The Film Stage

If you were handed over the man who destroyed your life and those of countless others––a psychopath who tortured, raped, and murdered in the name of a tyrannical system––what would you do? Would you exact revenge or do the impossible––forgive...

I could name few living filmmakers better equipped for the Western than Alessio Rigo de Righi and Matteo Zoppis. The duo behind The Tale of King Crab––a film I revere like a sacred relic––have created their own niche in contemporary...

It came as quite the surprise that acclaimed director Rebecca Zlotowski’s latest film, led by Jodie Foster and an all-star French cast, did not make Cannes competition. If it turns out A Private Life might indeed be too slight for...

Spike Lee’s joints are known for their sweeping coverage of New York City, in particular Brooklyn, and even more specifically Bed-Stuy––hardly ever the luxurious, Gotham-tinged, cobble-stoned streets of Dumbo. Outside a short doc made for the Brooklyn Chamber of Commerce...

Continuing in the low-key register of her Golden Bear winner Alcarràs, Carla Simón returns with Romería, another tale of intergenerational dissonance. A film about the stories families choose to tell and the ones they bury deep inside, it unfurls on...

Julia Ducournau has turned 180 degrees since Titane, the gritty and bizarre thriller that Spike Lee’s Cannes jury awarded the Palme d’Or in 2021. There’s no doubt that all eyes are on her newest, Alpha, in a way they weren’t...

Attempting to bounce back after his career nadir of The Whale, Darren Aronofsky has all the right ingredients for a much-needed energy boost. Led by Austin Butler, Caught Stealing follows a burned-out former baseball player as he’s unwittingly plunged into a wild fight...

When Armando (Wagner Moura) finally resolves to seek a fake passport and one-way ticket out of Brazil for himself and his young son, he asks his father-in-law to suggest a spot where he could meet a fixer. The old man...

A few scenes into Urchin, we take a trip through the Bardo. First the camera (as in a million films before this) closes in on a shower drain, but then something new: a tunnel of darkness and color that gives...

While there’s the oft-repeated observation that every generation thinks they are living through the end of the world, the maelstrom of anxieties (both quotidian and universal) in today’s age is particularly concerning, even debilitating for many to comprehend. Anne Émond’s...