100 Words on Alexandre Aja's The 9th Life of Louis Drax (2016)

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By Thomas Puhr

Despite an unconvincing performance by Aiden Longworth as the titular character and a glaringly-obvious twist ending, Alexandre Aja’s The 9th Life of Louis Drax (2016) is still noteworthy as a phantasmagoric cocktail of genres (it mixes elements of feel-good family dramas, creature features, psychosexual thrillers, police procedurals, and [naturally] graphic horror-shows in its story of the mysterious circumstances surrounding Louis’ coma-inducing fall from a cliff during a family picnic) and as an opportunity for the director to display some genuinely-startling imagery; consider, for example, an extended, dreamlike hypnosis session, or the del Toro-esque monster that guides Louis through his subconscious.  

100 Words on Jim Jarmusch's Paterson (2016)

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By Thomas Puhr

Things repeated in Jim Jarmusch’s Paterson (2016): circles, symbols of repetition, painted on curtains; twins, both literal and figurative (the titular Paterson [Adam Driver], an aspiring poet, encounters a Japanese doppelganger at a crucial moment); the daily routines of Paterson and his wife, Laura (Golshifteh Farahani), the small variations of which feel like different drafts for the same, universal poem; word-filled pages replaced by empty pages, which must be filled again; and water, indicative of both life’s transience and endurance. Paterson, recognizing these cycles, continues his life’s work; to paraphrase his “twin,” an empty page sometimes presents the most possibilities.

100 Words on Lorcan Finnegan's Without Name (2016)

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By Thomas Puhr

As its title suggests, Lorcan Finnegan’s Without Name (2016) addresses nature’s inscrutability. Eric (Alan McKenna) and Olivia (Niamh Algar) are land surveyors working in a remote Irish forest: a setup that allows for some eerily-beautiful nature shots. In one scene, Eric vanishes in the forest; while Olivia frantically searches for him, Finnegan’s clever camerawork makes the surrounding trees appear to shift and warp her (our) perspective, like a naturally-occurring hall of mirrors. A stroboscopic sequence reminiscent of A Field in England (2013) adds to the visual experimentation.  “Communicate!” Eric shouts at a phantom-like figure roaming the forest. Nature remains silent.

100 Words on Sean Byrne's The Devil's Candy (2015)

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By Thomas Puhr

Sean Byrne upends the clichéd association between heavy metal music and Satanism in The Devil’s Candy (2015). Though shaggy-haired and covered with tattoos (a characteristic of many a villain/henchman), metalhead/artist Jesse (Ethan Embry) emerges as a sympathetic hero who resists the devilish presence threatening his family’s new, countryside home. Byrne largely favors suspense  over gore (a sequence in which Jesse’s daughter struggles to escape a killer’s bathroom is particularly nail-biting) and incorporates some vivid imagery, such as an arresting montage of Jesse’s frenzied painting with a killer’s frenzied cleaning of a murder scene. Who says heavy metal can’t be subtle?   

100 Words on Trey Edward Shults' It Comes at Night

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By Thomas Puhr

Trey Edward Shults’ follow-up to his fantastic Krisha (2015) is less a horror film (as it has been advertised) and more a stripped-down survival story, following the unsteady dynamics of two families sharing an isolated home during a mysterious, unexplained epidemic. Shults slightly changes the film’s aspect ratio whenever the young Travis (Kelvin Harrison Jr.) has a foreboding dream; later, the writer-director alters this pattern in order to blur the line between reality and nightmare. Otherwise, the aural and visual experimentalism that made his first feature feel so exhilarating are largely absent. The performances, though effective, often feel stiflingly muted.

Cannes Short Films Roundup: 2017




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100 Words on Jo Southwell's Deirdre (2016)

 

In her Cannes-bound short film, Deirdre (2016), writer-director Jo Southwell provides a glimpse into her gestating feature-length adaptation of an Irish folktale. Within a crisp 15-minute runtime, Southwell introduces the titular heroine (India Mullen), her fanatically-religious mother (Elaine Fox), and her absent, mysterious father (Zeb Moore). In addition to its mythological roots, the short makes some intriguing allusions to classic genre films; the violent mother locking her “sinful” daughter in a closet, as well as a disturbing bath scene, call to mind DePalma’s Carrie (1976). The film ends with a tantalizing cliffhanger, leaving much room for exploration in the feature.

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 100 Words on Patricia Chica's Morning After (2017)

Patricia Chica’s 2017 Cannes short, Morning After, unflinchingly charts the evaporating notion of concrete gender dichotomies. Returning to Montreal from a trip abroad, Michael (Thomas Vallieres) finds himself redefining his sexuality over the course of an increasingly-erotic welcome home party. Other than some off-the-cuff philosophical observations (if the universe is constantly changing, why shouldn’t humans?), Kristian Hodko’s script is light on its feet; the actors, both male and female, inhabit their characters with a laid-back ease. Dop Martin Bouchard’s cinematography, reminiscent of Aguirresarobe’s work in Vicky Cristina Barcelona, bathes both the characters and their home city in a sensual glow.

