A Pfeiffer Portrait of Devastating Despair

by Murtada

The year of Michelle Pfeiffer continues. We’ve seen the trailer and pictures from Murder on the Orient Express. We've seen the poster for mother! (sacrilege she’s not on it). We’ve seen her on HBO as Ruth Madoff. And now her Sundance film, Where is Kyra?, made its way to Brooklyn and played at BAMCinemaFest last weekend.

Andrew Dosunmu (Mother of George) collaborates once again with Bradford Young to gorgeous results. This time Pfeiffer’s transfixing visage supplements their beautiful frames with movie star magic...

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"Rough Night" and the State of Comedy

by Eric Blume

My assignment for TFE was a review of the movie Rough Night. But since I was not raised in a barn, nor raised by wolves, my mother once told me if you can’t find something nice to say, don’t say anything at all. So we’ll keep it short on Rough Night itself.  It’s actually depressing how bad this movie is, a twist on a rather good mainstream movie called Very Bad Things, back in the Cameron Diaz days of 1998.  That Peter Berg film had a bit of an edge as it followed several guy friends on a bachelor party who find themselves in a dead hooker situation.  Rough Night is the distaff version of this tale, but the inept script, bad performances, and bland direction make it a tough sit.  The film’s five actresses (Scarlett Johansson, Kate McKinnon, Zoe Kravitz, Jillian Bell, and Ilana Glazer) are winning, talented ladies and deserved a far better vehicle.

Sitting through Rough Night your mind may wander, as did mine, to the state of mainstream comedy in the cinema these days...

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Splendid Sally makes "Maudie" a delight

by Murtada

If you are a fan of Sally Hawkins then Maudie is a gift full of joy made just for you. Hawkins plays real life folk artist Maud Lewis, a smart lively woman who’s hunched with crippled hands from arthritis, as she finds solace and purpose in becoming an artist. Maud works a housekeeper for a hardened reclusive bachelor, Everett Lewis (Ethan Hawke). Of course she thaws his heart and they eventually couple up. The film is a two-hander even as Hawkins is its unquestionable center and beam of delight...

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See, I Listen to You.

Those times I ask you "what's on your cinematic mind?" are not just filler. I really do listen. Sometimes it inspires articles and other times I take direct requests. Thanks, for example, to Kris who pointed out that I needed to update the Review page. The funny thing is I thought I had because earlier in the year I'd been updating daily. But I was three months behind --eeep! -- and now I see the films I never got around to reviewing. Now the page is fresh again with all recent reviews notated and the list of everything screened thus far. Take a look if you think you missed something. 

Pssst I'm seeing The Beguiled this Monday and couldn't be more eager.

Pride Month Doc Corner: 'Political Animals'

We are continuing this Pride Month series of documentaries about queer issues. After last week's look at the life of Armistead Maupin, we detour into politics with Political Animals.

It’s just a matter of fact that men are the predominant voice of cinematic history. This is hardly surprising given that men are the predominant voice of history in general, but this of course means that the stories of women make up a frustratingly small portion of those told on the silver screen (even if we may curate our own viewing experiences to counteract this). The same can sadly be said about queer cinema where films about LGBTIQ women and by women (gay or otherwise) are without a doubt outnumbered by those by and about men.

It’s wonderful then to see Political Animals, a film that seeks to take a side-step away from the more famous names of gay politicians and activists like Harvey Milk, Larry Kramer, Cleve Jones and Barney Frank and focuses on the openly gay women from the halls of American politics. In particular, four women from California whose long and exhausting efforts in the face of bigotry across generations (although, quite telling, almost exclusively from older white men) slowly yet surely chipped away at government homophobia.

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