Category: Quick Daily Reviews

12/03/2025 – Irma Vep (1996)

On By LaurenDolceVitaIn Movie Reviews, Quick Daily ReviewsLeave a comment

I am still an Assayas neophyte having seen his two Kristen Stewart pictures and nothing else, but during last month’s Criterion Collection sale, I blind purchased Irma Vep on his name alone. This film deals with a lot of French cinematic history that despite my love for their films, I am still not the best suited to do, but I will give it my best chance.

Starring Maggie Cheung as a fictionalized version of herself, Irma Vep is loosely the story of a French director René (Jean-Pierre Léaud) choosing to remake the 1915 ten-episode serial Les Vampires with Cheung playing the lead Irma Vep, an anagram for vampire. The film follows Cheung a non-French speaking actress from Hong Kong, on set for a few days of shooting where nothing goes as one would expect. Supported by costume designer Zoé (Nathalie Richard) who develops an instant crush on Cheung, she is thrown from moment to moment with little control over the circumstances.

The original Irma Vep (Musidora) from 1915’s Les Vampires

The plot synopsis is rather brief for this film, because there is A. very little of it, and B. what plot there is has next to no importance to the themes with which Assayas is wrestling. Irma Vep is an exploration of the history of French cinema, as well as its place in the wider film world in the mid-90s. As I warned up front, I am not a scholar in this department, so while some of my assumptions may be off base from what Assayas was attempting to get at, I am going to share my reading of the film.

Simply by being about remaking one of the cornerstones of French film history, especially a few decades before all movies became nostalgic look backs, Irma Vep declares that it wants to have a conversation with the countries past with the medium. Of specific note, after her first day on set, Cheung goes home with Zoé for an after-work party that she is hosting and runs across a pair of filmmakers discussing a film of theirs that Zoé calls “new” when they insist that the film is 20 to 25 years old. This is a clear allusion to the French New Wave and that what was revolutionary at the time no longer feels like where the country was cinematically. There is mention that the two directors do not make political films anymore which further emphasizes this move away from the New Wave and its aggressively progressive politics. While personally I don’t know that I buy this argument as films like La Haine had come out just a year prior, it is undeniably true that the New Wave had ended.

Maggie Cheung as a fictional Maggie Cheung as Irma Vep

Cheung represents France importing other cultures filmmaking into theirs. I think when also considering that in the miniseries remake Cheung’s character is instead American both represent a piece of the culture that France was being influenced by. From America, the hyperviolent indie boom (think Quentin Tarantino), and from Asia, Cheung herself was famous at the time from the Police Story and The Heroic Trio films (the latter of which is even played by René implying that is why he sought her out) represent France’s movement from Auteurism to more Vulgar Auteurism. Assayas also seems to worry that France’s film industry may be left behind as once a new director takes René’s place and does not believe a Hong Kong actress should play one of Frances most classic roles, Cheung flies not home, but to New York and Los Angeles to meet with Ridley Scott (who the real Cheung never worked for) and then her agent. This seems to be Assayas believing that America is the new home for the transgressive cinema that France had a near monopoly on for decades.

Filled with likely hundreds of references that I did not pick up, Irma Vep is an extremely deep text for being less than 100 minutes. While I would never recommend the film for someone looking to turn their brain off for a movie, if you are interested in engaging with the history that Assayas is grappling with, then Irma Vep is a French cinema 101, 201, and 301 rolled up into one unique package.

12/02/2025 – Bone Lake

On By LaurenDolceVitaIn Movie Reviews, Quick Daily ReviewsLeave a comment

The last few days have involved some rather high brow cinema, so today seemed like a good chance to prove that I don’t only watch 5 ½ hour Russian documentaries and heart throbbing dramas from auteurs. Today I reached into my 2025 back log and pulled out an aggressively sexual, sleezy horror film Bone Lake.

Starring Maddie Hasson (who despite what I originally thought is not Florence Pugh’s alias) and Marco Pigossi as Sage and Diego a couple whose relationship is on the precipice of change as Diego leaves his job teaching to work on a novel full time. They escape to a remote mansion on the titular Bone Lake only to have their weekend interrupted when it Will (Alex Roe) and Cin (Andra Nechita) show up as well having apparently rented the same place.

