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Articles by Fedor Tot
Promised Spaces | easternkicks.com
A languid, documentary-inflected look at a construction site in Cambodia, and the errant dreams that run amok there… Serbian cinematographer Ivan Marković has spent much of the last decade-plus lensing a specific type of arthouse-y slow cinema, often acclaimed at festivals and amongst cinephiles but unsurprisingly underseen outside of that.
The radical DIY miracle of Marble Ass
About Little White Lies Little White Lies was established in 2005 as a bi-monthly print magazine committed to championing great movies and the talented people who make them. Combining cutting-edge design, illustration and journalism, we’ve been described as being “at the vanguard of the independent publishing movement.” Our reviews feature a unique tripartite ranking system that captures the different aspects of the movie-going experience. We believe in Truth & Movies. Editorial Design
New Italy, Old Attitudes: Michelangelo Antonioni's 'Il Grido'
1950s Vague Visages’ Il Grido essay contains spoilers. Michelangelo Antonion’s 1957 film features Steve Cochran, Alida Valli and Dorian Gray. Check out VV movie essays at the home page. * Michelangelo Antonioni’s run of 1960s classics have earned him his place in the canon of Big Auteurs. From L’Avventura (1960) onwards, the Italian filmmaker’s style crystalized into rich and absurdly beautiful people wandering around modern urban landscapes, reckoning with the existential emptiness of their lives.
Review: Clint Eastwood's 'Juror #2'
2020s Vague Visages’ Juror #2review contains minor spoilers. Clint Eastwood’s 2024 movie features Nicholas Hoult, Toni Collette and J.K. Simmons. Check out the VV home page for more film reviews. * Juror #2 predicates itself on a number of simple dichotomies, each of which provides another layer to the film’s dissection of the ideals and values at the heart of the American legal system.
Crime Scene #20: 'Tiger Bay' and the Adolescent Capital
1950s Crime Scene is a monthly Vague Visages column about the relationship between crime cinema and movie locations. VV’s Tiger Bay essay contains spoilers. J. Lee Thompson’s 1959 film on The Criterion Channel features John Mills, Horst Buchholz and Hayley Mills. Check out more movie coverage in the film essays section. * Tiger Bay in Cardiff doesn’t exist anymore. As a place, a community, as a state of mind, it has long since disappeared.
Crime Scene #19: 'Only the River Flows' - A Detective Goes Around the Bend
2020s Crime Scene is a monthly Vague Visages column about the relationship between crime cinema and movie locations. VV’s Only the River Flows essay contains spoilers. Wei Shujun’s 2023 film features Yilong Zhu, Chloe Maayan and Tianlai Hou. Check out film essays, along with cast/character summaries, streaming guides and complete soundtrack song listings, at the home page. * In the first scene of Only the River Flows, a group of kids in cop uniforms play in an abandoned government building.
Crime Scene #18: 'Victims of Sin' - Nightclubbing with Ninón Sevilla
1950s Crime Scene is a monthly Vague Visages column about the relationship between crime cinema and movie locations. VV’s Victims of Sin essay contains spoilers. Emilio Fernández’s 1951 film on The Critierion Channel features Ninón Sevilla, Tito Junco and Rodolfo Acosta. Check out film essays, along with cast/character summaries, streaming guides and complete soundtrack song listings, at the home page.
Crime Scene #17: 'Lone Star' - Porous Borders at the Edge of America
1990s Crime Scene is a monthly Vague Visages column about the relationship between crime cinema and movie locations. VV’s Lone Star essay contains spoilers. John Sayles’ 1996 film features Chris Cooper, Elizabeth Peña and Kris Kristofferson. Check out film essays, along with cast/character summaries, streaming guides and complete soundtrack song listings, at the home page. * John Sayles’ Lone Star (1996) is set in the town of Frontera, Rio County, Texas.
Crime Scene #16: 'Salvatore Giuliano' - Sicily, Power and Geography
1960s Crime Scene is a monthly Vague Visages column about the relationship between crime cinema and movie locations. VV’s Salvatore Giuliano essay contains spoilers. Francesco Rosi’s 1962 film on The Criterion Channel features Salvo Randone, Frank Wolff and Pietro Cammarata. Check out film essays, along with cast/character summaries, streaming guides and complete soundtrack song listings, at the home page.
