Following upon his divisive hitman turned menacing horror film Kill List, Ben Wheatley continued his genre-play with Sightseers, a wicked weaving of sardonic comedy and horror within a dark romance. Belying this serial killer jaunt is a surprisingly accurate reflection of British identity.
Shot in sumptuous B&W, the striking, dreamlike yet hyperrealist cinematography of Live Cargo is spellbinding, creating a long-lasting effect. The darkness emanating from the images also leaks into the evocative, threatening atmosphere of this intimate thriller, equal parts chilling and captivating.
We know what you’re thinking, “but I haven’t seen the first Uncle Kent” (or perhaps “what is Uncle Kent?”), but don’t fret—this is an entirely standalone film. A happily egregious sequel to end all sequels, Todd Rohal’s film is a welcome cocktail of sincere absurdity and filmmaking as playfulness.
The aftermath of Nepal’s civil war. Deepak Rauniyar’s sophomore feature explores intergenerational difference between royalists and Maoists, as told through the perspective of a family torn asunder by varying ideology. An essential portrait of family and necessary allegory of a nation on the mend.
Famous for the timeless One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest and The Firemen’s Ball, today is Czech American auteur Miloš Forman’s birthday. We honor the late maestro with his Goya’s Ghosts, a venture to a turbulent crossroads in history, as experienced by one of the 18th century’s finest painters.
We welcome back to the world of cinema Erick Zonca, whose The Dreamlife of Angels is a ‘90s classic, but who hasn’t made a film since 2008’s beguilingly torrid Tilda Swinton vehicle, Julia. Zonca returns with a fiercely dark and twisting thriller, led by an unforgettably volatile Vincent Cassel.
Calling upon the tradition of the psychological chamber thriller, Queen of Earth unites Elizabeth Moss with Katherine Waterston to burrow deep into the vast, complicated identities of two disaffected women. A fiery exploration of the iron grip emotions, both interior and exterior, have on our lives.
With his often imitated yet singular style astoundingly built only from what he viewed as essential to and most expressive of cinema’s art, Robert Bresson made very few films, but very many masterpieces. First among equals is this sublime, deeply influential drama of spiritual devotion and turmoil.
With three stellar films made in 2018, Sergei Loznitsa’s most surprising is this enthralling view of a celebration of the Soviet victory in World War 2. Your eyes dart across the wide, colorful images as they capture the tremendous variety and depth of meanings it still has for today’s Russians.
Too few films depict stories set within the Roma community with stylish aesthetics, burlesque humor, and inventive atmosphere. Reminiscent of Fassbinder’s Querelle, this stylized hybrid documentary further subverts the norm by exploring this community through a seldom seen angle: gay sex work.
It’s always a delight to discover what the impishly unpredictable Québécois director Denis Côté has in store for us. With his new film in the Berlinale’s competition, we’re showing his last competitor: a wry satire of a powerful man, dosed with comic pathos. Cameos by Denis Lavant and Bruce LaBruce!
Released in 2013 yet set in a future Spain, Yesterday Never Ends concerns a couple’s shared grief and through gentle symbolism their respective nation and its economic and cultural peril. With bracing turns by Almodóvar alumni’s Javier Cámara (Talk to Her) and Candela Peña (All About My Mother).
Closer to a thriller than a talking heads documentary, this film sensation inspired a wake of outrage and controversy, making its remarkable exposé of terrible misdeeds a must-see and earning an Academy Award for Best Documentary. Animal cruelty depicted within—not for the faint of heart.
We continue our Berlin Film Festival takeover with a surprise visit to the Hamptons by New German Cinema auteur Volker Schlöndorff (The Tin Drum), subject of a 2017 series on MUBI. This thoughtful drama of romance and regret is a showcase for two arthouse favorites: Stellan Skarsgård and Nina Hoss.
From its storied history glorified by the Nazis and enshrined for its role in the Berlin Airlift, Berlin’s Tempelhof is probably the world’s most famous airport. Karim Aïnouz’s striking documentary explores the essential role it has today, housing refugees in its astounding, repurposed architecture.
