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      ‘Spoor’ Review: Hunters in the Snow

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      #masthead-section-label, #masthead-bar-one { display: none }What to WatchBest Movies on NetflixBest of Disney PlusBest of Amazon PrimeBest Netflix DocumentariesNew on NetflixAdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main story‘Spoor’ Review: Hunters in the SnowThis oddly structured whodunit from Poland is a reverie wrapped around a murder mystery.Agnieszka Mandat in “Identifying Features.”Credit…Palka Robert/Samuel Goldwyn FilmsJan. 21, 2021, 7:00 a.m. ETSpoorDirected by Agnieszka Holland, Kasia AdamikComedy, Crime, Drama, Mystery, ThrillerNot Rated2h 8mFind TicketsWhen you purchase a ticket for an independently reviewed film through our site, we earn an affiliate commission.“Spoor,” directed by the Polish filmmaker Agnieszka Holland and her daughter, Kasia Adamik, went nearly four years without an American release. At the New York Film Festival the fall after its February 2017 premiere, the critic Amy Taubin, one of its many champions, introduced it as perhaps her favorite film so far that decade. She has interpreted it as a politically charged critique of Polish patriarchy.Praise that high, for a feature that has not played widely in the United States, makes a skeptic want to leave a light footprint, especially after spending time in the film’s dark, snow-covered landscapes.[embedded content]A nature reverie wrapped around a mystery, “Spoor” centers on Duszejko (Agnieszka Mandat), who lives by herself in rural Poland and loves animals. (She refuses to be called by her first name, Janina.) More than slightly flighty, she uses astrology to gauge people. After her dogs go missing, she takes schoolchildren to whom she’s teaching English on a potentially traumatic nighttime “field trip” to search for them. She continually locks horns with hunters and asks a high-handed priest why “thou shalt not kill” doesn’t apply to killing animals. Then the hunters start to die.“Spoor” is sensationally atmospheric. The deep bass of the woodwind scoring; the shots of vacant-eyed deer that look like they’re conspiring; the use of limited exterior light; a wintry setting so bone-chilling that, when the action flashes forward to June, the verdant green and Mandat herself are momentarily unrecognizable — all hit on a primal level.The structure, though, seems counterproductively, even confusingly, elliptical, and the timing of flashbacks muddles the point of view. This is a whodunit that plays tricks with the “who.”SpoorNot rated. In Polish and English, with subtitles. Running time: 2 hours 8 minutes. Rent or buy on Apple TV, Google Play and other streaming platforms and pay TV operators.AdvertisementContinue reading the main story More

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      ‘Atlantis’ Review: A Bleak Apocalypse Love Story

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      #masthead-section-label, #masthead-bar-one { display: none }What to WatchBest Movies on NetflixBest of Disney PlusBest of Amazon PrimeBest Netflix DocumentariesNew on NetflixAdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main storyCritic’s Pick‘Atlantis’ Review: A Bleak Apocalypse Love StoryUkraine’s official Oscar entry, the movie depicts an all-too-convincing dystopia, with no fancy gadgets or cars.Andriy Rymaruk in “Atlantis,” directed by Valentyn Vasyanovych.Credit…Grasshopper FilmJan. 21, 2021, 7:00 a.m. ETAtlantisNYT Critic’s PickDirected by Valentyn VasyanovychDrama, Sci-Fi1h 46mFind TicketsWhen you purchase a ticket for an independently reviewed film through our site, we earn an affiliate commission.Conventional cinematic dystopian futures almost always compensate for their bleakness with nifty gadgets or, at the very least, incredibly fast and dangerous cars chasing one another. Not “Atlantis,” Ukraine’s official entry for the Best Foreign Language Film Oscar this year. Written, directed and shot by Valentyn Vasyanovych, the movie is an especially economical, even ruthless exercise in what could be called “slow cinema,” with no shiny widgets in sight.This is in part because the future in which “Atlantis” is set is extremely not-too-distant: 2025, to be exact, in the aftermath of an incredibly destructive war between Ukraine and Russia. PTSD-riven ex-soldiers Ivan and Sergei let off steam with target practice, which gets heated, ending with one plugging the other in the bulletproof vest.[embedded content]At work in a massive factory — one that seems to produce lava-like sludge, essentially — Ivan (Vasyl Antoniak) commits an act that results in a shutdown, and in a lot of resentment against Sergiy (Andriy Rymaruk). Sergiy then finds a gig driving a water truck. This is a necessity in their land, as naturally potable water is scarce. He soon forms an alliance with a young woman, Katya (Liudmyla Bileka), who exhumes, and tries to identify, the war dead.The story is told in single long takes with a mostly static camera — Vasyanovych’s style is informed by both Kubrick and early Jim Jarmusch. The topography depicted in these shots is startling, starkly insisting that we humans really do live on a rock. The movie’s visual language sometimes expands as its emotional temperature heats up; there’s actually a dissolve near the end.Sergiy and Katya’s home is, an ecologist tells Sergiy near the end, all but uninhabitable in its current state. But it’s where they found each other, and it’s their country. Vasyanovych and his actors manage to make this parable both heartening and stupefying.AtlantisNot rated. In Ukrainian, with subtitles. Running time: 1 hour 46 minutes. Watch on Metrograph.AdvertisementContinue reading the main story More

