REVIEW: De rouille et d’os [Rust and Bone] [2012]

“What’s up Robocop?” There’s nothing like a little tragic drama helping troubled souls find purpose in their lives to warm your heart. No, really, there isn’t. With the way the movies tell it, sometimes I get jealous I’ve never gone through a horrible near-death experience or witnessed someone close to me doing so because those things always seem to meander their way into allowing their victims to achieve that ever-elusive moment of clarity. Sure the path probably contains a few more rough patches—with the worst generally yet to come—but sometimes…

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REVIEW: Amour [2012]

“Promise me one thing.” For someone as famously attuned to the intellectual thriller oftentimes leaning towards the hidden recesses of humanity’s darkest proclivities, seeing writer/director Michael Haneke‘s name attached to the universally lauded Amour was always a bit of a puzzle. Depicting the final months in the lives of two eighty-year old former music teachers—Georges (Jean-Louis Trintignant) and Anne (Emmanuelle Riva)—after the lady of the house suffers a debilitating stroke, the film’s rather heartbreaking portrayal of sacrifice and unwavering adoration is without a doubt an aberration in the auteur’s oeuvre.…

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Posterized Propaganda January 2013: The Top 10 Movie Posters of 2012

“Don’t Judge a Book by Its Cover” is a proverb whose simple existence proves the fact impressionable souls will do so without fail. This monthly column focuses on the film industry’s willingness to capitalize on this truth, releasing one-sheets to serve as not representations of what audiences are to expect, but as propaganda to fill seats. Oftentimes they fail miserably. Another year is complete and the time has come to revisit the best one-sheets that did all they could to help their films achieve box office glory. Unsurprising to those…

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