2023 Sundance Film Festival Movie Review: Mami Wata

2023 Sundance Film Festival Movie Review: Mami Wata

  Mami Wata is a stunning cinematic experience. Director C.J. ‘Fiery’ Obasi put his blood, sweat, and tears into this seven-year process of making the film and the final product was worth the effort. Mami Wata is a gorgeous movie rooted in West African folklore. Set in the remote West African village of Iyi. the villagers worship a Mermaid-diety named Mami Wata, who lives in the body of water on the island’s coast. The villagers…

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2023 Sundance Film Festival Movie Review: Infinity Pool

2023 Sundance Film Festival Movie Review: Infinity Pool

  Infinity Pool was one of my most anticipated movies of the 2023 Sundance Film Festival. Director Brandon Cronenberg, son of the legendary David Cronenberg, has immediately established himself as an exciting voice in horror with his first two films, 2012’s Antiviral and 2020’s Possessor, one of my favorite movies from that year’s Sundance, by making visceral, grotesque horror films that run in the same vein as his father’s iconic body horror films while also…

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2023 Sundance Film Festival Movie Review: Pianoforte

2023 Sundance Film Festival Movie Review: Pianoforte

  Pianoforte is a documentary that looks that the Chopin Piano Competition, the prestigious competition held in Warsaw, Poland that sees the world’s best young piano players come together and compete for a chance of a lifetime. It is a gripping, emotional ride filled with thrilling musical numbers as well as a fascinating analysis on competition and the pursuit of perfection. Director Jakub Piątek, whose feature film debut, Prime Time, premiered at the 2021 virtual…

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2023 Sundance Film Festival Movie Review: Magazine Dreams

2023 Sundance Film Festival Movie Review: Magazine Dreams

  If there was a way to invest in the careers of an actor, like buying stock in a company in hopes of future gains, I would take all the money I have and invest it in the career of Jonathan Majors. From the first time I saw him in 2019’s The Last Black Man in San Francisco to last year’s war-epic Devotion, Majors has been a star on the rise, consistently giving great performances…

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2023 Sundance Film Festival Movie Review: Fair Play

2023 Sundance Film Festival Movie Review: Fair Play

  We first meet Emily (Phoebe Dynevor) and Luke (Alden Ehrenreich) at a wedding reception. The two cannot get enough of each other. They love each other’s personalities, they love their jobs, they love their bodies, and they love the life they have with each other, which is why Luke proposes to Emily that very evening.  The following morning, they go to their jobs as financial analysts at a cutthroat financial firm where nobody knows…

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2023 Sundance Film Festival Movie Review: Animalia

2023 Sundance Film Festival Movie Review: Animalia

  Watching a movie like Animalia makes me feel happy and excited about the future of cinema because we are witnessing a new talented voice in the cinematic world. Directed by Sofia Alaoui, in her feature film directorial debut, the film is an assured, well-made film that puts a unique spin on a classic genre. Though not all the ideas come together fully, you can’t help but be impressed by Alaoui’s confidence as a director….

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2023 Sundance Film Festival: 10 Movies To Be Excited About

2023 Sundance Film Festival: 10 Movies To Be Excited About

The 2023 Sundance Film Festival is just around the corner, returning in-person and virtually for the first time since 2020. I will be attending this year’s festival in person and I cannot wait to go back to the snowy mountains of Park City, Utah.  The Sundance Film Festival is my favorite film festival in the world. I have been attending the festival since 2011 and love it every single year I go. I love the…

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From the Collection: Imitation of Life (1934)

From the Collection: Imitation of Life (1934)

John M. Stahl’s 1934 melodrama Imitation of Life is the latest film to enter the Criterion Collection. The good folks at Criterion sent me a copy to check out. Adapted from Fannie Hurst’s 1933 novel of the same name, the film looks at the friendship between two struggling single mothers: Beatrice (Claudette Colbert) a working-class white woman, and Delilah {Louise Beavers), her Black housekeeper and closest friend. The two open up a successful pancake shop…

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The Best Movies of 2022

The Best Movies of 2022

It’s that time of the year again. Time to look at the very best movies of 2022. I’ve broken down what I think are the best movies from each genre, the best technical achievements, and the best actors and directors of the year, and now it’s time to look at what I think were the best movies of 2022. Overall, 2022 was a strong year for movies and it also felt like a normal movie…

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Best Movies of 2022: Best Performances of 2022

Best Movies of 2022: Best Performances of 2022

In my continued analysis of the best movies of 2022, here are my picks for the best performances in 2022. Every year this is the toughest list to make and every year I feel bad about leaving some performances off, but I think the performances I chose are all truly great and deserve all the recognition they get.  Like previous years, I have broken the performances down by category, much like the Oscars, with Best…

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