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      ‘Identifying Features’ Review: Lost in Migration

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      #masthead-section-label, #masthead-bar-one { display: none }What to WatchBest Movies on NetflixBest of Disney PlusBest of Amazon PrimeBest Netflix DocumentariesNew on NetflixAdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main storyCritic’s Pick‘Identifying Features’ Review: Lost in MigrationIn this confident drama, a mother searches for her son who went missing while trying to migrate from Mexico to the United States.Juan Jesús Varela in “Identifying Features.”Credit…Kino LorberJan. 21, 2021, 7:00 a.m. ETIdentifying FeaturesNYT Critic’s PickDirected by Fernanda ValadezDrama1h 35mFind TicketsWhen you purchase a ticket for an independently reviewed film through our site, we earn an affiliate commission.The drama “Identifying Features” begins with a figure approaching from across a field, his appearance obscured by a heavy fog: perhaps he’s a soldier, maybe a farmer. It becomes clear only when he’s a few feet away that the man in the mist is really just a boy. As his face emerges, with smooth cheeks and cold eyes, the beauty, elusiveness and surprise of the film around him surfaces, too.With calm conviction, this teenager, Jesús (Juan Jesús Varela), announces his plans to cross the border from Mexico to Arizona. Jesús’s mother, Magdalena (Mercedes Hernández), explains in a voice-over that this is one of her last memories of Jesús before he went missing on his journey to reach the United States.[embedded content]The movie follows Magdalena as she attempts to follow her lost son’s trail, and her quest soon spills over into the plains near where Jesús was last seen. There, she meets Miguel (David Illescas), a young man returning to his family after being deported from the United States. As they hunt together for their missing relatives, each acts as the other’s surrogate family, a makeshift son for a makeshift mother.Though it is a somber story, the film is enlivened and energized by striking, purposeful images. The writer-director Fernanda Valadez builds depth within her frames by staging action in the background and making liberal use of offscreen sound. Traffic glows from border highways, villains loom from the shadows. There always seems to be movement happening just outside of the characters’ field of vision, events that develop without their understanding. It’s a confident debut feature, and a sophisticated acknowledgment of the powerlessness that migrants face.Identifying FeaturesNot rated. In Spanish, Zapotec and English, with subtitles. Running time: 1 hour 35 minutes. In theaters and on Kino Marquee. Please consult the guidelines outlined by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention before watching movies inside theaters.AdvertisementContinue reading the main story More

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      ‘Our Friend’ Review: Lean on Me

