This review may contain spoilers.
And just when you think it’s over, he makes you exit through the gift shop 🙄
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Says something very interesting about how the world functions in a post-online age. In conversation with Demonlover and The Beast, and very specifically about the post-modern commodification of everything, even people. Cosplay in a courtroom, ISIS videos as NFTs, post-irony, customised AI assistants.
Among the most ahead of its time films of this decade. Excellent probing, disorienting camerawork. Sick Uboa needledrop.
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Very cute. It remains very impressive what can be achieved with claymation, sad it’s becoming a dying artform. Also achieves the unachievable in making being British look appealing.
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Cannot wait for the sequel where Truman goes through the child star > rehab > podcast pipeline.
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This review may contain spoilers.
Happy Wheels bus crash ahh ending.
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Gorgeous film that I was worried would be slight, but it isn’t in the least. It’s an interesting follow-up to Parallel Mothers - which receives a nod early on - to follow two women, whose lives converge in an unexpected way.
Almodóvar’s reckoning with death feels like new territory for him as a filmmaker. Gone is the goofiness, but we’re left with something amusing and profound.
Tilda Swinton is heartbreaking, and Julianne Moore is especially compelling.
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So beautiful, so sad, so moving. What Chungking Express does for Hong Kong, and Payal Kapadia does for Mumbai, Maura Delpero does for remote mountainous Italy.
Loved the family, but those screaming babies, where’s a Devil’s Bath when you need one…
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The first Bergman chamber drama to be set entirely within an Airbnb. They’re both toxic, hope this helps!
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Palme d’Or, Cairns QLD film festival.
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What the hell, sure
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Lowkey was giving Mrs Doubtfire 💀
If the premise of this film seemed like a stretch, unfortunately it does feel messy at some points - but the total commitment that Audiard has to his characters cuts through the noise. Glad to see him finally recognised internationally, even if it’s not for one of his best films.
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The Land of Oz may have talking animals and an Emerald City, but not all the magic in the world could apparently light a movie properly.
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I’m relieved to have finally caught up with Black Dog, after missing it at SFF in favour of fellow Cannes selected Ghost Trail.
From the very start, Guan Hu immerses you into this otherworldly Chinese town, that feels like the ends of the earth. A little reminiscent of how Aussie drama Limbo transformed Coober Pedy into a barren wasteland, virtually the moon.
Here not much transformation was needed, as we follow inhabitants of a decrepit town, that seems imminent for demolishment, and its residents for relocation. A month and a half out from the 2008 Beijing Olympics, this is China rapidly approaching a milestone that caused such development and so-called ‘advancement’ in the 2000s. It’s fitting that Chinese auteur Jia Zhangke, would appear here as an actor in a film releasing simultaneously to his own travelogue Caught by the Tides.
Black Dog shies away from turning its buddy comedy-Western hybrid into a political statement against this rapid modernity. Rather, we’re left with a film that is quiet and refreshingly sentimental for the last days of a nation in flux, decades leading up to this moment.
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Honestly, Black Christmas is kinda the best Christmas movie of all time. A joy to wrap presents to. They should show this in schools.
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Beautifully shot, solemn documentary about the systematic infanticide in Canada, and in the US by association. It isn’t a film that provides many answers, but rather leaves you with questions about reparations, the apologies of political and religious leaders, and how to move past this grief.
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That final fight scene kinda giving this 💀
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Not that there’s stiff competition, but this is the best of the diabolical string of 2010s Melissa McCarthy comedies.
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Crazy stuff going down at the Tbilisi Louis Garrel lookalike contest.
Interesting to see the nods to First Reformed in so many reviews. It certainly is a film about a downward spiral and loss of hope; but the religious radicalism and sense of alienation reminded me more of Kirill Serebrennikov’s The Student.
Great performances from Data Chachua, and the always reliable Ia Sukhitashvili.
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Escape Room: Heroes vs Villains
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Interrogating the myth of the American justice system; gods & monster et al.
Feels eternally stuck in the late afternoon - paranoid, Sunday scaries. It's a shame this was dumped in the States, and didn't seem to release internationally, at least in my country. This is gripping, and honestly surprising how Clint Eastwood has delivered a subtle, apolitical, and searing film about the justice system, wrapped up in a studio courtroom drama. He deserved laurels for this.
