Tag: Dennis Boutsikaris

TIFF21 REVIEW: Violet [2021]

Jared Mobarak

Don’t you feel better now? While the first voice to tell Violet (Olivia Munn) she was worthless came from a woman (her mother), it’s unsurprising that writer/director Justine Bateman turns the one incessantly pushing her around from the inside out today a man’s (Justin Theroux). Part of it probably stems from the fact that she works in Hollywood and thus deals with men oscillating between cruelly objectifying and cruelly belittling every single day, but the biggest reason is surely because of the world in which she lives. Men “built” this…

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REVIEW: She’s Lost Control [2015]

Jared Mobarak

“Yes, you pay me for my time. But you can’t control how I feel.” Ronah (Brooke Bloom) may be working as a sexual surrogate to help people and complete her masters in behavioral psychology, but it isn’t long into She’s Lost Control to realize the title’s sentiments. It’s as though she has decided to retreat into these strange men—vessels to supply her intimacy both physically and mentally—rather than move forward with her own life into a healthy relationship. We can infer this stems from her childhood, one where her estrangement…

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