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      #masthead-section-label, #masthead-bar-one { display: none }What to WatchBest Movies on NetflixBest of Disney PlusBest of Amazon PrimeBest Netflix DocumentariesNew on NetflixAdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main story‘Our Friend’ Review: Lean on MeJason Segel is the ballast that keeps this soggy drama from sinking completely.Jason Segel and Dakota Johnson in “Our Friend.”Credit…Claire Folger/Gravitas VenturesJan. 21, 2021, 7:00 a.m. ETOur FriendDirected by Gabriela CowperthwaiteDramaR2h 4mFind TicketsWhen you purchase a ticket for an independently reviewed film through our site, we earn an affiliate commission.As with any bad movie emerging from someone’s real-life tragedy, “Our Friend” is almost more painful to critique than to watch. Based on Matthew Teague’s raw 2015 article detailing the decline of his wife, Nicole, from ovarian cancer, this drippy drama presents precisely the kind of prettified portrait of death that Teague’s candid writing sought to rebut.Packing roughly 14 years into a ruinously nonlinear timeline, the director Gabriela Cowperthwaite (whose nonfiction skills would seem perfectly suited to this material) strains to pin down emotions that reconstitute with almost every scene. Watching Matt and Nicole (Casey Affleck and a charming Dakota Johnson) process Nicole’s 2012 diagnosis, argue in 2008 over Matt’s job as a war correspondent and deal with an infidelity in 2011, the movie’s splintered chronology keeps us at arm’s length. As a consequence, Nicole’s suffering — she’s bedridden one minute, brightly playing charades the next — is drained of the force to wound us.[embedded content]The only constant is Dane (a perfectly steadfast Jason Segel), the friend of the title and the family’s glue. Counselor, housekeeper, babysitter to the couple’s two small daughters — he’s indispensable and unfathomable, moving in to help and staying more than a year. His selflessness is as astonishing as Matt and Nicole’s casual acceptance of it, his motivations a mystery perhaps only the audience cares to solve.It’s not the only puzzle in Brad Ingelsby’s frustratingly vague script, like why is Nicole’s family — who supposedly prompted the couple’s move from Louisiana to Alabama — not more involved? And how could an article that grappled openly with the horrors of terminal illness grow into a Lifetime-ready weepie like this?Our FriendRated R for distressing language. Running time: 2 hours 4 minutes. In theaters and available to rent or buy on Amazon, Apple TV and other streaming platforms and pay TV operators. Please consult the guidelines outlined by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention before watching movies inside theaters.AdvertisementContinue reading the main story More

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      ‘No Man’s Land’ Review: Leaving Home, Learning Tolerance

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      #masthead-section-label, #masthead-bar-one { display: none }What to WatchBest Movies on NetflixBest of Disney PlusBest of Amazon PrimeBest Netflix DocumentariesNew on NetflixAdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main story‘No Man’s Land’ Review: Leaving Home, Learning ToleranceAn act of violence forces a Texas rancher to cross the Rio Grande and question his beliefs.Jake Allyn and Andie McDowell in “No Man’s Land.”Credit…IFC FilmsJan. 21, 2021, 7:00 a.m. ETNo Man’s LandDirected by Conor AllynAction, Adventure, Thriller, WesternPG-131h 54mFind TicketsWhen you purchase a ticket for an independently reviewed film through our site, we earn an affiliate commission.Strangled by good intentions and teachable-moment clichés, Conor Allyn’s “No Man’s Land” turns the border between Texas and Mexico into a gateway to racial empathy.When Jackson Greer (Jake Allyn, the director’s brother) accidentally kills a young Mexican boy during a chaotic confrontation near his family’s ranch, his father (Frank Grillo) tries to take the blame. A suspicious Texas Ranger (George Lopez) isn’t buying it, though, so Jackson takes off on horseback, crossing the Rio Grande and heading south into Mexico. What follows is less a flight from justice than a journey of moral redemption and attitude realignment.[embedded content]Wracked with guilt and haunted by visions of the dead boy, Jackson begins a slow and sensitive awakening. As he interacts with the Mexican families who feed him and offer him work, the film’s meandering middle section is marked by moments of gentle humanity and arid beauty. Brief dust-ups with various pursuers — law enforcement; a lanky, leering coyote — barely mar Jackson’s leading-man looks and beseeching gaze, both of which help endear him to the lovely woman (Esmeralda Pimentel) who facilitates his ongoing escape.Relying on music to build a tension that’s missing from the script, the director, who grew up between Texas and Mexico, is unable to moderate his impulses. So when Jackson risks his life to confront the dead boy’s enraged father (Jorge A. Jiménez), his penitence has more than a touch of the sacrificial. By the end, “No Man’s Land” is so thickly blanketed in a plea for comity that virtually every act of kindness feels like a step toward saving Jackson’s soul.No Man’s LandRated PG-13 for guns, knives and a hint of drugs. Running time: 1 hour 54 minutes. In theaters. Also available to rent or buy on Amazon, Vudu and other streaming platforms and pay TV operators. Please consult the guidelines outlined by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention before watching movies inside theaters.AdvertisementContinue reading the main story More

