Women Who Kill (And The Women Who Love Them)

Team Experience is reporting from the 2016 Tribeca Film Festival. Here's Jason on Women Who Kill.

Replace the hard gray rocks of a Provençal lake with the hard gray sidewalks of Park Slope Brooklyn and you'll find there's a lot in common between the gay men of 2013's Stranger by the Lake and the gay women of Women Who Kill, Ingrid Jungermann's droll black comedy screening today at Tribeca. Sure the lesbians are wearing a lot more clothes, but nature is nature, and who hasn't found themselves fetishizing sexy danger for the right mysterious someone? We want what we want, sanity be damned. (It doesn't hurt when maybe-crazy comes in the form of A Girl Walks Home Alone at Night's sultry-eyed Sheila Vand either.)

Women Who Kill vibes on humor over heavy petting though, and the laughs are steady and smart and nigh on rollicking at times in Jungermann's script, and beneath her sharp straightforward direction - I probably recognized even more of myself in the foibles of these Brooklyn ladies, with their terror of swans and urine-stained grass, than I did their gender-flipped French counterparts. I'm just one serial-killer podcast and an urban rooftop garden away from a perfect storm of commiseration. Who isn't?

Grade: B+

Review: The Invitation

A dinner party reunion of estranged friends sets the stage for director Karyn Kusama's unnerving and twisted micro-horror The Invitation. The film's marketing has wisely eschewed going much further than that vague synopsis, for this one is most rewarding when experienced fresh. But don't just expect surprises with what unfolds, but from what's underneath the plentiful chills.

Shot almost entirely within one swanky Los Angeles home, the modest production is deceptive for how easily it gets under your skin and rattles. Its slim budget is hidden by a glossy presentation and a production design that finds the right alchemy of alluring and demonic (paging Daniel Walber!). Kusama treats this house as she does the many characters, all hidden corners of darkness packaged within a polished facade. If you watch The Invitation on VOD, prepare to have home jealousy, for this is pure house porn. And you'll definitely want a glass of wine.

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A Monster Calls For A "Visionary Filmmaker"

Laurence here. Have you checked the children? Landing somewhat quietly in a week of splashy comic book trailers was something that looks, frankly, altogether more interesting than both. J.A. Bayona, director of The Orphanage and The Impossible, seems to have found the narrative intersection between both for his new film, A Monster Calls. We only have a teaser trailer so far so we won't give it the full YNMS treatment just yet, but it's an enticing, Burtonesque first glimpse.

Some more information on the film after the jump...

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Happy Birthday, Emma Watson!

A happiest of birthdays to former blockbuster youngster and now indie starlet Emma Watson! In one of the most charming bits of movie programming serendipity, her new film Colonia is also being released today.

Colonia debuted at last fall's Toronto Film Festival, and is now in select theatres and on VOD. Set during the factual Chilean military uprising in 1973, the film stars Watson as a young woman going undercover within a cult to rescue her lover (Daniel Brühl) from its terrifying captivity. The film looks to deliver morbid thrills against a political background, with Michael Nyqist's variation on an actual cult leader looking like the stuff of nightmares.

While Watson is still beloved by Harry Potter fans for her long-haul performance as Hermione Granger, her post-franchise work in smaller films has steadily shown new shades to the actress. Her best work yet is her turn in Sofia Coppola's The Bling Ring, giving a smart, measured take on excess-obsessed youth culture that also gives the film a surprising shot of acid wit. More great work followed in The Perks of Being a Wallflower, a performance of subtle emotional maturity that should have earned her the similar praised received by costars Logan Lerman and Ezra Miller.

We missed giving Colonia a YNMS treatment, so check out the trailer after the jump...

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April Showers: Kenneth Lonergan's Margaret

In April Showers, Team TFE looks at our favorite waterlogged moments in the movies. Here's Chris on Margaret (2011).

If you missed Kenneth Lonergan's Margaret during it's microscopic release in 2011, you aren't alone. The film spent four years in the editing room after wrapping in 2005, leading to a litigious post-production and a bare bones theatrical run. Even with its bursting ensemble of recognizable faces like Mark Ruffalo, Matt Damon, and lead Anna Paquin, Margaret couldn't get an audience without promotion, so it died.

But if you ever want to complain about Film Twitter, remember Margaret as the poster child for its ability to create a movement around a worthy film. Thanks to #TeamMargaret, led mostly by the film's passionate British fanbase, word of mouth (and curiosity) spread quickly. Eventually distributor Fox Searchlight made the film more readily available, even sending screeners out to a handful of critics for end-of-the-year consideration. The home release also features an extended version closer to Lonergan's original intention.

Sometimes we just miss a masterpiece, but they always have a way of coming back. (more after the jump)...

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