A Hard Day's Night (1964)

A Hard Day's Night (Richard Lester, 1964) Perhaps the most curious thing about A Hard Day's Night is how the film, supposedly a low...

Sex and Lucia (2001)

Sex and Lucia (Julio Medem, 2001) Spanish Title: Lucía y el sexo Julio Medem's Sex and Lucia is such a confounding film, quite frustrat...

Pan's Labyrinth (2006)

Pan's Labyrinth (Guillermo del Toro, 2006) Spanish Title: El Laberinto del Fauno In the much-lauded Pan's Labyrinth , writer-directo...

Hamlet Goes Business (1987)

Hamlet Goes Business (Aki Kaurismäki, 1987) Finnish Title: Hamlet liikemaailmassa Aki Kaurismäki's Hamlet Goes Business is a pretty muc...

Decasia (2002)

Decasia (Bill Morrison, 2002) Decay, in its most technical sense, connotes deterioration. It is a chemical process that transforms a substan...

Children of Men (2006)

Children of Men (Alfonso Cuarón, 2006) The thing that strikes me the most about Alfonso Cuarón's Children of Men is how familiar every...

Shortbus (2006)

Shortbus (John Cameron Mitchell, 2006) There's no doubt about it, John Cameron Mitchell's sophomore feature, Shortbus is made with ...

Miss Potter (2006)

Miss Potter (Chris Noonan, 2006) Appreciation for Miss Potter would depend largely on one's tolerance for Renée Zellweger's acting ...

The Adventures of Prince Achmed (1926)

The Adventures of Prince Achmed (Lotte Reiniger, 1926) German Title: Die Abenteuer des Prinzen Achmed It's quite funny actually how toda...

Assault on Precinct 13 (1976)

Assault on Precinct 13 (John Carpenter, 1976) The first thing that a viewer who stumbles upon John Carpenter's Assault on Precinct 13 ...

Sunshine (2007)

Sunshine (Danny Boyle, 2007) "The sun is dying," narrates an offscreen voice. In order to save mankind, a crew of eight scientists...

Lady Snowblood (1973)

Lady Snowblood (Toshiya Fujita, 1973) Japanese Title: Shurayukihime To claim that Toshiya Fujita's Lady Snowblood is artful cinema, whi...

Silip (1985)

Silip (Elwood Perez, 1985) aka Daughters of Eve Elwood Perez's Silip has that ball-grabbing opening. It is that sort of opening that im...

Tuli (2005)

Tuli (Auraeus Solito, 2005) English Title: Circumcision After the introduction of Ang Pagdadalaga ni Maximo Oliveros ( The Blossoming of Ma...

Ten Canoes (2006)

Ten Canoes (Rolf de Heer & Peter Djigirr, 2006) The title is derived from a black and white photograph by Dr. Donald Thompson, an anthro...

Django (1966)

Django (Sergio Corbucci, 1966) The film's opening has achieved a certain legendary status. Greeted with a sense of prophetic foreboding ...

Wonderland (1999)

Wonderland (Michael Winterbottom, 1999) Wonderland is a lovely film, probably director Michael Winterbottom's best film to date. It...

Scoop (2006)

Scoop (Woody Allen, 2006) In a scene in Scoop , Woody Allen's character, neurotic magician Sid Waterman, tells Scarlett Johansson's...