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Proud to be a Hard Truther! Marianne better get that Oscar nom.
I do feel the film lingers on silence towards the end for a few beats too long. Leigh works wonders at creating suspense, but it feels devoid of a conclusion. I guess the real Hard Truths are the friends we lost along the way.
Superb Mother’s Day sequence. I really hope that Michele Austin gets her flowers too.
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Gladiator II certainly feels as sprawling and epic as you’d hope for - it’s just a shame that the political intrigue is delivered in CliffsNotes form, allowing a film as long as this to feel rushed.
Denzel Washington is excellent. Connie Nielsen’s performance is a new camp classic.
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For as pristine and controlled an environment as her OR is, the outside world is harsh and unforgiving. An almost pastoral, natural world turns roads in bogs in a matter of minutes - the attitudes of its inhabitants similarly.
Like About Dry Grasses from last year, April contends with a protagonist bound to her environment. Unlike the former film, there’s no reason for her to remain in this place; it’s her compelling, empathetic almost inert martyrdom that drives her to remain. Nina, a leading OB-GYN, freelances as an abortionist in the local villages. Even as her world falls under scrutiny, she continues this, almost compulsively.
Dea Kulumbegashvili, who so greatly impressed me with Beginning, expands her palette here. It’s an abortion drama that feels more like a horror film, slow cinema feels extraordinarily riveting and deeply unsettling. One of the year’s absolute best.
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This should have won the Palme d’Or tbh
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Halfway between a hostage thriller and a police procedural, Kurosawa’s High & Low is an expertly crafted drama. This film is major. What a banger, can’t believe I’ve waited this long to watch - but also, so grateful I had the opportunity to see this on the big screen.
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Kind of crazy that for all of its misgivings, and poorly aged comedy, Scary Movie actually holds up well. I’d be lying if I said I didn’t love it.
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Dea Kulumbegashvili’s tight, claustrophobic framing terrified me in ways that I feel has genuinely pushed the artform further. In Beginning, I see Haneke, Tarkovsky, Reygadas, Schrader, Akerman.
This is a bleak, suffocating film that follows the crisis of faith in the wife of a Jehovah’s Witness leader following a terrorist attack. The violence in the film’s opening scene confirms her fears about her role as a wife, and a woman in this community. This is no doubt a divisive film here - many seem to question the abhorrent violence on screen, and slow, methodical pace that Kulumbegashvili takes.
To me, there is no doubt that Beginning is a landmark film. It is shocking that this is a feature debut, given how singular the vision is - and how uncompromising the end result.
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Incredibly rich in a way you wouldn’t expect from something so cerebral and minimalist. The trains, the moss, the soup - kinda feel like this has rewired my brain.
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Éric Rohmer transforms a dull, mundane afternoon into a grand mystery. People-watching at its most transfixing.
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Nothing beats a shark movie, however lots of things beat an aesthetically barren Xavier Gens film.
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Incredibly kinetic cinematography from Robbie Ryan, and a great trip-hop score from Burial do wonders to enhance Andrea Arnold’s latest in a quite different direction than expected.
Of course she’s known for telling the stories of the working class, and similarly to Sean Baker, the Dardennes, and Ken Loach, she’s received criticism for ‘exploiting’ these marginalised communities. I’d suggest doubters and detractors actually watch Bird before considering this.
While the basic premise is only a stone’s throw from Fish Tank, Arnold’s use of magic realism creates a much different film. I’m not sure it all works narratively, but it does result in a unique spin on something akin to a live-action Miyazaki.
Loved the use of editing to reveal layers of key scenes in a non-linear form. I’m not sure if Arnold has experimented with this before, but it fits the film very well.
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Juliette Binoche and Charlie Plummer having a crazy nose flair off, but at least it’s a brief distraction from the atrocious performances of the supporting cast.