Marco Pigossi and Maddie Hasson as Diego and Sage

Mercedes Bryce Morgan directs the film by bringing a decent amount of style from the directorial chair for the journeywoman director. Her experience with directing music videos shows as much of the style is reminiscent of that medium. Perhaps the greatest accomplishment of her direction, however, is that she kept her vision untouched resulting in a film that is slightly gorier and substantially sexier than most films in this genre made today.

A significant amount of digital ink has been spilled in the last handful of years on gen Z’s disinterest in sex in movies. While I understand and respect the desire for more platonic stories in film, there is something to be said about enjoying some gratuitously horny cinema. Sex is a part of humanity worth capturing, and a titillating one at that. Bryce Morgan does not shy away from this piece of humanity and understands its inherent entertainment value.

Sage reaching for the showerhead in the bathtub

While Bone Lake won’t be brought up in the coming months as the awards conversation takes over Hollywood, it still fills a niche that has been increasingly shrinking in the current cinematic landscape. Bryce Morgan created a film that was first and foremost fun entertainment without resorting to endless flatly lit wide shots on a green screen. When so much of what makes it to theaters is $300 million blockbusters shot so safely that they risk nothing and $5 million arthouse gems (which don’t get me wrong I love), Bone Lake proves that pure entertainment does not have to be so safe it might as well be hermetically sealed.

12/01/2025 – My Undesirable Friends: Part I – Last Air in Moscow

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When films cross the two-and-a-half-hour mark, that tends to be the point at which terms like bloat and poorly edited come into play. However, there exists a second line somewhere around the four-hour mark where the running time becomes a feature of the film rather than a bug. When one is locked in a room with the same few people for such an extended period (and it is essential that films this long be watched in one day with no more than a few intermissions), they become less characters on the screen and more personal acquaintances or even friends.

Julia Loktev’s five-and-a-half-hour epic of a documentary My Undesireable Friends: Part 1 – Last Air in Moscow is one such example of a film using its marathon length as an important part of the filmmaking. Through five chapters, the film makes a record of the last five months of TV Rain, the last independent, oppositional news organization in Russia, before they were forcefully closed after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. While a 90-minute documentary on this subject would be informative and if done well impactful, Loktev’s decision to be as expansive as she was brought a power with it by getting to know a wide array of characters intimately.

TV Rain employee “foreign agent” Anna Nemzer

Loktev is a Soviet-born American filmmaker who in October 2021 traveled to Moscow to create a documentary about Russia’s recent branding of oppositional journalists as “foreign agents” including her friend Anna Nemzer. Anna introduces Loktev to the contributors to TV Rain for which she has a show. The handful of journalists who originally were branded with the foreign agent label wear it with a combination of pride and fear and many use the required language they are required to include on every post for ironic purposes.

One of the genius decisions of the film is the chapter flow. Each individual chapter is presented in a cinéma vérité or slice of life manner. Most of the filming takes place in cars, the TV Rain studio, or people’s apartments, and each hour-long section seems most interested in giving the viewer a peek into the life of an oppositional journalist at that exact moment in time. When zooming out, however, the film takes a concrete shape. The initial two chapters provide a background for the people and the circumstances which they inhabit. The third chapter is a bit of a break from the intensity. Things are obviously still tenuous in each journalist’s life, however even as the walls close in they are able to enjoy the New Years holiday together. That moment is a welcome reprieve before the final two chapters leading until the very moment that the TV Rain employees are forced to vacate the soon to be under siege studio and exile themselves from the country.

Ksenia Mironova

My Undesirable Friends is an engrossing cinematic experience starring journalists whom having spent so much time with I feel intimately connected to. The film teaches about the horrible human rights violations Putin is behind while keeping things personal. I cannot wait to dedicate another five plus hours to the topic when part II is released.

11/30/2025 – The Fall

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While technically a re-watch for me, it has been 15 years since I last saw Tarsem’s The Fall, and this was my first chance to see the eye blindingly gorgeous film in 4K. Shot on location in 28 countries over the course of 4 years with next to no computer effects, The Fall is the quintessential cinematic passion project where quality trumps everything else.

