‘Blue Film’ Review: An L.A. Camboy Gets a Blast From the Past in Elliot Tuttle’s Intense Queer Chamber Drama
Tuttle’s striking feature debut channels the boldest provocateurs of European cinema to deliver a work hellbent on excavating the moral and sexual boundaries of Queerness in ways rarely seen onscreen, culminating in a film both viscerally demanding and endlessly fascinating in its ideas.
‘The School Duel’ Review: A Sobering and Satirical Vision of the U.S. Gun Crisis
An unapologetically in-your-face condemnation of pro-gun politics and the nationalist sentiments that support them, The School Duel is a stylish work that startles in just how closely its satirical vision resembles the Trumpian America we are increasingly confronted with.
‘Omaha’ Review: John Magaro Stuns in Great Recession-set Road Movie
The directorial debut from Cole Webley, Omaha is an affecting road film that captures complex corners of American family life with an impressionistic feel.
‘The Stranger’ Review: François Ozon Plays by the Rules to Bring the French Absurdist Classic to the Silver Screen
Elegantly shot in crisp monochrome and starring Benjamin Voisin as the epochal antihero at the center of the novel, Ozon’s effort serves as a sensual adaptation that may surprise some of the director’s longtime fans with its willingness to play by the rules laid down by its source material.
‘Living the Land’ Review: An Exquisite Ode to Life and Tradition in Rural China
Chinese filmmaker Huo Meng elegantly examines a time of great change for the traditionally rural communities of his home country, richly showcased through the eyes of a ten-year-old boy.
‘Revelations of Divine Love’ Review: Caroline Golum’s Latest Is a Handcrafted Ode to One of History’s Forgotten Heroines
Golum heads back to the late Middle Ages to explore the life and work of Julian of Norwich, an English Catholic anchoress whose history-making work (from which the film draws its title) is the oldest known English-language book written by a woman.
Berlinale Review: ‘Traces’ Soberly Speaks to Overlooked Injustice in the Ongoing Russo-Ukrainian War
Premiering in this year’s Panorama program at the Berlin Film Festival, Traces calls crucial attention back to the Russo-Ukrainian War, albeit through a perspective commonly overlooked: that of female survivors of sexual violence experienced during Russia’s war of aggression.
‘Islands’ Review: Sam Riley Stands Out in a Sun-Baked Neo-Noir
German filmmaker Jan-Ole Gerster makes his debut English-language feature with a twisty resort-set neo-noir starring Sam Riley, Stacy Martin, and Jack Farthington.
‘The Plague’ Review: A Kubrickian Study of Teenage Boy Toxicity
For his feature directorial debut, American filmmaker Charlie Polinger draws inspiration from his own teenagehood to investigate the unsettling social and biological changes that shape adolescent boys' psychology, albeit through an uncanny process that parallels male puberty with cinematic traditions of psychological horror.
‘Reflection in a Dead Diamond’ Review: Style Reigns Over Substance in Dizzying Giallo-Inspired Thriller
For their latest movie, which premiered earlier this year in Competition at the Berlin Film Festival, filmmaking duo Hélène Cattet and Bruno Forzani fully lean into their fancy for Giallo cinema to deliver a work packed to the brim with stylistic flourish, although drastically detouring from any sense of satisfying narrative coherence in the process.
‘Train Dreams’ Review: Joel Edgerton Delivers His Career-Best in a Meditative and Moving Exploration of Americana
Adapted from the novella of the same name by Denis Johnson, Train Dreams follows the life of a simple working-class man who comes to experience all of the horrors and beauty that life has to offer against the backdrop of a rapidly changing America at the dawn of the 20th century.
‘River of Grass’ Review: Sasha Wortzel’s Tesselated Tribute to the Florida Everglades
Wortzel’s latest documentary combines her personal history with the spirit of Marjory Stoneman Douglas’ 1947 text, from which the documentary takes its name, and the traditions of the Indigenous custodians of Florida’s increasingly endangered Everglades National Park.
‘The Ice Tower’ Review: A Frosty, Hitchcockian Spin on a Classic Fairytale
French filmmaker Lucile Hadzihalilovic’s 2025 Berlinale winner casts a wholly hypnotic spell through its explorations of obsession and belonging.
‘The Tale of Silyan’ Review: Feathers and Folklore Amalgamate in the Latest From One of Macedonia’s Most Celebrated Filmmakers
Academy Award nominee Tamara Kotevska’s latest film brilliantly links the hardships of a peasant farmer facing a world in flux with those of a 17th-century Macedonian fable about a boy transformed into a white stork.
‘Noviembre’ Review: Tomás Corredor’s Debut Viserally Reflects on One of Colombia’s Darkest Moments of Modern History
World premiering in the Discovery section at this year’s Toronto International Film Festival, Noviembre concentrates on Colombia’s Palace of Justice 1985 siege by the M-19 Leftist group and the violent military retaliation that followed.
‘Riefenstahl’ Review: A Timely and Perturbing Excavation of Leni Riefenstahl’s Estate
Utilizing a vast array of archival materials from the Riefenstahl estate with a masterful hand, Andres Veiel’s latest documentary delivers a topical vision of an enduring yet contradictory figure who denies their complicity in the structures of power that profit them.
‘Sudan, Remember Us’ Review: Hind Meddeb Platforms the Poetry, Music, and Youthful Spirit That Motivate the Future of a War-Torn Nation
Taking her camera to the streets of Khartoum, Meddeb concentrates on the youthful spirits at the epicenter of the nation’s evolving situation, filming between 2019 and 2023 to bring a fully developed impression of the nation’s descent into upheaval to the silver screen through the experiences of its young adult subjects.
‘Diciannove’ Review: A Colorful, Kinetic, and Molto Italiano Coming-Of-Age Tale
Filled to the brim with clashing energies reflective of its youthful protagonist, Diciannove powerfully embodies the challenges we experience in the complex position between childhood and adulthood that most of us face at age nineteen.
‘Collective Monologue’ Review: Jessica Sarah Rinland’s Latest Is a Brilliantly Immersive Examination of Human-Animal Connections
For her latest cinematic experiment, multidisciplinary artist Jessica Sarah Rinland explores the tacit connections between animals and their keepers in several Argentine animal sanctuaries undergoing significant transformation. Enigmatic in form but moving in the sensations it so skillfully captures, Collective Monologue stands out as one of the year’s most mesmerizing documentaries.
‘Life After’ Review: Sundance-Winning Documentary Investigates the System’s Sinister Grip on the Disabled Community
A long-forgotten account from a disabled Californian woman is reborn in Life After, serving as the North Star in documentarian Reid Davenport’s latest socio-political exploration of the disabled community’s experiences within the modern world and the legal and healthcare system’s authority over their autonomy.