REVIEW: Hustlers [2019]

We were like hurricanes. What’s a better hustle than declining the price tag a Hollywood studio offered for your life rights to wait until the film is a hit and then sue the production for defamation? Samantha Barbash pretty much bet on the story—I’m hypothesizing that this was her intent based solely on her characterization in Jessica Pressler‘s New York Magazine article “The Hustlers at Scores” and Lorene Scafaria‘s cinematic adaptation Hustlers—and stands to make something regardless of how often these types of cases are dismissed. She’d usually have to…

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REVIEW: Braid [2019]

Reality will never keep up with our dreams. Our lives consist of uncertainties. To progress forward is to confront each new possibility as the product of dream or nightmare—an open door to leap through and succeed or a closed window to surrender all hope of escape. We retreat within ourselves for the motivation to jump higher and rely on those we trust to help break our inevitable falls. One road leads to comfort until the shine wears off. The next winds its way towards rebirth until tragedy strikes or self-doubt…

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FANTASIA18 REVIEW: Cam [2018]

I literally love you. There’s a moment in director Daniel Goldhaber‘s Cam where Alice (Madeline Brewer) is talking to her younger brother Jordan (Devin Druid) about the previous evening’s performance on web-cam site Free Live Girls. She moved past sex gimmicks towards the dark world of snuff film aesthetics and it worked to move her up more leaderboard spots in one session than she ever had before. He gives her a congratulatory fist-bump and asks whether she’s told their mother (Melora Walters‘ Lynne) what her new lucrative job actually is…

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