 

By Thomas Puhr

100 Words on M. Night Shyamalan's Split (2016)

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By Thomas Puhr

In his best film since 2002’s Signs, Shyamalan takes a conceit that is excessively used as a twist ending (a main character having multiple personality disorder) and instead makes it the foundation for his tale of three girls (headed by Anya Taylor-Joy) who are abducted and terrorized by a man (James McAvoy, attacking the role with relish) with 23 personalities; especially noteworthy is a final confrontation that is by turns genuinely-unsettling and oddly-touching (echoes of Blade Runner here); the requisite twist actually enriches the story preceding it, announcing what could be a more ambitious and experimental phase in Shyamalan’s career.

100 Words on Adam Wingard's Blair Witch (2016)

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By Thomas Puhr

Frequent collaborators Adam Wingard and Simon Barrett’s follow-up to the great The Blair Witch Project (1999) is well-constructed (a subtle visual twist brings everything full circle), yet ultimately unnecessary. Attempts are made to varnish the original’s roughness; a drone camera, for example, provides some eerie overhead shots (a clever conceit that is ultimately wasted). Just as John Carpenter did with his masterful update of The Thing, Wingard and Barrett make explicit what the original left in shadows. This decision is fine (did they really have a choice?), but the inevitable reveal of the creature is a mess of generic CGI. 

100 Words on Michael Wong's "The Story of 90 Coins" (2015)

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By Thomas Puhr

In his directorial debut, “The Story of 90 Coins,” Michael Wong explores the peaks and valleys of a months-long relationship between the sentimental Wang Yuyang (Dongjun Han) and the ambitious Chen Wen (Zhuang Zhiqi), all in under 10 minutes, no less. The central conceit (Wang Yuyang gives Chen Wen a coin and accompanying note to mark each of their 90 encounters) allows Wong to hopscotch freely amongst the couple’s experiences, which range from comic to unabashedly-melodramatic. Despite an unnecessary postscript, the action ends on a pleasantly-ambiguous note. The cinematography, which tempers some overwrought moments with a crisp sheen, stands out.

100 Words on Ted Geoghegan's We Are Still Here (2015)

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By Thomas Puhr

In his feature film debut, Ted Geoghegan essentially delivers two movies for the price of one: a slow-burn haunted house tale about two parents attempting to cope with their son’s death, and a giddy splatter-fest with some of the most over-the-top gore in recent memory. The final half hour’s extreme violence, while more than a bit incongruent, does not detract from the earlier scenes’ reliance on subtler thrills (Geoghegan appreciates the power of both creaking floorboards and arterial spray). Ultimately, these jarring tonal shifts are grounded by the surprisingly-emotional performances of Barbara Crampton and Andrew Sensenig as the grieving parents.

100 Words on Jeremy Saulnier's Green Room (2015)



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By Thomas Puhr

Writer-director Jeremy Saulnier follows up his fantastic Blue Ruin (2013) with what is surely the best genre thriller in a long time. The late Anton Yelchin heads a punk band that becomes trapped in a neo-Nazi concert hall/bar after witnessing a brutal killing; what follows is by turns excruciatingly suspenseful and shockingly graphic. A clever reversal of John Carpenter’s 1976 classic, Assault on Precinct 13 (instead of defending their symbolic home, the band members are essentially held captive within the enemy’s headquarters), Green Room is the cinematic equivalent of a great punk song: short, visceral, angry, exhilarating, and ultimately cathartic.   

100 Words on Mickey Keating's Darling (2015)

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By Thomas Puhr

In this love letter to Roman Polanski’s apartment trilogy, Lauren Ashley Carter plays the titular “Darling,” who is hired by “Madame” (Sean Young) as the caretaker for a (possibly) haunted New York townhouse; shades of Repulsion (Darling wanders the streets, has sexual nightmares, stores a body in a bathtub), The Tenant (the previous occupant jumped to her death from the roof: a fate that will be repeated), and Rosemary’s Baby (hidden doors, rumors of devil worship); Carter conveys a wide-eyed hysteria with aplomb; the lush, black-and-white cinematography cements Darling as an admirable, largely successful attempt at recapturing 60s-era psychological horror.
  

What Will You Remember? Thoughts on Memory and Time in Richard Linklater’s Boyhood

By Thomas Puhr

I review/analyze Richard Linklater's incredible film in The Open End, which you can find here:

http://theopenend.com/2014/08/18/what-will-you-remember-thoughts-on-memory-and-time-in-richard-linklaters-boyhood/

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