Crime Scene #15: 'Strangler vs. Strangler' - Belgrade Is Not a Serious City
1980s Crime Scene is a monthly Vague Visages column about the relationship between crime cinema and movie locations. VV’s Strangler vs. Strangler essay contains spoilers. Slobodan Šijan’s 1984 film features Taško Načić, Nikola Simić and Srđan Šaper. Check out film essays, along with cast/character summaries, streaming guides and complete soundtrack song listings, at the home page.
Crime Scene #14: 'Five Deadly Venoms' and Kung Fu Criminality
1970s Crime Scene is a monthly Vague Visages column about the relationship between crime cinema and movie locations. VV’s Five Deadly Venoms essay contains spoilers. Cheh Chang’s 1978 film features Sheng Chiang, Chien Sun and Phillip Chung-Fung Kwok. Check out film essays, along with cast/character summaries, streaming guides and complete soundtrack song listings, at the home page. * Most of the featured movies in this column are unequivocally “crime” films.
Crime Scene #13: 'Memories of Murder' and Rainy Rembembrances
2000s Crime Scene is a monthly Vague Visages column about the relationship between crime cinema and movie locations. VV’s Memories of Murder essay contains spoilers. Bong Joon Ho’s 2003 film features Song Kang-ho, Kim Sang-kyung and Kim Roe-ha. Check out film essays, along with cast/character summaries, streaming guides and complete soundtrack song listings, at the home page. * Bong Joon-ho’s second feature premiered in 2003, a time when Korean cinema was emerging as a major force.
Berlin International Film Festival Review: Meryam Joobeur's 'Who Do I Belong To'
2020s Vague Visages’ Who Do I Belong Toreview contain minor spoilers. Meryam Joobeur’s 2024 movie features Salha Nasraoui, Mohamed Grayaâ and Malek Mechergui. Check out the VV home page for more film reviews, along with cast/character summaries, streaming guides and complete soundtrack song listings.
Berlin International Film Festival Reviews: 'Betânia' and 'Dormir De Olhos Abertos'
2020s Vague Visages’ Betâniareview and Dormir De Olhos Abertos review contain minor spoilers. Marcelo Botta’s 2024 movie features Diana Mattos, Ulysses Azevedo and Nádia de Cássia, while Nele Wohlatz’s 2024 drama spotlights Nahuel Pérez Biscayart, Liao Kai Ro and Shin-Hong Wang. Check out the VV home page for more film reviews, along with cast/character summaries, streaming guides and complete soundtrack song listings.
Berlin International Film Festival Review: Roman Bondarchuk's 'The Editorial Office'
2020s Vague Visages’ The Editorial Officereview contains minor spoilers. Roman Bondarchuk’s 2024 movie features Dmytro Bahnenko, Zhanna Ozirna and Rimma Zyubina. Check out the VV home page for more film reviews, along with cast/character summaries, streaming guides and complete soundtrack song listings. * What is the shape of independent Ukrainian cinema going to look like when the country emerges from war?
Crime Scene #12: 'Amores Perros' and Gringo Cinema
2000s Crime Scene is a monthly Vague Visages column about the relationship between crime cinema and movie locations. VV’s Amores Perros essay contains spoilers. Alejandro G. Iñárritu’s 2000 film features Emilio Echevarría, Gael García Bernal and Goya Toledo. Check out movie reviews, along with cast/character articles, streaming guides and complete soundtrack song listings, at the home page. * This column has thus far focused largely on films that, to put it simply, I enjoy.
Crime Scene #11: 'Case of the Naves Brothers' and a Sertão Mentality
Crime Scene is a monthly Vague Visages column about the relationship between crime cinema and movie locations. VV’s Case of the Naves Brothers essay contains spoilers. Luiz Sérgio Person’s 1967 film features Anselmo Duarte, Raul Cortez and Juca de Oliveira. Check out movie reviews, along with cast/character articles, streaming guides and complete soundtrack song listings, at the home page. * There are multiple Brazils in the cinematic imagination.
Crime Scene #10: 'Key Largo' and a Hurricane of Justice
Crime Scene is a monthly Vague Visages column about the relationship between crime cinema and movie locations. This Key Largo essay contains spoilers. John Huston’s 1948 film features Humphrey Bogart, Edward G. Robinson and Lauren Bacall. Check out VV movie reviews, along with cast/character articles, streaming guides and complete soundtrack song listings, at the home page. * For this column, in terms of studio productions vs.