Staring the young Romanian 6-year-old actress Catinca Untaru in her only feature role as Alexandria a patient in a hospital with a broken arm, and Lee Pace as Roy, a bedridden stuntman who she befriends, The Fall is a touching story of collaborative storytelling and the power that it holds over those who tell and listen to it. When Roy inadvertently receives a message that Alexandria threw out a window to Nurse Evelyn (Justine Waddell) she becomes quickly enamored with him and he feels as though through telling her a story, he might be able to use Alexandria to steal morphine for him. Through this initially transactional relationship, Alexandria eventually penetrates Roy’s depressive, nihilist mood as together they shape his fantastical story.

Tarsem employs a filming technique with Untaru that can easily backfire but works excellently in the film. Most of Untaru’s lines were unscripted, instead she was put in the scene with Pace and her natural reactions were what was used. Pace was even kept in the faux hospital bed for entire shooting days so that Untaru would believe that he was actually unable to walk. This leads to an unprecedented naturality in the young girl’s performance, and the occasional trailing off and losing of the thread is an acceptable tradeoff for the genuineness of the performance.

While the story and acting in The Fall are both very good, it would be disingenuous to call either the highlight of the film. Colin Watkinson’s photography, Robert Duffy’s editing, and Eddy Pearce’s location scouting are unmatched and should be studied for the rest of cinematic history. Tarsem used no sets or stages in the creation of the film, every single shot needed to be shot on location, including a South African mental hospital as the early 20th century Los Angeles hospital that most directors would be fine staging. Rather than resulting to any trickery, Tarsem would go to lengths of providing locals of the blue city Jodhpur with fresh paint so that the shots would pop rather than perform post shoot color collection. In reference to the editing, The Fall has the single most impressive fade that ever captured on film as seen below.

In the nearly 20 years since The Fall was released Tarsem’s nightmare for the state of movies has largely come true. Most movies these days tend to be shot entirely on green screens with each frame being shot wide and lit flatly so that computers can easily fill in all the empty space. Because of this, Tarsem’s visual masterpiece has grown in importance throughout the years, and the film which had notoriously been impossible to see previously now has an immaculate release as home viewing technology has evolved enough to truly appreciate The Fall’s beauty.

11/29/2025 – Hamnet

On By LaurenDolceVitaIn Movie Reviews, New Release Reviews, New Releases, New Releases, Quick Daily ReviewsLeave a comment

Holy Shit Jessie Buckley!

I honestly thought about making that my entire review for Chloé Zhao’s return from the Marvel verse with Hamnet; her performance was just that good. Stoping after that would both somehow undersell Buckley’s acting masterclass and be disrespectful to the rest of the cast and crew that makes Hamnet a uniquely special film so I shall continue.

Hamnet is a fictionalized telling of the love and grief of William Shakespeare (Paul Mescal) and his wife Agnes (Buckley) who is often known as Anne in history but in some records and this film as Agnes. Maggie O’Farrell adopted her novel of the same name with Zhao which tells the story of Agnes and William’s three children and creates a story for the circumstances that preceded the creation of Hamlet, filling in the gaps in history. While William is obviously the most famous character in the story, the film is primarily Agnes and her children’s story as long sections of the film take place while Shakespeare is in London leaving Agnes to take care of their first child Susanna (Bodhi Rae Breathnach) and later their twins Judith (Olivia Lynes) and Hamnet (Jacobi Jupe).

Zhao’s unique directorial vision is used to create a poetic feeling to the film. She makes liberal use of unannounced time jumps, both large ones between scenes and short ones contained within a scene. While these jumps can be slightly disorienting to begin with, they are employed to bring the most important moments and shots to the screen. It is not necessary to see William walk to Agnes and lie down with her, cutting directly from a conversation to them lying together results in amplifying the direct cause and effect. She also uses repetitious shots of nature which call back to the rumors of Agnes being born of a forest witch and create a mesmerizing pace that keeps the audience entranced.

