Will Bjarnar
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freelance writer/critic • member, @nyfco • co-host, @thelistwatchpod • emmy winner • recovering tv producer • goose’s dad • wbjarnar31@gmail.com
Articles by Will Bjarnar
Movie Review: ‘You Can See Everything’ Is An Astonishing Act Of Anthropological Filmmaking
Director: Nathan Fielder, Lance Oppenheim Stars: Elizabeth Holmes, Nathan Fielder, Billy Evans Synopsis: Thirty-four days before she’s sent to prison, notorious Silicon Valley founder Elizabeth Holmes invites a skeptical film crew to document her every move. What begins as an intimate portrait of an enigmatic felon becomes a mind-bending three-year journey into the abyss.
Movie Review (NYFF 2026): ‘Edward Said: Between Worlds’ Resurrects A Vital Voice
Directors: Maiken Baird Synopsis: Celebrated as a prophet and vilified as a terrorist, Palestinian-American scholar Edward Said was America’s most outspoken critic of the West and Palestine’s fiercest advocate. Twenty years after his death, Said guides viewers through the untold history of Palestine through a kinetic assemblage of footage, recordings, and newly digitized archives.
Movie Review (NYFF 2026): ‘Clarissa’ Is A Sharp, Elegant Reimagining Of ‘Mrs. Dalloway’
Directors: Chuko and Arie Esiri Writer: Chuko Esiri Stars: Sophie Okonedo, David Oyelowo, India Ria Amarteifio, Toheeb Jimoh, Ayo Edibiri Synopsis: A Lagos society wife prepares for a party while reflecting on her youth and the choices that led her to marry a respected man instead of her poet boyfriend.
Movie Review (NYFF 2026): ‘Artificial’ Generates A Middling Apocalyptic Satire From A Slippery Origin Story
Director: Luca Guadagnino Writer: Simon Rich Stars: Andrew Garfield, Yura Borisov, Monica Barbaro, Cooper Hoffman, Ike Barinholtz, Mark Rylance Synopsis: Follows the confusing firing and rehiring cycle of Sam Altman at OpenAI where the board gained control of the company and removed him, and Altman still returned.
Movie Review (NYFF 2026): ‘Minotaur’ is a Masterful Maze Of Domesticity, Deceit, And Darkness
Director: Andrey Zvyagintsev Writer: Andrey Zvyagintsev, Simon Liashenko Stars: Dmitriy Mazurov, Iris Lebedeva Synopsis: When Gleb, a successful company director, finds himself under siege from mounting corporate pressures, an increasingly unstable world, and the discovery of his wife’s affair, the collapse of his carefully ordered life accelerates toward violence.
Movie Review (NYFF 2026): ‘Behemoth!’ Turns A Complicated Life Into A Symphony
Director: Tony Gilroy Writer: Tony Gilroy Stars: Pedro Pascal, Olivia Wilde, Eva Victor, Will Arnett Synopsis: Gifted cellist Alex Serian returns home to Los Angeles after 20 years on the road. Music, which has been the constant, all-consuming river of his life, begins to carry Alex on an adventure that will change him forever. Alex Serian is a tough nut to crack. He’s a world class cellist, that we know.
Movie Review (NYFF 2026): ‘Bucking Fastard’ Blends Bliss With The Bizarre
Director: Werner Herzog Writer: Werner Herzog Stars: Kate Mara, Rooney Mara, Orlando Bloom, Domhnall Gleeson Synopsis: Twin sisters Jean and Joan Holbrooke, in search of an imaginary land where true love is possible, start digging a tunnel through a mountain range.
Movie Review (NYFF 2026): ‘Naza’ is the Most Essential Film You Will See This Year
Directors: Yuval Abraham, Rachel Szor Synopsis: In secret conversations on the rooftops of Tel Aviv at night, the systems behind Israel’s calculated mass killing of Palestinian civilians in Gaza are revealed by the people who designed and operated them. You may think that Naza, the title of Yuval Abraham and Rachel Szor’s documentary, is a rejiggering act, one that takes the Palestinian city of Gaza and swaps out its first letter for one that tends to begin words with sour connotations.
