REVIEW: To the Stars [2020]

Welcome to Oklahoma. The whole of Martha Stephens‘ To the Stars can be summed up by a line in the director’s statement of intent: “Longing is part of the human condition: the ever-present awareness of what’s still missing from our lives.” It’s true. We all long for something. Sometimes it’s for something as simple and direct as love. Sometimes it’s for something as complex and harrowing as equality. We long to be seen as who we are and often for the escape that’s necessary to allow it to happen far…

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REVIEW: 20th Century Women [2016]

“You wish you were crazy” There’s a lot to unpack in 20th Century Women, Mike Mills‘ look at lost souls adrift on paths towards happiness (if happiness even exists). For one he’s a man writing progressive feminists who in turn earnestly educate the two men in their lives how to be men. That alone takes you down corridors of psychological profundity that may actually be profound or simply a mask for the filmmaker’s own explanation that all men aren’t stereotypically single-minded. Because despite the title including the word “women,” this…

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