Tag: Vicky Krieps

REVIEW: Old [2021]

Jared Mobarak

Stop wishing away this moment. The first mention I heard about M. Night Shyamalan adapting Pierre-Oscar Lévy and Frederick Peeters‘ French graphic novel Sandcastle was a tweet that more or less stated how he knew he had to try turning it into a film the moment he put it down. It’s not hard to imagine why since the book is almost tailor-made for the Shyamalan treatment with its mysteriously secluded locale; ensemble cast mired in a tense, supernatural scenario seemingly outside of their control; and a science fiction writer walking…

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REVIEW: Phantom Thread [2017]

Jared Mobarak

You found me. I’m not sure there’s a better director working today than Paul Thomas Anderson. I don’t say this as a long-time fan that calls Magnolia his favorite film of all-time. I say it as someone who’s watched his career expand and evolve in orchestration, aesthetic, tone, and performance. There’s an air about his art that demands revisiting for introspective ruminations and profound revelations. It’s almost as though he creates these works for them to be dissected into their hybridized genres, dramatic gravitas, and historical eccentricities. But just as…

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TIFF17 REVIEW: Gutland [2018]

Jared Mobarak

“Well, it’s not impossible to learn” When a German drifter walks into the quaint Luxembourg village of Schandelsmillen with a scruffy beard, bag full of money, and stoically gruff attitude, we wonder what secrets his past holds. Jens Fauser (Frederick Lau) arrives with a single question: “Do you need help with the harvest?” That specific query unfortunately can’t help but make him stick out like a sore thumb further than he already does considering the harvest is half over. The townspeople therefore prove cold and cryptic, forcing him to accept…

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TIFF15 REVIEW: Colonia [2016]

Jared Mobarak

“You may never get back out” It’s amazing how many horrific acts mankind has initiated over the past century. With all the coups, wars, dictators, etc. it’s impossible to find a country devoid of at least one historically heinous blight. Chile under Augusto Pinochet certainly had its fair share, but I never heard of the prison camp/cult commune Colonia Dignidad. Run by a “godly” savior in Peter Schäfer (Michael Nyqvist), this community guarded by an electrified fence and segregated between men, women, and children became his state-run playground. He took…

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