Jessie Buckley and Paul Mescal as Agnes and William

As not so subtly hinted at above, Jessie Buckley not only gives a career best performance, but the decade’s best performance as Agnes. She mixes bombastic yet true to life moments of pain and suffering, with subtle emotions captured in nothing more than a twitch from an otherwise still face in silence. Agnes is so much more than just the little known wife of the world’s greatest playwright. Under Zhao’s direction and Buckley’s embodying of the woman, William fades to the background (despite another excellent turnout from Mescal) and the story of this woman, her love, and her grief matter more in this moment than the dozens of eternal plays and sonnets.

Agnes (Jessie Buckley) at the Globe Theater

Behind an unmatched acting feat by Jessie Buckley, an engrossing story and adaptation by Maggie O’Farrell, and the directorial elegance of Chloé Zhao, Hamnet is an example of the power that cinema can impart. Equal parts engrossing and devastating the film is an emotional experience to behold that will leave an audience changed. My only advice, outside seeing the film as soon as physically possible, is to double, no triple the amount of tissues you think you need to bring along.

11/28/2025 – Bugonia

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The newest film by Greek auteur/ provocateur Yorgos Lanthimos with his muse Emma Stone. Bugnoia, is a remake of the film I reviewed yesterday, Save the Green Planet! the 2003 Korean science fiction film by Jang Joon-hwan. Along with Jesse Plemons, who joined the director’s stable of actors with last year’s Kinds of Kindness, Lanthimos takes the at times farcical Korean genre blur and engulfs it in his signature pitch black satire.

Bugonia follows its predecessor’s basic plotline closely with cousins Teddy (Plemons) and Don (Aidan Delbis) who are convinced of an alien conspiracy and that Michelle (Stone), a CEO of great import, is one of said aliens. One afternoon after chemically castrating themselves to avoid distraction, Teddy and Don camp out at Michelle’s home and kidnap her. While interrogating and torturing her, Teddy’s mixed motives come to the surface.

Emma Stone as Michelle after being kidnaped and having her hair shaved

12 years further into our world’s post-capitalism decline, the themes that Jang Joon-hwan brought to the science fiction story are much more apparent in day-to-day life, and Lanthimos brings them to the forefront. Whether she be an alien or just a corporate monster, Michelle and the corporation she runs are destroying the planet. Teddy, like many activists speaking against kleptocracy today, is demonized and ostracized by the ruling class who control public outlook.

All three of the lead actors gave excellent performances. Stone captures the controlled mannerisms of an executive who has undergone extensive training to come across as considered and polite. She uses phrase like “can we have a dialogue?”  in meticulously paced patterns that reflect corporate speak but come across as alien to the blue-collar cousins who have captured her. Plemons, as the lead conspiracy theorist, is initially convincing in his resolve, but as Michelle puts the pieces of his past together, he becomes violent and emotional.

The standout of the film, however, is Aidan Delbis in his first feature film. He begins the film by playing Don as a simple character who is easily manipulated by Teddy. Delbis shows that Don is unable to completely dehumanize Michelle like Teddy and struggles with the torturous conditions that Teddy is doing to Michelle. After a major turning point in the film, it becomes apparent that Don is not simple, rather he is stunted from emotional loss in his past. This revelation unlocks the layered nuance Delbis had been seeding in his performance from the start, and brings out the lone moment of true sympathy from the viewer.

Aidan Delbis as Don in his first film role

While Bugonia does not reach the highs of some of Lanithmos’ prior films, a middling picture from the auteur is still an excellent release worth viewing. And while most of the acting accolades will end up going to the two star actors, I hope that this film becomes a jumping off point for Delbis’ career.

11/27/2025 – Save the Green Planet!

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Between being in a sapphic cinema mood and then needing to catch up on 2025 films my watchings this week have followed an understandable progression, so watching a random 2003 Korean film must seem strange if you do not immediately know why this film makes sense for me to watch today, you will understand tomorrow.

This was an odd one. The film starts not exactly en medias res, but also devoid of any setup to inform the viewer of the world in which the film exists. Primarily following Byeong-gu (Shin Ha-kyun) who appears to not exist in the reality of the people around him. Convinced that aliens exist in the everyday world disguised as human, he along with his partner Su-ni (Hwang Jung-min) kidnap an important executive, Kang Man-shik (Baek Yoon-shik) whom the believe is an alien with a direct line of contact to the alien’s prince.