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A Real Pain is definitely a step-up from Eisenberg’s debut. He remains interested in the complicated relationship between family members, misfits and the straight-laced. His sophomore feature takes the oddball, situational comedy further, but also provides more of a solid emotional foothold. Perhaps the first mainstream/American holocaust comedy. Was not shocked to see Emma Stone (a real tastemaker) produced this.
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No-one talk about the sold out Amélie screening on Fri 1 November.
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Pleased to announce that despite the doubters (me), Smile 2 actually RIPS. It feels invigorating in a way few horror sequels do, by actually telling a story that warrants it, rather than rehashing the original.
Sure, the film hits the same beats, but it is a much more interesting film than it probably has the right to be. Naomi Scott is terrific. Would be a four star if it didn’t disorient the audience the exact same way as the original.
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I’ve had to really sit on The Brutalist for a full week to come to my senses on it. Brady Corbet has delivered a staggering work that probes and interrogates the desire to create, the power money holds, and the violence inherent to greed.
Adrien Brody is phenomenal - but that we already knew - Guy Pearce, Felicity Jones and Joe Alwyn all hold their own. This film is shot beautifully, and masterfully edited. It makes the case for a 3.5 hour drama, halfway between Tár, The Godfather and There Will Be Blood. Loved the ending, but know it will frustrate some.
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Motherhood might be a bitch, but this film is anything but feral. I’ve had worse dreams on melatonin. Amy Adams needs to drink a glass of water, have a multivitamin and hire a babysitter.
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It’s been a long wait for this year’s Palme d’Or winner. Sean Baker’s Anora is a funny, chaotic, yet deeply empathetic film. Mikey Madison is perfect as Anora, making the most of the film’s slapstick comedy and serious drama in equal measure. Yuriy Borisov, who I’ve been a fan of since Compartment No. 6, is like a secret weapon here. I could see this as a massive breakout role for him.
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I feel mean giving this an average rating - I really wanted to love this. There’s a great cast of recent discoveries and a fun stressful story, but it sort of loses its way with uneven pacing, one too many absurdities, and the vague and unspecific motives of Willam Dafoe’s antagonist.
Owes a lot to Altman, to Birdman and to be honest, Shiva Baby. I knew Jason Reitman couldn’t be trusted with this.
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My main take away from this is that no matter where in the world you are from, American food will give you one hell of a culture shock.
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This has a 3.6 average on here… the bar is literally so low 😫
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Ohhh wait until that Instagram 'depop drama' account finds out about this one!
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Batshit crazy film. Kiyoshi Kurosawa knows how to turn normal domestic life into ambient dread. He pulled horror out of thin air in Cure and Pulse, and again this year with Chime.
I love how sadistic and ruthless he can be. A master filmmaker on a victory lap this year.
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Odessa A’zion, you’re a star! Really thoughtful, compassionate film. It helps that director Sam Hayes is an all-round legend (and can throw a great kick-ons).
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Welcome back Isabelle Adjani
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Opens with an AI generated fake Orson Welles quote. Dasha making Nara Smith TikToks. Surveillance culture, long covid, reality TV. What’s not to love?
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No this was so crazyyy !!
Everyone on here calling this lazy needs to check themselves. This film is so intricate, so silly, the comedic timing is perfect.
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Unfortunately such a dud, and I went in open minded! It’s a shame how everything suspenseful and interesting in this film evaporates once Amy Ryan departs the film.
Like you’re telling me two of the biggest stars in Hollywood are such charisma vacuums under Jon Watts’ direction? Should be winning the Razzie for Worst Screenplay btw. Too slick, fuck off.
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The latest daring work from Austria’s bande à part - Severin Fiala, Veronika Franz and produced by Ulrich Seidl - is their most daring provocation yet. The 1750s set feature follows the trials and tribulations of being a woman in Middle Ages Europe. Confined by society, and her own religious beliefs, a shocking acts seems to be the only way out.
Fiala and Franz have crafted a suspenseful moral fable that owes a lot to Anja Plaschg’s terrific leading performance, and period detail that revels in the murky muck of Eighteenth Century Austria.
The Devil’s Bath is a tough watch - never exploitative, but not one that suffers fools well. That vegan alert girl on here is gonna have a field day.
]]>Some of these may have international Blu-Ray releases without Eng subs.
