her head …

“CANDYMAN”  (in theatres) A refreshing rendition of the 1992 original; taking it seriously from the get-go was an easy task because of the casting and direction (Nia DaCosta); “Candyman” is an urban legend, rising from the defunct Cabrini Green project in Chicago; doomed by his reputation, murdered unjustly; to meet him, stand in front of a mirror and say his …

SKIP: BECKETT (NETFLIX)  In fairness I could not last for more than 15 minutes of tested endurance; insufferable travails of “Beckett” (John David Washington) and his unflinching, clueless, girlfriend “April” (Alicia Vikander); a sparkless relationship and plot deserving of cauterization at its inception. ANNETTE (AMAZON PRIME) Yikes! Adam Driver and Marion Cotillard, two respected, consummate actors had me cringing with …

 This is NOT a film review; it was a time of rejuvenation, a time to doff, escape the norm, the perpetual titillation of movie manna; deliverance from the cacophonous mayhem of city life: cars, motorcycles, souped up vehicles, whose only purpose is the annihilation of peace; a time to “stop the world” and wallow, effortlessly in a landscape guaranteed to …

“HIT & RUN”  (ENGLISH/HEBREW) NETFLIX A scintillating collaboration between Israel and Netflix starring inimitable, aggressively masculine, swashbuckling Lior Raz (“Fauda”) as “Segev Azulai”, a benign tour guide in Tel Aviv, his lithesome wife, “Danielle”(Kaelen Ohm) a dancer, whose death, initially assumed accidental, proves anything but; bouncing from New York and Israel, the scenario quivers with layers of duplicity, no one, …