Byeong-gu (Sin Ha-kyun) with the captured Kan Man-shik (Baek Yoon-shik)

I will admit that as an American cinephile I have seen my fair share of Korean films, however, they are primarily the ones that get exported to the US which are skewed heavily to the arthouse variety. Save the Green Planet! is not a traditional high art film but is instead an example of the Korean cinema that is created for the Korean masses. Director Jang Joon-hwan plays with tones in a way that is unfamiliar to a US audience but blends soap, action, horror, martial arts, and science fiction in a way that is undeniably entertaining. Complete with dated, cheesy special effects and extreme overacting, the film would make for an excellent camp movie night.

Over the top entertainment aside, the film has an aspect that needs to be addressed. While Kang Man-shik’s fiancé is mentioned at times, Su-ni (and Byeong-gu’s comatose mother) is the only woman who appears in the film and her characterization is unfortunate. Su-ni acts extremely childlike. She plays with dolls and is obsessed with the song “Somewhere Over the Rainbow”. This combined with the childlike demeanor results in her coming across as someone developmentally disabled. Byeong-gu’s treatment of her, and the films eventual fridging of her feels rather problematic and does hamper the experience of watching the film.

Su-ni (Hwang Jung-min) with her doll

Wild and undefinable, Save the Green Planet! fits most of the criteria to exist among the great cult movies. Unfortunately, its treatment of women leaves a sour taste in one’s mouth and prevents it from getting a full-throated endorsement.

11/26/2025 – The Smashing Machine

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Even two years ago I would never have missed a big theatrical A24 release, but as Neon continues to rise, A24’s luster has started to dim. They have released more than their fair share of busts this year and as such when the new Dwayne Johnson headed Oscar hopeful biopic was released to a less than stellar reception, it dropped down my priority list, but with Benny Safdie at the helm I was going to make my way around to it eventually.

The Smashing Machine is a narrative remake of a 2002 documentary of the same name. Johnson takes over the role of Mark Kerr, an M.M.A. fighter from the earliest days of the UFC. Supported by his partner Dawn (Emily Blunt) and friend/ trainer Mark Coleman (Ryan Bader) Kerr fights not only the competition but also his demons as he strains to remain in control.

Johnson’s performance is the standout component of the film. He was looking for a way to prove that he was an actor and not just a movie star, and while the film’s poor performance will likely deny him the Oscar nomination that he was gunning for, he has provided a strong proof of concept that he is an actor worth respecting. From intense focus to exasperated boyfriend to giddy friend he hits unique notes throughout the film while still making Mark feel like a complete character.

Dwayne Johnson as Mark Kerr

While many biopics fall for the trap of trying to fit too much into a single film, The Smashing Machine marks the rare occasion in which a little more scope would have been appreciated. The film focuses on such a short time period, a single Japanese tournament, that it is difficult to grasp the level of fame Kerr possessed at the time. This may have been less on an issue in the documentary as the audience would likely be self-selected to be fans of the sport, but for a wide release awards hopeful more context on the state of the sport and Mark’s place in it would have gone a long way. Similarly, it was very hard to get a grasp on the relationship between Kerr and Dawn. They both came across as manipulative and toxic in the small amount of time they interacted on screen, yet the epilogue exclaimed that they were married and together for years, which implies they might have been right for each other.

Emily Blunt as Dawn with Dwayne Johnson

The Smashing machine is a frustrating film. Dwayne Johnson excels in his most serious role to date, yet the film does not feel like it is solid enough to support the performance. The film feels like the 4th episode of a six episode docuseries, and while I still land on the side of recommending it, it is hard not to be disappointed that the film did not meet Johnson’s performance.

11/25/2025 – Train Dreams

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After missing the one-night engagement Train Dreams had in theaters in Seattle as part of the Seattle Film Critics Society PNW Awards, my hopes were that the film would be good but not so good that I would regret missing my chance to see it on the big screen. At least one of my wishes was granted.