- The Intruder
- The Beasts
- House of Tolerance
- Retribution
- Noriko's Dinner Table
- Eden
- My Mother
- Liverpool
- Aurora
- Reflection
...plus 14 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.
]]>- Leviathan
- Brother
- The Execution
- Charade
- Interiors
- Retribution
- Red Road
- The Intruder
- Angel Dust
- Everyone Else
...plus 18 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.
]]>- The Power of the Dog
- Drive My Car
- The Worst Person in the World
- Red Rocket
- Titane
- France
- Moffie
- Spencer
- A Hero
- Nitram
...plus 83 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.
]]>- Breaking the Waves
- Dogville
- Moonrise Kingdom
- Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind
- The Seventh Seal
- The Color Wheel
- High Tension
- High Fidelity
- The War Zone
- Control
...plus 26 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.
]]>- The Swimmer
- Belle de Jour
- 8½
- Open Hearts
- Oasis
- Humanité
- Vagabond
- 3-Iron
- Two Days, One Night
- L'Avventura
...plus 21 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.
]]>Films to watch for the 2022/23 awards season
- Ahed's Knee
- All the Beauty and the Bloodshed
- Amsterdam
- The Apartment with Two Women
- Argentina, 1985
- Armageddon Time
- Avatar: The Way of Water
- BARDO, False Chronicle of a Handful of Truths
- Black Panther
- Black Panther: Wakanda Forever
...plus 63 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.
]]>Yes I am hyped for these potential serves 🥰
- Wolf
- Pleasure
- Montana Story
- Free Fall 2
- The Restless
- El Planeta
- In Front of Your Face
- Little Fish
- We're All Going to the World's Fair
- Enys Men
...plus 188 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.
]]>- Call Me by Your Name
- The Killing of a Sacred Deer
- Lady Bird
- Good Time
- Columbus
- BPM (Beats per Minute)
- Loveless
- The Square
- First Reformed
- Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri
...plus 26 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.
]]>Ranking the movies released in 2020, including films I watched later but were released in 2020.
- Quo Vadis, Aida?
- The Father
- Nomadland
- And Then We Danced
- Another Round
- Minari
- Possessor
- Never Rarely Sometimes Always
- Pieces of a Woman
- Sound of Metal
...plus 51 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.
]]>- Martyrs
- Irreversible
- Dancer in the Dark
- Antichrist
- Inside
- Revenge
- Salò, or the 120 Days of Sodom
- The Piano Teacher
- The House That Jack Built
- Enter the Void
...plus 10 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.
]]>- The Crow
- Anaconda
- Arachnophobia
- Razorback
- Alien Resurrection
- Prometheus
- Life as a House
- Contact
- Buffy the Vampire Slayer
- From Dusk Till Dawn
...plus 10 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.
]]>- Dogville
- Adaptation.
- Burning
- Drive My Car
- To Die For
- My Own Private Idaho
- Official Competition
- Scary Movie
- Synecdoche, New York
- I'm Thinking of Ending Things
...plus 36 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.
]]>Yes
- Mad Max: Fury Road
- Carol
- Sicario
- The Lobster
- Spotlight
- Holding the Man
- 45 Years
- The Hateful Eight
- Green Room
- Krisha
...plus 35 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.
]]>...plus 46 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.
]]>- TÁR
- Triangle of Sadness
- Aftersun
- Leila's Brothers
- Pacifiction
- Winter Boy
- Saint Omer
- Close
- Decision to Leave
- One Fine Morning
...plus 110 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.
]]>- The Hunt
- The Master
- Spring Breakers
- The Raid
- Frances Ha
- In Another Country
- Holy Motors
- The Perks of Being a Wallflower
- Paradise: Love
- Killing Them Softly
...plus 11 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.
]]>- Incendies
- The Social Network
- Certified Copy
- Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives
- Tuesday, After Christmas
- I Saw the Devil
- Toy Story 3
- Black Swan
- Inception
- Never Let Me Go
...plus 12 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.
]]>- The Zone of Interest
- La Chimera
- The Beast
- Do Not Expect Too Much from the End of the World
- Anatomy of a Fall
- Green Border
- Afire
- Fallen Leaves
- The Beasts
- Monster
...plus 113 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.
