A personal journal of film and documentary reviews, and reviews of anything else that intrigues me.
Carl Byker, “The Meth Epidemic” (2011) Having seen and reviewed “Winter’s Bone” last year, I was intrigued to find out more about the methamphetamine addiction epidemic…
Forough Farrokhzad, “The House is Black” / “Khaneh siah ast” (1962) Made about 50 years ago but still very confronting, “The House is Black” is the…
Andrei Shushkov, “Invention of Love” (2010) Came across this elegant and melancholy film short by chance while hunting out another film short on Youtube.com and decided…
Sally Cruikshank, “Quasi at the Quackadero” (1975) Here’s a great little cartoon about a mismatched couple, Anita and Quasi, living in a science fantasy future and…
Osamu Tezuka, “Jumping” (1984) Boing! BOING! BOI-I-I-ING-G-G!!! Here comes “Jumping” by the legendary Osamu Tezuka, creator of Astroboy, who made a fair few experimental anime film…
Kwon Ohsung, “Doggy Poo” / “Ganggajidong” (2003) Here is a very sweet and beautiful little film about having purpose in life and being valuable in the greater…
German and German-language Films
Chris Stenner, Arvid Uibel and Heidi Wittlinger, “Das Rad” / “The Wheel” aka “Rocks” (2003) Made with a mix of stop-motion and computer-generated styles of animation…
Larry and Andy Wachowski, “The Matrix” (1999) Strip “The Matrix” of its sci-fi trimmings, its computer FX and choreographed martial arts and gunfight scenes and what…
Norman McLaren and Claude Jutra, “A Chairy Tale” (1957) A delightful little number that even young children will appreciate, this Canadian short is a fable about…
Shuhei Morita, “Kakurenbo: Hide and Seek” (2004) A very lavish short film that uses cel-shaded animation to render the CG imagery three-dimensional, “Kakurenbo” has a definite…