Based on a Denis Johnson novella, writer/ director Clint Bentley along with co-writer Greg Kwedar adapt Johnson’s work of the same name in a way that is both visually arresting while still capturing the prose that is often relegated exclusively to the written word. Some of these prose-like feelings come from implementing Will Patton as a voiceover narrator. While I generally feel like voiceover is a cheap distraction from a movie used to cover up holes in the screenplay, it works well for Train Dreams which is approximating a visual poem more than a traditional movie.

The ethereal setting of Train Dreams

Robert Grainier (Joel Edgerton) is a quiet man working as a laborer in the Pacific Northwest in the early 1900s. He takes seasonal work building infrastructures and logging where he meets other men who have a profound impact on his beliefs and outlook on life, though he remains largely solitary. During an off season, his isolation is broken when he meets and falls instantly in love with Gladys (Felicity Jones). Together they build a home outside of town and upon having a child, Kate, live a life full of meaning and love together. However, with minimal paid opportunities in town, Robert does have to leave Gladys and Kate for long periods of time during logging season to provide for them until they can save enough money to build a small business of their own on their acre. After one of his long absences working, he arrives to find his home burned to the ground and his family missing. Reverting to his isolationist tendencies, Robert struggles to find his meaning in life once again.

Felicity Jones and Joel Edgerton as Gladys and Robert Grainier

While the cinematography, direction, score, and editing all play a significant part in creating the ethereal state that Train Dreams exists in, the performance by Edgerton is what creates such an emotional experience. Edgerton taps into the meekness of Robert in his acting. He feels no need to speak to fill the empty spaces but instead takes time to listen and process what he has heard. Wordless looks and subtle facial movements just barely noticeable through the scraggly facial hair expose the soul of the character, showing his gentleness and astuteness.

Edgerton’s career best performance is still further enhanced by Bentley’s handling of tone and pacing to create a film that feels at place in the beautiful Washington woods where it was shot. Train Dreams deserves to be appreciated as one appreciates the nature in which it is set. By immersing oneself into it and absorbing it with no outside distractions, just accepting the peace that it brings.

11/24/2025 – Nouvelle Vague

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2025 has been the year for indie auteurs to be especially prolific. First Steven Soderbergh releases Presence and Black Bag in the first quarter of the year, and now Richard Linklater releases Nouvelle Vague less than a month after Blue Moon’s release. I was lucky enough to see Blue Moon in theaters a few weeks ago, and it is all but certain to make my best films of the year list come January, so I entered his second film of the year with high expectations.

Nouvelle Vague translates to New Wave which is an apt title for a film about the making of one of the defining French New Wave films: Jean-Luc Godard’s Breathless. Breathless came out in 1960, two years (or five if you count Agnès Varda’s La Pointe Courte) into the French New Wave movement. While Godard’s debut was not the beginning of the movement, it was a step to the more radical and revolutionary side of the movement, so it does make sense to signal the film out.

Guillaume Marbeck as Jean-Luc Godard

Unfortunately, while Breathless is a groundbreaking, convention shattering piece of cinema, Linklater did not have similarly lofty goals for his fictional behind-the-scenes telling of its creation. Linklater is a student of film and as such has a lot of reverence for the film, but other than paying his respects to the late Godard does not have much to say in Nouvelle Vague. He casts the Cahiers du Cinéma writers and future filmmakers as the cool outsiders who disrespect the current film industry because they know what art should be. History, and I, agree with that sentiment in hindsight, but it does not stop the characters of Godard (Guillaume Marbeck), Truffaut (Adrien Rouyard), Chabrol (Antoine Besson), and Schiffman (Jodie Ruth-Forest) from coming across as unbearably pompous.

Zoey Deutch as Jean Seberg

Marbeck’s depicts Godard as such an unlikable cad which does match my understanding of the director himself, but it also becomes grating as the film continues with him in every scene constantly talking. The only truly likable character in the film is Jean Seberg (Zoey Deutch), and while Deutch is excellent Linklater portrays her as naïve and unable to understand the genius that is Godard. Linklater wants the viewer to know that Godard was a genius who changed cinema for the better, and he is not wrong that Godard’s creations are that impressive and important. I am just done with aggrandizing arrogant men who think themselves a god. Instead, I choose to celebrate the work while acknowledging that creators can be flawed.