Kicking off our takeover dedicated to the Berlin Film Festival is the delightful Hotel Dallas, a docu-fiction-musical regarding the curious resonance the classic American soap opera Dallas had with communist Romania. This is a buoyant, playful, and astute inquiry into the universality of art.
“The film was the project of some of the main purveyors of underground S&M and fetish art of the time, including producer Leonard Burtman. Discovered in a closed film lab, the original 35mm negative underwent hours of painstaking repairs to picture & soundtrack, which had begun to deteriorate.” –NWR
Produced at Harvard’s Sensory Ethnography Lab (Leviathan, Manakamana), the second film in our focus on Huertas Millán dives into a matriarchal universe and knits a rich portrait of female independence. Through the exploration of an ancestral craft, La Libertad quietly challenges our idea of freedom.
The work of Colombian-French artist Laura Huertas Millán moves gently across disciplines, defying categorization. We’re proud to present two of her self-termed “ethnographic fictions,” starting with Black Sun, a mysterious and immersive inquiry into despair, family bonds and female resilience.
One of the best debuts of the 1990s, Little Odessa introduced us to so much of what we now love about director James Gray’s movies: operatically sweeping stories grounded in real New York neighborhoods, a love for the cinema of the 70s, and an emotional sincerity that is as rare as it is bracing.
This is not your usual dance documentary! Directed by famed photographer Dave LaChapelle, Rize delves into an utterly unique phenomenon, the beguiling transmutation of African tribal rituals to the social and racial culture of Los Angeles. A totally unique portrait of black art and life.
Winner of the Grand Jury Prize at Sundance, this enveloping drama by Debra Granik (Leave No Trace) also kickstarted Jennifer Lawrence’s prolific career with her fiery turn as an ordinary hero. Set in the Ozark mountains, Winter’s Bone is a an intimate odyssey of family, women, and survival.
We close our Rotterdam series with a sublime experiment: a film resurrecting cinematic ghosts, injecting life into projects that never saw the light. Made out of unfinished Argentinian movies, this entrancing patchwork of fragmented narratives is an ode to the infinite possibilities of storytelling.
From the acclaimed director of Hoop Dreams comes this document of a lost young man’s tragic life of mistakes. Captured with Steve James’ signature warm humanism and shot over the course of a decade, Stevie is a difficult yet necessary reckoning with the trauma existing in impoverished rural America.
Refreshingly set in the haven of Montréal’s punk-metal scene, Fake Tattoos is a buoyant and intimate story of two drifting youths who meet amidst a calming summer. A wise reflection on early romance, this is a film expressively alive with all of the music, passion, and confusion of young love.
Our next Rotterdam pick is a road movie of sorts, with hints of Béla Tarr’s cinema, and philosopher Walter Benjamin as its hero. Drawing a parallel between different forms of fascism, The Unwanted delves into the meaning of exile by confronting human vulnerability with the immensity of landscape.
20 years later and you can still feel the electricity: Darren Aronofsky’s breathtaking debut immediately immerses you in the manic energy of a mind (and person) obsessed. Shot on the streets of pre-Disneyfication New York on harsh 16mm, it was a calling card for the director’s relentless vision.
Starring Natasha Lyonne, But I’m a Cheerleader is a delightful, highly stylized queer comedy which graced the end of a decade in American cinema otherwise ruled by heteronormative rom-coms. Co-starring Michelle Williams and RuPaul (out of drag!), this sweet, satirical yarn is due for rediscovery.
The Sundance Film Festival has begun, and this year we’re bringing you 7 films from the festival’s rich, independent history. First up is the iconoclastic auteur-musician-actor-model Vincent Gallo and his idiosyncratic, masterful debut: the tender, hilarious, and bracingly honest Buffalo ’66.
With the invigoratingly eclectic Rotterdam Film Festival now taking place, we’re presenting three boldly imagined gems found by our curators at the last edition. From the director of the cult favorite Hausu comes an exuberantly stylized yet tender and moving story of love and friendship in wartime.