Interview: Director Paula González-Nasser and Lead Actress Mimi Davila On ‘The Scout’
Have you heard? It was a rather jam-packed weekend at the movies. Multiplexes are thriving again, or “we’re so back,” one might say. What a time to be alive? Too much, but we have to find joy somewhere; what better place than at your local cinema, where you can likely be treated to an offering to scratch any itch. Perhaps you’re in the mood for a gritty, based-on-truth thriller starring Robert Pattinson as To Catch A Predator host Chris Hansen, that being Lance Oppenheim’s narrative debut, Primetime.
‘Hope’ Review – Na Hong-jin’s Alien Epic Is More Exhilarating Than It Is Exhausting, But Just Barely
“Abandon all hope, ye who enter here.” So reads the translated inscription above the gates of Hell in Dante’s “Inferno,” just the first third of his epic “Divine Comedy.” The tagline doesn’t quite have the same ring to it when prescribed to the fictional South Korean town Hope Harbor, a quaint locale that seems particularly inclined to dissuade the fears of any visitors should they travel past the welcome sign.
Movie Review: ‘Finding Emily’ Isn’t Stale, But It’s Far Too Close
Director: Alicia MacDonald Writer: Rachel Hirons Stars: Angourie Rice, Spike Fearns Synopsis: When a lovesick musician is given the wrong number for his dream girl, he teams up with a driven psychology student to find her. Together, they spark a hilarious campus-wide frenzy that tests their own hearts and ambitions along the way. It all started on the one night a year when single people were legally allowed to have sex. Wait, no. That’s not it. My dates were mixed up.
Movie Review: ‘Rosebush Pruning’ Is Rank And Rudderless
Director: Karim Ainouz Writer: Efthimis Filippou Stars: Callum Turner, Riley Keough, Elle Fanning, Jamie Bell, Tracy Letts, Pamela Anderson Synopsis: In a Spanish villa, American siblings Jack, Ed, Anna and Robert wallow in isolation and their inherited fortune. When Jack wants to move in with his girlfriend and Ed uncovers the truth about their mother’s death, the fabric of the family begins to unravel. Have you ever had the pleasure of eating the rich?
Movie Review: ‘The Last Picture Shows’ is a Bittersweet Story Of Survival
Director: Rustin Thompson Synopsis: A journey into the American West on a search for traces of what was once a center of small-town life: the movie theater. The Sierra Theater in Susanville, California | Foghorn Features Five years ago, as the COVID-19 pandemic dawned, a documentary called Bloody Nose, Empty Pockets premiered in the Sundance Film Festival’s documentary competition.
Movie Review: ‘Her Private Hell’ Refuses To Meet Audiences On Their Terms
Director: Nicolas Winding Refn Writer: Nicolas Winding Refn Stars: Sophie Thatcher, Charles Melton, Havana Rose Liu Synopsis: When a mysterious mist engulfs a futuristic metropolis, unleashing a deadly and elusive entity, a troubled young woman searches for her father. Her quest collides with an American GI on a harrowing odyssey to rescue his daughter from Hell.
Following Direction: Christopher Nolan, Consequence, And The Journey Back To A Broken World
Welcome to Following Direction, a new recurring series at InSession Film that charts the careers of directors through the lens of the themes commonly explored in their work. To kick things off, I’m taking a look at the mighty Christopher Nolan and his newest epic, The Odyssey, and how his career hasn’t just been about examining our relationship with time, but to our loved ones, and the lengths his characters are willing to go to return to them.
Movie Review: ‘Jackass: Best and Last’ is Equal Parts Flashback and Farewell
Director: Jeff Tremaine Stars: Johnny Knoxville, Steve-O, Chris Pontius, and the whole rest of the gang Synopsis: The fifth and final installment in the Jackass franchise sees the crew go on one last insane crusade. If insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result, what’s the word for going back to the well and willingly falling down the bore in the name of cinema?
Movie Review: In ‘Leviticus,’ The Greatest Fear Is Desire Itself
Director: Adrian Chiarella Writer: Adrian Chiarella Stars: Joe Bird, Stacy Clausen, Mia Wasikowska Synopsis: Two teenage boys must escape a violent entity that takes the form of the person they desire most — each other. If The Holy Bible was a legislative doctrine – and, with apologies to our American cohabitants from a grave collection of jurisdictions, it is decidedly not – we’d already be residing in Hell. Maybe we already are.