Review: William Oldroyd's 'Eileen'
2020s Vague Visages’ Eileen review contains minor spoilers. William Oldroyd’s 2023 movie features Thomasin McKenzie, Anne Hathaway and Shea Whigham. Check out the VV home page for more film reviews, along with cast/character summaries, streaming guides and complete soundtrack song listings. * A film drastically less than the sum of its parts, Eileen commits the unfortunate blunder of continually reminding one of similar, better movies.
Review: Ridley Scott's 'Napoleon'
Vague Visages’ Napoleon review contains minor spoilers. Ridley Scott’s 2023 Apple TV+ movie features Joaquin Phoenix, Vanessa Kirby and Tahar Rahim. Check out the VV home page for more film reviews, along with cast/character summaries, streaming guides and complete soundtrack song listings.
Crime Scene #9: 'Red Rooms' and the Iciness of Social Isolation
Crime Scene is a monthly Vague Visages column about the relationship between crime cinema and movie locations. This Red Rooms essay contains spoilers. Pascal Plante’s 2023 film features Juliette Gariépy, Laurie Babin and Elisabeth Locas. Check out VV movie reviews, along with cast/character articles, streaming guides and complete soundtrack song listings, at the home page. * The weather and general climate of a place makes a vast difference to how people behave.
London Film Festival Review: Angela Schanelec's 'Music'
Vague Visages’ Music review contains minor spoilers. Angela Schanelec’s 2023 movie features Aliocha Schneider, Agathe Bonitzer and Marisha Triantafyllidou. Check out the VV home page for more film reviews, along with cast/character summaries, streaming guides and complete soundtrack song listings.
London Film Festival Review: Goran Stolevski's 'Housekeeping for Beginners'
Vague Visages’ Housekeeping for Beginners review contains minor spoilers. Goran Stolevski’s 2023 movie features Anamaria Marinca, Aswan Reid and Deborah Mailman. Check out the VV home page for more film reviews, along with cast/character summaries, streaming guides and complete soundtrack song listings. * Goran Stolevski has now released three features in less than two years, showing himself as a finely talented director, adept at a range of styles.
Crime Scene #8: 'Detour' - Nowheresville, USA
Crime Scene is a monthly Vague Visages column about the relationship between crime cinema and movie locations. This Detour essay contains spoilers. Edgar G. Ulmer’s 1945 film features Tom Neal, Ann Savage and Claudia Drake. Check out VV movie reviews, along with cast/character articles, streaming guides and complete soundtrack song listings, at the home page.
Crime Scene #7: 'Twilight' and the Hungarian Hills
Crime Scene is a monthly Vague Visages column about the relationship between crime cinema and movie locations. This Twilight essay contains spoilers. György Fehér’s 1990 film features Péter Haumann, János Derzsiand and Judit Pogány. Check out VV movie reviews, along with cast/character articles, streaming guides and complete soundtrack song listings, at the home page.
Crime Scene #6: 'Time and Tide' - A Hong Kong Elegy
Crime Scene is a monthly Vague Visages column about the relationship between crime cinema and movie locations. This Time and Tide essay contains spoilers. Hark Tsui’s 2000 film features Nicholas Tse, Wu Bai and Candy Lo. Check out VV movie reviews, along with cast/character articles, streaming guides and complete soundtrack song listings, at the home page. * The city is always dying: it’s such a consistent theme in this column that it may as well be the alternative title.
Direct Cinephilia: Play-Doc 2023
A wise man – and a festival director to boot – once said to me, “Film festivals are not about the films. Neither are they about the Q&As with the filmmakers, the industry panels, the workshops or any of that.
Talk to Me review - zeitgeisty horror is slightly derivative but gratuitously fun
Slick, entertaining and gnarly, Talk to Me certainly makes for a potent feature film debut, even as it creaks under the weight of its cribbing and nipping from other films. This is very firmly in the vein of the last ten years of so-called “elevated” horror: a hint of the identity-searching racial politics of Get Out, the fraught parental relationships of Hereditary, the stylistic whiz kid tricks of It Follows, albeit with a distinctly zoomer edge here.
While We Watched review - electric account of what it means to be in the eye of a raging storm
The struggle with any documentary dealing with the issues of the day is how to split the difference between pressing home the urgency of the cause and putting together the facts in a nuanced, eloquent way. While We Watched certainly makes for thrilling, angry viewing, an electric account of what it means to be in the eye of a raging storm as an independent voice.
