8 years ago
All posts by Anna Tatarska
“Very Good Girls” Is A Delicate, Heartfelt Coming-Of-Age Tale
If you've never been a 19-year old girl, to paraphrase The Virgin Suicides, you might not get the gravity of Lilly's (Dakota Fanning) and Gerri's (Elizabeth Olsen) dilemmas in Very Good Girls. But the path these girls are following during their last summer bef...
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“Boyhood”: Me, You, and Everyone We Know and Love
This tweet from Mark Cousins recently popped up on my Facebook feed: “I almost never re-watch films, but I want to see Richard Linklater's Boyhood every year of my life." The Scottish director was not the first in the movie's unanimous choir of praisers; he si...
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“Yves Saint Laurent” An Expected Design Unworthy of Laurent’s Seal of Approval
I'm very glad to be one of those privileged viewers who have already seen both recent biopics about Yves Saint Laurent: Jalil Lespert's Yves Saint Laurent and Bertrand Bonello's Saint Laurent. This year's Cannes contender featuring androgynous and charismatic ...
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“Snowpiercer” And the Eclectic Whiteness of the Eco-pocalyspse
Note. This review is based on the version screened during the 2014 Berlinale Film Festival.
Joon-ho Bong's The Host was delightfully eclectic, allowing gore and camp to swiftly mingle within a more traditional horror narrative frame. The Korean director's l...
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“Le Chef” Is More Like Fast Food Than Haute Cuisine
There's a clear link between Le Chef and French cuisine: they're both tasty. But while emblematic dishes like boeuf bourguignon, Alsatian foie gras, or Provencal bouillabaisse are famous for their finesse and richness, Daniel Cohen's film is more like cinemati...
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“Edge of Tomorrow” Is A CGI-Infused, Engaging Sci-Fi Black Comedy
Who would have thought that watching a woman painfully dying over 100 times in 2 hours could be entertaining? Or that 4D, the money-sucking, off-the-mark, ridiculously inadequate, and distractive technology there is, might prove it does have a little sense to ...
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Cannes days 3 & 4: Uncaptivating “The Captive”, lethally funny “Wild tales”, velvety “Saint Laurent”, and Mikkelsen going Wayne in the wild, wild West
The Captive
Certain competition choices in Cannes make critics' jaws drop. Sometimes it's in awe, but way too often in disbelief. I choose to think the programmers invited Atom Egoyan to join the tight Palme d'Or race as a friendly gesture towards Canada's ...
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Cannes Days 1 & 2: A Botched Grace Kelly Resurrection, Mike Leigh Mesmerizes, and “Timbuktu”‘s Disastrous Consequences of Faith
Grace of Monaco
There was no shortage of glamour and star power on the Cannes 2014 opening red carpet. Tim Roth and Nicole Kidman, the stars of long-awaited Grace of Monaco, are indeed true professionals. Their perfectly fitted tuxes, blingy gowns and ste...
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“Ida”: Enjoy the Silence
Anna grew up in a covent, sheltered from the everyday struggles. Wanda, a bitter stalinist show-trial prosecuting star, has experienced all life-shattering things there are and grew incredibly thick skin. A naïve, motherless girl, discovering the truth about h...
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“Fading Gigolo”: The Inconspicuous Star of the Party
An uninitiated spectator could easily mistake John Turturro's Fading Gigolo for the work of Woody Allen, who here plays Turturro's on-screen sidekick. But what distinguishes Turturro's film from those of his legendary costar is that Turturro is able -- and wil...
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