Fade in on an evening commute. We’re on the ocean, vast and pitiless. Framed against the ominous soundtrack of a foghorn’s elephantine bellow, a dinghy comes into focus, making its incremental progress with two stoic men behind the wheel. Their destination: oblivion. More literally, these rugged individuals — Robert Pattinson’s Ephraim Winslow and Willem Dafoe’s Thomas Wake … [Read more...]
Denis’ ‘High Life’ an arty space id-yssey
At first blush, High Life seems to be about a single father trying to raise an infant child in inhospitable conditions — in this case, outer space. As in the home, objects aboard his rectangular, wood-paneled spacecraft fail, and Monte (Robert Pattinson) must tend to them while monitoring his baby, always on alert in fronts both personal and existential. His daughter’s … [Read more...]
Visual poetry gives ‘Lost City of Z’ its epic passport
Depending on whom you ask, director James Gray (We Own the Night, The Immigrant) is either his generation’s Kubrick — a dogged, uncompromising auteur of narcotized mood pieces — or a ponderous, inert storyteller with an elegant camera eye. Whatever your opinion of the polarizing filmmaker, he’s an unlikely choice for The Lost City of Z (pronounced “zed”), an adaptation of … [Read more...]