Sundance review: Judy Reyes and Marin Ireland give the pregnancy horror 'birth/rebirth' its juice

by Jason Adams

Let me just stop you right here, at the start, and admit that I am going to be terribly biased in this review of writer-director Laura Moss’ horror film birth/rebirth. Why? Do I know the director? Have I played ping pong with the cinematographer? Did the boom mic operator donate a kidney to my mum? No no nothing like that – it’s just the entirely sane fact that I love love love the actress Judy Reyes with all of my being and seeing her be given a leading role in a movie is too much for me to bear, qualitatively speaking. 

Here at The Film Experience, within this safe space of actressexuals, I know I can admit this freely. But I just feel an upfront warning is due...

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11th Annual Team Experience Awards - NOMINEES

From the team…

Is there any awards body, including our dear writers, who isn't in love with "Everything Everywhere All At Once"?

Looks like the Oscars and the Film Experience writers share something in common. Both are crazy for Everything Everywhere All At Once. The Daniels’ sci-fi extravaganza earned a whopping twelve mentions from the team, including in Best Picture.  These nominees were voted on by all the writers at The Film Experience, sans Nathaniel (who will be revealing his own Film Bitch Awards separately). Come back to The Film Experience next Tuesday, February 7th for the winners. Check out the nominees after the jump...

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Drag Race RuCap: “House of Fashion”

Janelle Monáe is this week's extra special judge.

CLÁUDIO ALVES: Five episodes and four weeks in, Drag Race season 15 finally delivers an episode that isn't criminally ill-paced. Sure, the beginning is rushed as fuck, and there are still no judge deliberations to be seen, but it’s miles better than the previous episodes. Some would call this a filler episode, I wager, as no storyline moves forward in any significant way. Nevertheless, “House of Fashion” left me satisfied in a way I hadn’t felt yet this season.

NICK TAYLOR: The truncation of the reading challenge was a clear sore point, but it’s maybe my only complaint in what’s otherwise a well-paced episode of television. It looks like dropping a few contestants really has eased up the editor’s gas pedal. This week’s elimination keeps “House of Fashion” from being as paradigm-shifting as Snatch Game, but it’s about the best showcase for all of the queen’s talents so far...

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Sundance review: Eliza Scanlen proves ecstatic anew in 'The Starling Girl'

by Jason Adams

Usually when I write about getting “representation” on-screen I’m talking about the gay stuff – like when Call Me By Your Name knocked me flat with its warmly lyrical depiction of a neurotic gayling’s first same-sex longings. And there was gay stuff at Sundance this year that I felt deep in my bones – the darkly funny internalized homophobia of Sebastián Silva’s Rotting in the Sun squarely hit the mark.  But no movie felt more like a mirror at this year’s fest than did writer-director Laurel Parmet’s debut film The Starling Girl, which explores the world of rural Christian fundamentalism with the crystal cold precision of one who barely survived that very thing. I speak from my own experience...

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Weekend Box Office: The Oscar Bump

By Ben Miller

Yes, Avatar: The Way of Water won the box office battle for the seventh straight week.  Yes, it's now one of four highest-grossing films in history (the third James Cameron-directed film to achieve that).  Yes, it will end up being one of the biggest domestic hits in history.  But, I'm much more interested in the rest of the box office.  Following Tuesday's Oscar nods, several of the big contenders received a much needed expansion and a little financial boost...  

Weekend Box Office (actuals) Jan 27th-29th 🔺 = new or expanding /  ★ = Recommended
WIDE (OVER 800 SCREENS)	LIMITED / PLATFORM
THE WAY OF WATER	PATHAAN
1 ★ AVATAR: THE WAY OF WATER $15.9 (cum. $620.8) 3,600 screens	1 🔺 PATHAAN $6.8 *NEW* 695 screens
2 ★ PUSS IN BOOTS: THE LAST WISH  $10.4 (cum. $140.7) 3,452 screens	2 THE WANDERING EARTH II $1.4 (cum. $3.0) 142 screens

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