Month: September 2012

REVIEW: Santiago 73, post mortem [Post Mortem] [2011]

Jared Mobarak

“Congratulations. You now serve the Chilean Army.” Taking the formula he used in Tony Manero one step further, writer/director Pablo Larraín‘s Venice Film Festival Golden Lion award-winning film Santiago 73, post mortem [Post Mortem] assures the world he is a director worth your time. Retaining his trademark shooting style that lingers way longer than comfort should allow, we are thrust into the action by sifting through its aftermath. Always hearing destruction off-screen or seeing it on the edges of the frame, it’s the methodical tracking shots through empty streets with…

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REVIEW: Tony Manero [2008]

Jared Mobarak

“That glass floor is the only thing that turns you on” The first of Pablo Larraín‘s cinematic trilogy set during Augusto Pinochet’s reign in Chile, Tony Manero seems happy to keep the political turmoil of the dictator’s regime in the background. Rather than overtly describe the period and the oppression against government detractors, the writer/director decides to focus on one very eccentric man named Raúl Peralta. Friends with enemies and fans alike, we watch his proclivities for violence as he uses the police state to his advantage. With curfews enforced,…

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TIFF12 REVIEW: لما شفتك [When I Saw You] [2013]

Jared Mobarak

“You’re suffocating me” Leave it to writer/director Annemarie Jacir to make an American more or less indoctrinated to side with the Israelis in the war for the Holy Land see her people’s freedom fighters (fadayee) in a sympathetic light. The first ever female Palestinian director—her debut feature Salt of This Sea was the region’s 2008 Oscar submission for Best Foreign Language Film—Jacir introduces us to the Harir Refugee Camp of 1967 Jordan through the eyes of an innocent. Young Tarek (Mahmoud Asfa) knows nothing about the fight raging or the…

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