TIFF 50: The cranes are flying in "The Tale of Silyan"

by Cláudio Alves

According to Macedonian legend, there was once a boy called Silyan who wished to go far away, leave his village behind, and spread his wings into the world beyond. But when he told his father, the patriarch flew into a rage, cursing the name of the child and his dreams along with it. Answering these paternal furies, the heavens opened above, releasing a mighty force that struck the boy. He didn't die, though. Instead, as the father had decreed, Sylian turned into a stork who could now do as he wanted and leave everything that he knew. But this freedom was not to be an idyll. It was a cursed existence, lonely and unmoored, caught in the space between worlds and belonging to nowhere. 

Tamara Kotevska uses this folktale as the jumping start from which her latest exercise soars into the cinematic heavens above. The Tale of Silyan, which was just announced as North Macedonia’s submission for the 98^th Academy Awards, marks the director's second feature since she, along with Ljubomir Stefanov, helmed the Oscar-nominated Honeyland...

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Golden Lion Winner Reviewed: "Father Mother Sister Brother"

by Elisa Giudici

Tom Wait in Jim Jarmusch's FATHER MOTHER SISTER BROTHER

On the closing night of Venice 82, the Golden Lion went to Jim Jarmusch’s Father Mother Sister Brother. The decision immediately set off a storm of controversy. The overwhelming favorite had been Kaouther Ben Hania’s The Voice of Hind Rajab, Tunisia's Oscar submission, and a film that electrified audiences with its urgency and moral weight. Yet once again, the jury—this year led by Alexander Payne—opted for a different kind of statement: not the raw political immediacy of Gaza, but the quieter, “career-crowning” recognition of a grand elder of cinema.

This dynamic is nothing new on the Lido...

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TIFF 50: A Linklater Double Feature

by Cláudio Alves

Nowadays, if you're not named Hong Sang-soo, it's rare for a director to release multiple features in the same year. Rarer still for these projects to land on the main competition of two of the big three European film festivals, even winning an award when all is said and done. Well, that was the case this year for Richard Linklater, who bowed Blue Moon at Berlin and then took Nouvelle Vague to Cannes. Now, as happens with various of those fests' juiciest prospects, they are also playing at TIFF, where I had the luck to experience them back to back, finishing the day with a good old-fashioned double feature. Unfortunately, it's an unbalanced pair formed by one of the most disposable follies in the director's career and a gem seemingly composed to be seen as a minor work, that nevertheless sings the song of a major achievement…

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TIFF 50: Finding hope in "The Mysterious Gaze of the Flamingo"

by Cláudio Alves

Gazes, whether averted or confrontational, flirtatiously elusive or probingly direct, have been one of the cornerstones of queer desire on screen. In the 21st century, the state of post-New Queer Cinema has only exulted their role, almost codifying certain gestures across a plurality of artistic expressions that may, otherwise, appear to have very little in common past their shared LGBTQ+ label. In this regard, it's almost inevitable to find a picture like Diego Céspedes' The Mysterious Gaze of the Flamingo. Chile's official submission for the 98th Academy Awards and this year's Un Certain Regard champion ruminates on the transgressive essence of a queer gaze, transforming it into a conduit of infection in what, at first glance, strikes the viewer as an allegory for the AIDS crisis. Things are not what they seem, however…

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Say Goodbye Together with "The Conjuring: Last Rites"

by Nick Taylor

After twelve years, the main branch of The Conjuring film series has seemingly closed its doors. Whether we get any more Annabelles or The Nuns or a subsequent cash-grab inspired by the success of The Conjuring: Last Rites is a different story entirely, and I’ll wait a few years before I truly believe James Wan’s claims about this really being the end. But as a send-off to cinema’s own Ed and Lorraine Warren, there’s plenty of affecting work to admire within some godawful cinematography and a villain that’s never very compelling on its own terms.

We begin The Conjuring: Last Rites in 1964, as Ed and Lorraine (Orion Smith and Madison Lawlor) begin recording statements for their first-ever case. They’re investigating the haunted goings-on at a curiosity shop, where according to the shop’s assistant, there’s been an uptick in inexplicable paranormal activity since the owner inexplicably killed himself . . . .

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