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      ‘Preparations to Be Together’ Review: Mysteries of Love

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      #masthead-section-label, #masthead-bar-one { display: none }What to WatchBest Movies on NetflixBest of Disney PlusBest of Amazon PrimeBest Netflix DocumentariesNew on NetflixAdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main storyCritic’s Pick‘Preparations to Be Together’ Review: Mysteries of LoveA neurosurgeon pursues the man of her dreams in this simmering portrait of obsession by the Hungarian filmmaker Lili Horvat.Natasa Stork in “Preparations to Be Together for an Unknown Period of Time.”Credit…Greenwich EntertainmentJan. 21, 2021, 7:00 a.m. ETPreparations to be Together for an Unknown Period of TimeNYT Critic’s PickDirected by Lili HorvátDrama, Romance1h 35mFind TicketsWhen you purchase a ticket for an independently reviewed film through our site, we earn an affiliate commission.“Preparations to Be Together for an Unknown Period of Time,” the second feature by the Hungarian writer-director Lili Horvat, considers the slippery relationship between consciousness and desire with a poignant hypothetical: what if you fall so hard for someone that you convince yourself they love you back? At the shattering of such an illusion is where we meet Marta (Natasa Stork), an accomplished, 40-year-old neurosurgeon who hastily leaves behind her life and career in the U.S. to reunite with the man she loves. Yet when she arrives at their agreed-upon meeting point — the Pest end of Budapest’s Liberty Bridge — Janos (Viktor Bodo) is nowhere to be found. And when she tracks him down at the nearby medical institute, he claims to not know who she is.Horvat’s subversive portrait of obsession flips the femme fatale trope on its head by taking the enigmatic woman’s point of view. A noirish psychodrama simmering with ambiguities, the film cleverly toys with our perception by loosening our heroine’s grip on reality. Steely, self-possessed Marta is riddled with doubt over whether she is either the victim of gaslighting or legitimately insane. Summoning these ideas against a clinical backdrop, Horvat upends the glib notion of “a woman’s intuition.”[embedded content]Refusing to give up on Janos, Marta joins the surgical team at a hospital, and undergoes therapy in an attempt to find an explanation for her woes. Like a detective, she observes Janos by attending the same events, all while tolerating the advances of an obstinate medical student (Benett Vilmanyi). Is she behaving in a manner similarly hopeless and deluded as this young man?Shot in 35 millimeter by the cinematographer Robert Maly, “Preparations” manifests its protagonist’s uncertainty through fluttering reflections and slinky shadows, and images that conceal and obscure the full picture. An evocatively romantic moment in which Janos, remaining always on the opposite side of the road, follows Marta home, anchors the film’s ethereal sense of longing. And later, a tryst in Marta’s unfurnished apartment exudes the eeriness of a vividly realistic dream.Here, the absence of evidence and witnesses is less an erotic thrill than a point of despair.Marta is an expert in treating diseases affecting the human brain, yet Horvat understands that even the most sophisticated calculus is ill-equipped to interpret the mysteries of desire. After all, love itself may be a kind of neurological disorder.Preparations to be Together for an Unknown Period of TimeNot rated. In Hungarian and English, with subtitles. Running time: 1 hour 35 minutes. In theaters and on Film Forum virtual cinema. Please consult the guidelines outlined by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention before watching movies inside theaters.AdvertisementContinue reading the main story More

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      ‘Notturno’ Review: The Heart of the Middle East

