Chicago Critics Film Festival 2023 preview
It’s hard to believe that 10 years has passed since the very first Chicago Critics Film Festival! The inaugural event took place one weekend in May at what used to be called the Muvico theater in Rosemont, Illinois, with guests such as directors Sarah Polley, James Ponsoldt, and William Friedkin. The year after that, the CCFF stretched out it’s length to a week and took residency at the legendary Music Box Theatre in Chicago, which is where it’s been since and where it’s returning this week. Read more…
BEAU IS AFRAID (2023) review
written by: Ari Aster
produced by: Ari Aster and Lars Knudsen
directed by: Ari Aster
rated: R (for strong violent content, sexual content, graphic nudity, drug use and language)
runtime: 197 min.
U.S. release date: April 14, 2023 (limited) & April 21, 2023 (wide)
So far, writer/director Ari Aster has made two features, 2018’s “Hereditary” and 2019’s “Midsommar”, and with both of those psychological horror films he’s become quite a polarizing filmmaker. Rarely would you find anyone on the fence regarding his work, but I guess I’m one of the few. His work has generally received critical praise, yet while I’ve found his directing quite impressive and the performances he’s able to get out of his leads quite powerful, his kitchen sink approach to his screenplays often result in a heavy-handed third act, leaving me quite frustrated. Surprisingly, I found myself responding differently to Aster’s latest, “Beau is Afraid” and maybe because from the start it’s his funniest film to date. Read more…
CLFF 2023 – The Truths & The Shape of Things to Come
Perspective, or a point of view is something all storytellers must decide on. Whose perspective will the story be told from? Will there be a singular or dominant point of view or will multiple viewpoints collide? What can characters (or better yet, viewers) learn from more than one perspective? Having seen two films back to back at the 39th annual Chicago Latino Film Festival recently, I found myself ruminating how a character’s perspective can guide the path of a film’s story. One film weaved a half dozen perspectives while another found one particular point of view weigh heavily throughout the film’s story. Read more…
CLFF 2023 – The Fishbowl & Octopus Skin
The longest running Latino film festival, the Chicago Latino Film Festival (CLFF), returns for its 39th year! The festival will run from April 13th through April 23rd and will include 51 features and 35 shorts from Latin America, Puerto Rico, Portugal, Spain and the United States, with most of them screening at Landmark Century Center at 2828 N. Clark St. in the Lincoln Park neighborhood. This will be the U.S. premiere for many of the films, some of which have been screened at other film festivals outside of the States. Read more…
THE TUTOR (2023) review
written by: Ryan King
produced by: Robert Ogden Barnum, Eric Binns, Bavand Karim, Christopher Kopp & Joey Stanton
directed by: Jordan Ross
rated: R (for language, some violence and sexual material)
runtime: 92 min.
U.S. release date: March 24, 2023
By the end of “The Tutor”, I wound up asking myself why I watch certain movies. I don’t get paid to write about them (although I’m not opposed to it) and outside of a publicist, no one is asking me to view and review any specific movie. It’s all up to me. So, why this movie? Well, sometimes a movie doesn’t look all that great, but there’s a certain curiosity factor that gets the better of me and I wonder just how bad a movie can be and…and could it possibly surprise me and wind up being good. In this case, the answer to the latter is definitely “No” and in response to the former, “Apparently Not”. Read more…
MOVING ON (2023) review
written by: Paul Weitz
produced by: Stephanie Meurer, Andrew Miano, Chris Parker, Dylan Sellers & Paul Weitz
directed by: Paul Weitz
rated: R (for language)
runtime: 85 min.
U.S. release date: March 17, 2023 (theatrical)
Ever since 1980’s “9 to 5”, audiences have enjoyed seeing Jane Fonda and Lily Tomlin together in movies. Granted, it took them quite a while to get back together, but they did reunite in 2015 for a seven season run on Netflix’s “Grace and Frankie”, and the recently starred in the Super Bowl comedy “80 for Brady” as half of a comedy quartet, released earlier this year. Now, in writer/director Paul Weitz’s “Moving On”, Fonda and Tomlin are back together in a story that revolves around some heavy subject matter from their past, albeit with a dark comedy tint to it. Granted, laughs are kind of what you expect from a Fonda and Tomlin pairing, but the movie’s strengths come from its dramatic elements. Too bad it’s not marketed that way. Read more…
SCREAM VI (2023) review
written by: James Vanderbilt and Guy Busick
produced by: William Sherak, James Vanderbilt and Paul Neinstein
directed by: Matt Bettinelli-Olpin and Tyler Gillett
rated: R (for strong bloody violence and language throughout, and brief drug use)
runtime: 123 min.
U.S. release date: March 10, 2023
A year ago last January, a new Scream movie dropped after an eleven year hiatus, lazily called “Scream” in an effort to claim not so much a reboot, since it technically didn’t clean the slate and restart anything. The movie had the iconic Ghostface killer back and requisite characters that were, once again, all-knowing when it comes to horror movie tropes…AND it included some longstanding characters that have been in all of the movies from the Scream machine, so it was less of a requel and more of a legacyquel. Read more…
2023 Oscar-Nominated Documentary Shorts (review)
Although each year I always hope that the Animated Shorts category winds up being the best of the three Oscar Shorts, historically it’s been the Documentary Shorts which become the overall most memorable. That didn’t happen with this year’s batch, but there are at least three here that standout amid the five nominees for the Oscar-Nominated Documentary Shorts. Still, out of the three Shorts categories, this is the category that’s probably the easiest to view since two of these documentary shorts are available on Netflix. That being said, there’s really nothing better than sitting through all five nominees in a movie there, which can currently be done in these select theaters. Read more…
2023 Oscar-nominated Animated Shorts (review)
Out of the three categories in the Oscar-nominated Shorts, each year I quietly hope that the Animated category winds up offering the best of the bunch. That’s probably because I see the potential that the medium offers. Regardless of the subject, there is arguably more that can be done with animation than can be done with Live-Action and therefore the options and the potential are only as limited as the director’s imagination (and possibly the tools available). At their best, the shorts in this category can serve as a reminder that anything can happen in animation. Read more…
2023 Oscar-nominated Live-Action Shorts (review)
The Oscar-nominated Shorts of the Academy Awards are the categories I look forward to the most each year, since they typically offer a variety of intriguing stories from all over the world, told in an economic manner. That’s the key thing in any short film: economy. The academy defines short as being “not more than 40 minutes, including all credits”, so the question is whether or not the director and all involved can tell a story within that time frame that stands out amongst all the other submissions. Read more…