Letterboxd — Your life in film
there are problems with this — 16 endings, its directors’ desire to emotionally manipulative their audience being a present character in every single scene, evidence that the andy weir-drew goddard adaptation pipeline has no regard for bloat — but ryan gosling is unsurprisingly not among them.
Movie Review (NYFF 2025): ‘Rose of Nevada’ Sees Mark Jenkin Leveling Up While Staying True To His Singular Form
Director: Mark Jenkin Writer: Mark Jenkin Stars: George MacKay, Callum Turner Synopsis: A mysterious boat returns to a village 30 years after vanishing. Two men join its crew hoping for better fortune. After one voyage, they find themselves transported back in time, mistaken for the original crew.
Movie Review: ‘The Fence’ Is An Adaptation That Is Too Faithful For Its Own Good
Director: Claire Denis Writers: Claire Denis, Suzanne Lindon, Andrew Litvack Stars: Matt Dillon, Isaach De Bankolé, Tom Blyth, Mia McKenna-Bruce Synopsis: A vast public works project in West Africa. Horn, the construction site manager, and Cal, a young engineer, share lodging behind the double gates of their compound. Leone, Horn’s recent bride, comes to join them the same night that a man appears at the fence. His name is Alboury.
Movie Review (NYFF 2025): ‘Below the Clouds’ is a Composed Portrait of a City On the Verge of Annihilation
Director: Gianfranco Rosi Writer: Gianfranco Rosi Synopsis: Naples faces dual volcanic threats from Vesuvius and Campi Flegrei. Amid increasing tremors, archaeologists work as residents live anxiously, haunted by Pompeii’s fate while emergency services strain. “You’ve never seen death?” the French multihyphenate Jean Cocteau once asked, rhetorically.
Movie Review (NYFF 2025): ‘The Love That Remains’ Is Hlynur Pálmason’s Most Grounded Work Yet, And Also His Best
Director: Hlynur Pálmason Writer: Hlynur Pálmason Stars: Saga Garðarsdóttir, Sverrir Guðnason, Ída Mekkín Hlynsdóttir, Grímur Hlynsson Synopsis: Captures a year in the life of a family as the parents navigate their separation. Through intimate vignettes and strange occurrences, the film explores the complexities of family, love, and the impact of shared memories.
Director: Ben Stiller Stars: Jerry Stiller, Anne Meara, Ben Stiller, Amy Stiller Synopsis: Ben Stiller tells the story of his parents—comedy icons Jerry Stiller and Anne Meara—exploring their impact on popular culture and at home, where the lines between creativity, family, life, and art often blurred.
Movie Review (NYFF 2025): ‘Mr. Scorsese’ Is An Epic, All-Encompassing Profile Of A Master
Director: Rebecca Miller Stars: Martin Scorsese, Jay Cocks, Robert De Niro, Leonardo DiCaprio,, Thelma Schoonmaker Synopsis: Explore the many lives of Martin Scorsese through intimate interviews with the man himself, access to his private archives, plus conversations with Robert De Niro, Leonardo DiCaprio, Margot Robbie, Daniel Day-Lewis, Steven Spielberg, and more.
Movie Review (NYFF 2025): ‘Father Mother Sister Brother’ Is Jim Jarmusch’s Charming, Minor Return To His Roots
Director: Jim Jarmusch Writer: Jim Jarmusch Stars: Tom Waits, Adam Driver, Mayim Bialik, Charlotte Rampling, Cate Blanchett Synopsis: Three stories concerning the relationships between adult children, their somewhat distant parent (or parents), and each other: a reclusive father visited by his grown children in the US, sisters visiting their novelist mother in Dublin, and adult twins called back to their Paris apartment to address a family tragedy.
Movie Review (NYFF 2025): ‘Is This Thing On?’ Is A Hilarious And Moving Testament To Stepping Outside Of Your Comfort Zone
Director: Bradley Cooper Writers: Bradley Cooper, Will Arnett, Mark Chappell Stars: Will Arnett, Laura Dern, Andra Day, Bradley Cooper Synopsis: As their marriage quietly unravels, Alex faces middle age and an impending divorce, seeking new purpose in the New York comedy scene while Tess confronts the sacrifices she made for their family—forcing them to navigate co-parenting, identity, and whether love can take a new form.