Shabu review - effortlessly breezy neighbourhood portrait is full of flair
“I’m Shabu and I’m gonna be famous!” proclaims our hero – and he probably will be. The 14-year-old star at the heart of this exuberant documentary is a natural showman, with aspiring dreams of being a rapper. Unfortunately, when we meet him, Shabu's just taken his grandmother’s car out for a joyride and crashed it: he now owes her 1200 euros, which he has to pay back over the summer working odd jobs whilst she’s on holiday in Suriname.
Smoking Causes Coughing review - Quentin Dupieux pulls off another smart-stupid satire
French filmmaker Quentin Dupieux has cobbled together a cult fanbase courtesy of his prodigious work-rate (five feature films since 2018 alone, alongside a whole other career as a musician via Mr Oizo); his films all have a high-concept genre-inflected idea at their source and brief runtimes – most run at less than 80 minutes. Smoking Causes Coughing is as surreal and amusing as any of his other works.
Crime Scene #5: 'Branded to Kill' and Tokyo Teardowns
Crime Scene is a monthly Vague Visages column about the relationship between crime cinema and movie locations. This Branded to Kill essay contains spoilers. Seijun Suzuki’s 1967 film features Jô Shishido, Mariko Ogawa and Annu Mari. Check out VV movie reviews, along with cast/character articles, streaming guides and complete soundtrack song listings, at the home page.
Small, Slow But Steady review - boxing biopic is an uppercut above the rest
The title might as well describe the experience of watching this meditative, rhythmic film. Small, Slow But Steady is an exploration of what it means to be Deaf, from the margins, and a professional sportsperson: this is a biopic of Keiko Ogasawara (played here by Yukino Kishii), who in 2019 became the first ever hearing-impaired professional woman boxer. But don’t expect any standard biopic beats here.
The Super 8 Years review - astonishing diary film knits together the personal and political
Annie Ernaux has earned worldwide acclaim and a Nobel Prize as an author excavating the inner recesses of her life via autofiction. With her books increasingly being adapted for the screen – such as the excellent Happening, directed by Audrey Diwan, released in the UK in 2022 – she now turns her razor-sharp self-reflection to celluloid, in collaboration with her son David Ernaux-Briot.
Inland review - rickety Lynch riff only shows splashes of imagination
Inland is uneven and shaky, though there are splashes of imagination littered throughout. The headline star is Mark Rylance, seen here slumming it as a mechanic out in rural Gloucestershire. He's a father figure to (Rory Alexander), who arrives after spending some time in a mental institute; a violent breakdown following the mysterious disappearance of his mother. He returns, at odds with himself and the world, drifting between nights out with sketchy blokes and revisiting old haunts.
Pretty Red Dress review - Alexandra Burke shines in an all-too-neat look at Black identity
The centrepiece of Dionne Edwards’ debut feature film, Pretty Red Dress, is a spangly, glittery number, sensual and attention-grabbing. As we find out through the film, the dress holds a particular significance to each of our three protagonists, all housed under one roof. There’s mum Candice (Alexandra Burke), a supermarket manager by day and singer by night. Up for a role as Tina Turner in a West End jukebox musical, the dress represents a bit of star power that helps power her through auditions.
Forbidden Worlds Film Festival: 'Cliffhanger,' Sylvester Stallone and Realism
This Cliffhanger essay contains spoilers. Renny Harlin’s 1993 film features Sylvester Stallone, John Lithgow and Michael Rooker. Check out VV movie reviews, along with cast/character articles, streaming guides and complete soundtrack song listings, at the home page. * At the center of Forbidden Worlds Film Festival 2023 lies a simple observation about the cinematic experience: aren’t things much better when we film and record real things that exist in three-dimensional spaces?
Hairspray review - John Waters’ musical finds just the right balance of kitsch and sincerity
Consensus largely has it that John Waters’ “commercial” period, which hit full bloom with Hairspray, followed by Cry Baby in 1990 and Serial Mom in 1994, is not a patch on his grungy, radical early works.
My Imaginary Country review - invigorating insights into a nation at a crossroads
There is a fatal flaw at the centre of My Imaginary Country, the latest film by veteran Chilean documentarian Patricio Guzmán, and yet it’s the kind of flaw that deepens and complicates the film. It’s a flaw that brings in questions of how far documentary can go, particularly when capturing the present, contemporaneous moment.