]]>- I Saw the TV Glow
- Unicorns
- City of Wind
- Pepe
- All Shall Be Well
- The Rye Horn
- Puan
- Motel Destino
- There's Still Tomorrow
- Dahomey
...plus 19 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.
]]>- Elle
- The Handmaiden
- Nocturama
- Moonlight
- Aquarius
- 20th Century Women
- La La Land
- Your Name.
- Things to Come
- Toni Erdmann
...plus 31 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.
]]>- Mommy
- Clouds of Sils Maria
- Gone Girl
- Winter Sleep
- Phoenix
- Boyhood
- Whiplash
- The Grand Budapest Hotel
- Force Majeure
- Citizenfour
...plus 38 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.
]]>- Drive
- House of Tolerance
- Shame
- Melancholia
- Weekend
- Beauty
- Oslo, August 31st
- Elena
- You're Next
- The Cabin in the Woods
...plus 13 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.
]]>- The Ascent
- The Cremator
- The Color of Pomegranates
- Marketa Lazarová
- Wings
- Mirror
- Stalker
- The Sacrifice
- Come and See
- Reflection
...plus 20 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.
]]>- A Prophet
- White Material
- Fish Tank
- The White Ribbon
- Antichrist
- Fantastic Mr. Fox
- Thirst
- Coraline
- Dogtooth
- I Killed My Mother
...plus 44 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.
]]>- Parasite
- The Lighthouse
- Marriage Story
- Portrait of a Lady on Fire
- Little Women
- Uncut Gems
- Waves
- Midsommar
- Bait
- Atlantics
...plus 38 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.
]]>- Prisoners
- Tom at the Farm
- Under the Skin
- Inside Llewyn Davis
- Eastern Boys
- Night Moves
- Stranger by the Lake
- The Wolf of Wall Street
- Enemy
- Stoker
...plus 30 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.
]]>- Red Road
- Oasis
- The Blonde One
- The Intruder
- Clean
- The Life of Jesus
- The Pornographer
- Polisse
- Supermarket Woman
- Another World
...plus 10 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.
]]>- The Innocents
- Repulsion
- The Innocents
- Demons
- Tetsuo: The Iron Man
- The Wailing
- Spider
- eXistenZ
- The Exorcist
- Lake Mungo
...plus 11 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.
]]>Potential serves n slays
- Onibaba
- May
- Orphan
- Saw
- Halloween Ends
- Mona Lisa and the Blood Moon
- Barbarian
- Demons
- Funeral Parade of Roses
- A Tale of Two Sisters
...plus 1 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.
]]>- It's Raining in the House
- Riddle of Fire
- The Nature of Love
- About Dry Grasses
- The Breaking Ice
- Hounds
- Remembering Every Night
- How to Have Sex
- Birdeater
- Tommy Guns
...plus 11 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.
]]>Criterions first 🫣
- White Material
- Come and See
- Crash
- The Piano Teacher
- Beau Travail
- Mirror
- Mulholland Drive
- Fox and His Friends
- Amores Perros
- Wild Reeds
...plus 30 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.
]]>- Asteroid City
- Subtraction
- I Like Movies
- Music
- The New Boy
- Fallen Leaves
- Late Night with the Devil
- Bad Behaviour
- 20,000 Species of Bees
- Lost in the Night
...plus 15 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.
]]>- Personal Shopper
- Clouds of Sils Maria
- Persona
- Loveless
- Purple Noon
- The Double Life of Véronique
- Close-Up
- Certified Copy
- Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me
- Beau Travail
...plus 26 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.
]]>- Alcarràs
- The Beasts
- Suro
- Costa Brava, Lebanon
- The Water
- Summer 1993
- Aquarius
- Nothing in Return
- Ixcanul
- Casa Grande
...plus 10 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.
]]>- White Material
- Beau Travail
- 35 Shots of Rum
- Both Sides of the Blade
- Friday Night
- High Life
- Nenette and Boni
- Stars at Noon
- Trouble Every Day
- No Fear, No Die
...plus 1 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.
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