With every awards season comes a flood of “best of” compilations and top ten lists, but film scores can be tricky in that department. After all, different composers are operating on different levels, each one working toward a separate goal in his or her respective picture. Brian Tyler aims for something propulsive and heroic in Iron …
As with any year, some people have begun arguing that 2013 was a bad year for film, because of the expected glut of effects-heavy blockbusters that litter the multiplexes each summer, or because there was a lack of auteur-driven storytelling for the majority of the year. Though it is indeed frustrating that studios hold their …
The struggle to maintain one’s personal sense of youth is at the heart of Adore, an Australian drama that wishes to be provocative without being particularly salacious or deep. Based on one of four short stories by Doris Lessing in the collection “The Grandmothers,” Adore feels very much like an adaptation of a story that’s too brief, a mere wisp that should be a gale force.
We are now officially half way through the year and so I’ve asked our staff to vote for their favourite films released thus far. Hollywood blockbusters may have disappointed us, but thankfully we can always rely on independent filmmakers to create some truly inspiring films. Rounding out the special mentions is Terrence Malick’s To The …
The Place Beyond the Pines, so called for the English translation of the Mohawk word “Schenectady,” is close to a carousel in structure, one that would not be out of place at that traveling carnival where we first meet Luke in an extended tracking shot. Round and round it goes, taking the audience on an exacting, circular up-and-down ride. Cianfrance, along with co-writers Ben Coccio and Darius Marder, lets the film linger in moments, allowing it a hypnotic, novelistic pacing.
After a bold narrative choice, the film’s momentum is slowly drained as the hyper ferocity of the first hour is substituted for a less than involving police procedural arc involving Cooper’s character, whose role as a blue collar policemen fails to even register on a dramatic level.
[quote by=”Synopsis”] A mysterious and mythical motorcycle racer, Luke (Ryan Gosling), drives out of a traveling carnival globe of death and whizzes through the backstreets of Schenectady, New York, desperately trying to connect with a former lover, Romina, (Eva Mendes) who recently and secretly gave birth to the stunt rider’s son. In an attempt to …
Running from February 14th to the 24th, the 2013 installment of the increasingly popular Glasgow Film Festival marks its ninth incarnation. Advertised as a festival “for the people”, GFF tends to stray from the red carpet approach and curation-heavy feel of its local(-ish) cousin, June’s Edinburgh International Film Festival, though it does have various themed …
[quote by=”Synopsis”] The Place Beyond the Pines is the multi-generational story of a motorcycle stunt rider (Gosling), who considers committing a crime in order to provide for his newborn child, an act that puts him on a collision course with a cop-turned-politician (Cooper). [/quote] via EW
The best part about being a film fan in a big city is that you are exposed to so many films that you would have otherwise never heard of. Obscure arthouse releases, strange french films and more film festivals that you can shake a fist at, it’s rare that I am able to predict with …