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      #masthead-section-label, #masthead-bar-one { display: none }What to WatchBest Movies on NetflixBest of Disney PlusBest of Amazon PrimeBest Netflix DocumentariesNew on NetflixAdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main storyCritic’s Pick‘Notturno’ Review: The Heart of the Middle EastGianfranco Rosi’s latest, beautifully shot documentary movingly observes people and places across Syria, Iraq, Lebanon and Kurdistan in the aftermath of war.A scene from Gianfranco Rosi’s documentary “Notturno.”Credit…Super LtdJan. 21, 2021, 7:00 a.m. ETNotturnoNYT Critic’s PickDirected by Gianfranco RosiDocumentary1h 40mFind TicketsWhen you purchase a ticket for an independently reviewed film through our site, we earn an affiliate commission.The sound of distant gunfire crops up in the background in Gianfranco Rosi’s “Notturno,” one of many reminders of how war has shaped the inhabitants of Syria, Iraq, Lebanon and Kurdistan who appear onscreen. Rosi has a way of sitting with people, sometimes close-up, more often from afar, and soaking in their lived experience and the pulse of landscapes shaped by brutal external forces (from Western incursions to ISIS). His melancholic documentary moves beyond a sense of perpetual aftermath by picking up threads of continuity in people’s resilience.Rosi, who directed the migrant-focused “Fire at Sea,” excels at uncovering scenes of drama and emotion without leveraging them for sentimental impact. The opening sequences of “Notturno” offer a kind of overture for the whole film: soldiers march past the camera in relentless hut-hut-hut succession; an old woman mourns her son, touching the walls in what looks like an abandoned prison; and a man rows off into the night, seemingly to hunt for food. We’ll see more of people getting through their days — a couple smoking hookah on a rooftop is one sweet sight — but shots of soldiers are never very far, standing guard, waiting. Half an hour in, a boy also starts to appear, working multiple jobs, and in his youth, he’s like a glimpse of a hopeful horizon.[embedded content]But the boy also has noticeable sleep circles under his eyes, and Rosi’s moody photography moves between this kind of sympathetic portraiture and vistas of countrysides with yawning skies, or crepuscular city streets. (Some desolate backdrops recall his underappreciated 2008 film, “Below Sea Level,” which visited with the squatters of Slab City, California, years before “Nomadland.”) Lest the film sound like a kind of travelogue, it can also knock the wind out of you, as in a wrenching look at children and their drawings about violent traumas inflicted by ISIS.Eschewing interviews and captions, Rosi puts his faith in a steady tripod camera and an evident ability to build up trust. He’s able to join troops on what looks like a nighttime reconnaissance mission, to watch rehearsals of a play about Iraqi history at a Baghdad psychiatric hospital, and to observe ISIS soldiers milling about in a prison yard. The past two decades of documentary film have produced many anatomies of history that attempt to summarize several millenniums, but Rosi’s borderless tableaus bring out another kind of truth in faces, places and pure feeling.NotturnoNot rated. In Arabic and Kurdish, with subtitles. Running time: 1 hour 40 minutes. Watch through virtual cinemas. Starting Jan. 29, watch on Hulu and rent or buy on pay TV operators.AdvertisementContinue reading the main story More

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      Matthew Rhys to Turn One-Man Show 'Playing Burton' Into Audible Production

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      Speaking about bringing Richard Burton back to life through the new radio play, ‘The Americans’ actor praises his legendary fellow Welshman for ‘blazing the trail for us all.’

      Jan 21, 2021
      AceShowbiz – Matthew Rhys will bring his legendary fellow Welshman Richard Burton back to life in a new radio play for Audible.
      The “Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?” star, who earned seven Oscar nominations during his career, was almost as famous for his partying and colourful off-screen love life, which included two marriages to Elizabeth Taylor – and “The Americans”‘ Rhys has been a fan of his work for decades.
      When he was an 18-year-old drama student in London, the Emmy winner saw the one-man show “Playing Burton”, which was all about his hero’s life and career and told from the actor’s own perspective, and the play, written by Mark Jenkins, really changed his life.
      It also follows his hildhood in an impoverished mining community in South Wales to becoming one of the most acclaimed as well as highly-paid actors in his generation. It will also feature his love affair with fellow “Cleopatra” co-star Elizabeth Taylor as well as his public battle with alcoholism and related health issues prior to his death at the age of 58.

        See also…

      Now he’s taking on the role for himself in a new production for Audible’s Theater programme – and he couldn’t be more honoured.
      “The reason I wanted to act was because of Richard Burton,” Rhys tells Variety. “Since first seeing his incredible performance in ‘Look Back in Anger’ to still listening to his audio (recordings) of ‘Hamlet’ and ‘Under Milk Wood’. He blazed the trail for us all and showed us it was possible.”
      Burton died of a brain haemorrhage, age 58, in 1984.
      Catch Matthew as his acting hero on Audible Theater from 28 January (21).

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