Author: World Cinema Reports' Editors

A Fantastic Woman, the Chilean drama that just won the Oscar for Best Foreign Film, features an extraordinary performance in the lead role and a quietly convoluted story that prizes gradual revelations of character over any of the twists in its potentially melodramatic plot. The title character is a transgender singer named Marina Vidal, and she’s played by a transgender actress, Daniela Vega. Marina is immersed in a passionate affair with an older man, Orlando (Francisco Reyes), a textile executive who has left his family and moved into an apartment with Marina. The morning after a night of romance with…

The fifth annual edition of SR Socially Relevant Film Festival New York opens tomorrow, March 16th, at Cinema Village in downtown Manhattan, screening 70 films from 35 countries on a broad range of social topics such as immigration, women and girls, human trafficking, climate change, aging, mental health, disability, social justice, LGBTQ rights and VR/360º films. Here are some highlights: Opening night, ceremony and opening film, followed by a reception; Film – Stickman, with Malik and the Turtle on Friday the 16th. Is there a winner hidden here? Film – Doing Nothing All Day, with Common Ground (very interesting and…

GUADALAJARA — The excitement surrounding Guillermo del Toro’s presence at Mexico’s Guadalajara Film Festival reached fever pitch by the end of last week, and manifested itself as a rousing standing ovation when the director made his first appearance at this year’s 33rd edition of the Guadalajara Film Festival. It had long been planned that the director would come back to his home town to open a theater in his name and give a masterclass. That was before the genial Mexican won best director and best picture at last Sunday’s Academy Awards. Spots for Saturday’s scheduled masterclass filled immediately when an astounding 30,000 requests for entry…

There’s almost enough exposition before the main title appears in Don’t Leave Home to fill most movies. But writer-director Michael Tully dispatches that challenge with brisk economy, laying intriguing foundations for a story in which religion, urban legend, dreams and surreal waking nightmares collide in a landscape both beautiful and unsettling. While this twisty tale of an “evil miracle” connected to a self-exiled former priest ultimately withholds too much to resolve all of its enigmas, the atmospheric mood and persuasive performances keep you watching. It’s definitely on the more subdued end of the Irish horror spectrum, but that shouldn’t keep it from…

Although “The Legacy of a Whitetail Deer Hunter” comes to us from director Jody Hill and actor/co-writer Danny McBride, the masterminds behind the exuberantly surly HBO sitcoms “Eastbound and Down” and “Vice Principals,” far too much of this wildly uneven Netflix-bound comedy (scheduled to launch July 6) plays less like a transgressive farce than an overextended “Saturday Night Live” sketch. And yet, even at its most puerile and pedestrian, the movie remains at least passably amusing because of Josh Brolin’s totally committed and unabashedly heartfelt lead performance as Buck Ferguson, a good-ol’-boy celebrity outdoorsman who communicates a boundless joy as…

Latin American filmmakers are riding on Cloud 9 this week. Guillermo del Toro just won two Academy Awards for directing and producing The Shape of Water, marking the fourth time in the last five years that the Best Director statue was awarded to a Mexican-born filmmaker. Hopefully, the trend continues in 2018 and extends across all film industry events. At the South by Southwest Film Festival, Latin American directors are being represented fairly well and looking to be recognized during the fest March 9-17. Films from countries like Nicaragua, Brazil, Mexico, Argentina and Colombia are making their world and U.S. premieres…

In honor of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s historic “Mountaintop” speech, the I AM 2018 campaign will hold a contest seeking short films featuring personal narratives in order to connect MLK’s fight for racial and economic equality to today’s movements. The nationwide campaign calls for participants to create a 30 to 60-second video “that succinctly and creatively connects the struggles of the past to those of the present …” a press release announcing the contest states. Winning videos will be included in I AM 2018’s online ad campaign initiative that is projected to reach thousands of viewers across the country…

When we consider ways to initiate social change, we frequently favour legislative changes and enactments. We think of political activism and agitation as mechanisms of social justice. We emphasise fund-raising and other forms of financial assistance. And we volunteer our time and services for the greater good, confident that it will make a dent in the numerous social challenges our society faces. While this is necessary, we are overlooking something. We seldom think about the arts and the imperative role it plays in breaking social barriers and bridging socially constructed differences. For many, art – in whatever form it appears…

“Indivisible Justice Beyond Walls & Borders” is the theme of the 2018 J. Paul Taylor Social Justice Symposium. On Thursday, March 15, the symposium will include a full day of discussions, films and events at the ASNMSU Center for the Arts, 1000 E. University. On Wednesday, March 14, the public is invited to a pre-symposium community workshop by Christina Marín, from Phoenix College, from 7:30 to 9 p.m. at the Isabella M. Crouch Theatre. Access to the theater is available from the parking lot near Barnes and Noble. The symposium, hosted by NMSU’s College of Arts and Sciences, will showcase…

The final image is striking: A woman in a “Russia” tracksuit furiously striding on a treadmill alone in the cold. Election meddling aside, it’s the perfect metaphor for life under Vladimir Putin, a self-absorbed tyrant determined to return his country to the bleak, totalitarian days of the former Soviet Union. It’s a perfect ending to a perfect movie. But that’s just the start of what makes Andrey Zvyagintsev’s aptly titled “Loveless” so rich in depth and meaning. Its scathing indictment of the Russian leader is so arresting, it’s a wonder Zvyagintsev wasn’t arrested himself by the FSB. But to the…