A personal journal of film and documentary reviews, and reviews of anything else that intrigues me.
Tom Cebula, “Treasures Decoded (Season 4, Episode 8: Garden of Eden)” (2017) Many if not most people in Western society know of the Biblical story of…
French and French-language Films
Louis Malle, “Le Voleur / The Thief of Paris” (1967) A crime comedy caper starring then popular French actor Jean-Paul Belmondo and directed by Louis Malle,…
Peter Crystal, “Treasures Decoded (Season 4, Episode 6: Shrunken Heads)” (2017) Shrunken human heads are the kind of macabre curio objects, beloved of museums and oddball…
French and French-language Films, Northern European Films
Carl Theodor Dreyer, “The Passion of Joan of Arc” (1928) In itself, this silent film is remarkable for its lead actor Maria Falconetti’s acting from the…
Chinese and Chinese-language Films, Korean Films
Yoichi Shimatsu, “US Missile Base Upsets the Morning Calm (Lens.tv Report: THAAD Deployment in South Korea)” (2017) Structured as a news report rather than as a…
Australian and New Zealand Films
Philippe Mora, “Mad Dog Morgan” (1976) Based on the life of an actual bushranger who plagued Victoria and New South Wales during the second half of…
French and French-language Films, Middle Eastern Films
Ari Folman, “The Congress” (2013) Partly based on Stanislaw Lem’s novel “The Futurological Congress”, in which the central character suffers from both delusional and actual mental…
German and German-language Films
Jan Ole Gerster, “Oh Boy” (2012) Debut film for German director Jan Ole Gerster, “Oh Boy” is a tragicomedy detailing 24 hours in the life of…
Terry George, “The Promise” (2016) A film about the Ottoman Turkish genocide of Armenians and other Christian minorities (1915 – 1918) is probably never going to…
Alex Kurtzman, “The Mummy” (2017) Somewhere in this hokey action blockbuster film is a story about flawed humans acting for purely selfish reasons and the consequences…