It doesn’t take much for a dinner party to go south, especially if it’s on the eve of a big move from Hanover to Berlin in the midst of a pandemic. Tension runs high and an awkwardly unpredictable guest list consisting of hasty cancellations and uninvited guests pushes the night towards inevitable chaos and breakdown. […]

Words and facts play the most decisive role in the courtroom. But what if they can’t lead us to the full truth? Justine Triet’s newest film, Anatomy of a Fall, was presented at this year’s Cannes Film Festival. I had the chance to see the film in one of the great cinema halls in Cannes, […]

“War Pony” (2022) is a movie that could be distinguished by its so-called “realness”. Little special effects, a plot without a happy ending, and characters who are not the over-idealized version of archaic human exemplars. The scenography gives us the feeling as if the camera was simply following the people of Pine Ridge Reservation in […]

Korean music leads us into the opening scene: a receptionist interacts with an interesting new guest at the hotel, switching quickly from Korean to English and finally French when she sees her passport. A film that opens with music and three languages in succession within the first three minutes is well set for complexity. Having […]

Director Saim Sadiq’s Joyland was highly praised when it premiered at the Cannes Film Festival (the first Pakistani film to ever be selected), but it caused quite a bit of stir and discussion in Pakistan. The tender queer love story between a married man named Haider (Ali Junejo) and a transgender woman named Biba (Alina […]

I recently watched the latest Aronofsky film, The Whale. He managed to dismantle a new tabou by bringing up a murky subject that I’ve personally infrequently seen in movies. It is about Charlie, a severely obese English teacher hiding in his apartment awaiting death. With one final attempt at atonement, he is desperate to get […]