Crime Scene #4: 'Amsterdamned' - The City Is Always Sinking
1980s Crime Scene is a monthly Vague Visages column about the relationship between crime cinema and movie locations. This Amsterdamned essay contains spoilers. Dick Maas’ 1988 film features Huub Stapel, Monique van de Ven and Serge-Henri Valcke. Check out VV movie reviews, along with cast/character articles, streaming guides and complete soundtrack song listings, at the home page.
The Old Man Movie: Lactopalypse! review - berserk stop-motion comedy is a laugh riot
This Estonian stop-motion animation, based on a popular web series, opens with a ‘50s style PSA, in which we’re told of what disasters occur when a cow escapes the farm and goes unmilked for 24 hours (hint: it is positively nuclear).
Unclenching the Fists review - sensitive and thoughtful coming-of-age story
When we’re introduced to Ada (Milana Aguzarova) in the opening of Unclenching the Fists, she’s digging her face into the collar of her jacket up to her nose, covering herself as with a mask. Ada will repeat this action throughout the film, befitting of a character who, up until now, has largely been uncertain about stepping foot into the world.
Inland Empire review - David Lynch’s nightmare fuel masterpiece returns to stalk cinemas
“Look at me and tell me if you’ve known me before,” asks Laura Dern at one point to two strangers, in perhaps the single line that most sums up the nightmarish uncanny valley effect of watching Inland Empire. Some decade-and-a-bit since release it remains perhaps Lynch’s single greatest piece of media.
Under the Fig Trees review - sensitive and eloquent filmmaking from Tunisia
There’s a gentleness and sweetness at the centre of Under the Fig Trees, the first fictional feature by documentarian Erige Sehiri, befitting of its loose and semi-improvised style. It has its rougher edges for sure, but ultimately this sweetness is precisely what gives it an impact, much like the titular fruit that our characters are picking. The film takes place across a working day at a fig orchard, somewhere in the countryside in Tunisia.
Review: Srđan Keča's 'Museum of the Revolution'
Vague Visages’ Museum of the Revolution review contains minor spoilers. Srđan Keča’s 2021 documentary features Marija Savic, Milica Novakov and Vera Novakov. Check out the VV home page for more film reviews, along with cast/character summaries, streaming guides and complete soundtrack song listings. * Museum of the Revolution is emblematic of a certain trend that seems to have taken over ex-Yugoslav documentary filmmaking. Let’s call it Slow Docufiction.
Use-it-or-lose-it: A Proposal
Restrictive legislation around film copyrights is stopping a countless amount of titles from doing what they are meant to do: being watched ‘A film that isn’t screened is dead’ — thus spoke Henri Langlois, the famed programmer of the Cinémathèque Française where Jean-Luc Godard, François Truffaut and their contemporaries found their film education.
The Dam review - Sundan-set drama is evocative but unspecific
The timing of The Dam’s release feels very conspicuous against current events in Sudan, where the film is set. Civil war has broken out in the country in the past month; the war may be a fresh round of pain but it has its origins in long-standing political turmoils that have buffeted the country, something which Ali Cherri’s debut fiction film touches on.
Pamfir review - technically superb and powerful filmmaking from Ukraine
The first thing you’ll notice about Pamfir is its stylistic bravado. This is a colourfully rich, technically superb film. The Ukrainian borderlands in which it is set (near Romania) are shot as muddy, earthy browns, and when the snow comes in the twilight, it lingers with that strange blue-white hue of low-light iciness. Village festivals – and a fiery accident – spark flashes of reds and yellows, accentuating what might be an oppressive sea of browns.
Crime Scene #3: 'Bob le Flambeur' and the Death of Paris
Crime Scene is a monthly Vague Visages column about the relationship between crime cinema and movie locations. This Bob le Flambeur essay contains spoilers. Jean-Pierre Melville’s 1956 film features Isabelle Corey, Daniel Cauchy and Roger Duchesne. Check out VV movie reviews, along with cast/character articles, streaming guides and complete soundtrack song listings, at the home page.
Love According to Dalva review - deafeningly empty exploration of child abuse
The explosion of true crime documentaries we’ve seen over the past few years, particularly since the success of Netflix’s Making a Murderer, is partly down to the salacious nature of these stories.
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