Movie Review (NYFF 2025): ‘Late Fame’ Argues That You’re Never Too Long In The Tooth For A Socialite
Director: Kent Jones Writer: Samy Burch Stars: Willem Dafoe, Greta Lee, Edmund Donovan Synopsis: A long time ago, Ed Saxberger wrote a book of poetry that no one ever cared about. When a group of young artists rediscover his work, he must reassess his genius. The wild card in the group is Gloria, a talented and mercurial theatre actress who toys with affections and who is all set to be admired by Saxberger.
Movie Review (NYFF 2025): ‘Springsteen: Deliver Me From Nowhere’ Is A Melodramatic Ode To A Depressed Rocker
Director: Scott Cooper Writer: Scott Cooper Stars: Jeremy Allen White, Jeremy Strong, Paul Walter Hauser, Stephen Graham, Odessa Young Synopsis: Bruce Springsteen, a young musician on the cusp of global superstardom, struggles to reconcile the pressures of success with the ghosts of his past.
Movie Review (NYFF 2025): ‘After the Hunt’ Aspires To Provoke But Only Manages To Poke
Director: Luca Guadagnino Writer: Nora Garrett Stars: Julia Roberts, Ayo Edibiri, Andrew Garfield, Michael Stuhlbarg, Chloë Sevigny Synopsis: A college professor finds herself at a personal and professional crossroad when a star student levels an accusation against one of her colleagues, threatening to expose a dark secret from her own past.
Movie Review: ‘One Battle After Another’ Meets Our Modern Moment Head-On In Massive, Exhilarating Fashion
Director: Paul Thomas Anderson Writer: Paul Thomas Anderson Stars: Leonardo DiCaprio, Sean Penn, Benicio del Toro, Regina Hall, Teyana Taylor, Chase Infiniti Synopsis: Bob is a washed-up revolutionary who lives in a state of stoned paranoia, surviving off-grid with his spirited and self-reliant daughter, Willa. When his evil nemesis resurfaces and Willa goes missing, the former radical scrambles to find her as both father and daughter battle the consequences of their pasts.
Movie Review: ‘Downton Abbey: The Grand Finale’ Is A Charm Machine’s Fitting Farewell
Director: Simon Curtis Writers: Julian Fellowes Stars: Michelle Dockery, Joanne Froggatt, Elizabeth McGovern Synopsis: In the summer of 1930, the Crawleys grapple with the threat of social disgrace when Mary finds herself at the centre of a public scandal and the family faces financial trouble as they embrace change.
Movie Review: ‘The History of Sound’ Should Have Trusted Its Own Tenderness
Director: Oliver Hermanus Writers: Ben Shattuck Stars: Paul Mescal, Josh O’Connor, Chris Cooper Synopsis: Two young men during World War I set out to record the lives, voices and music of their American countrymen. We are at the point in 2025’s cinematic calendar where the count has been lost on how many films have focused on the god-given musical genius a character possesses, and why it has the power to change the world.
"JUNK WORLD" - Review
THE STORY – A surprise attack on a joint expedition between humans and their emancipated clones becomes the freaky fulcrum for a dimension-hopping, time-travel fable set over a millennia before Takahide Hori’s original subterranean stop-motion animated opus, “Junk Head.” THE CAST – Atsuko Miyake THE TEAM – Takahide Hori (Director/Writer) THE RUNNING TIME – 104 Minutes The fact that film is a visual medium presents itself as both a blessing and a curse regarding Takahide Hori’s “Junk World,” a...
Movie Review: ‘Tape’ Wields Its Fascination With Surveillance Like A Dangerous Weapon
Director: Bizhan M. Tong Writers: Bizhan M. Tong, Selena Lee, Lok-Yung Lo, Stephen Belber Stars: Kenny Kwan, Selena Lee, Adam Pak Synopsis: When three former classmates reunite after 15 years, a buried secret resurfaces forcing them to confront the past, each other, and the silence around accountability.
"FORASTERA" - Review
THE STORY – Cata sees her summer vacation disrupted by the absurd and sudden death of her grandmother, which only she witnesses. Her grief shifts when she casually turns to play pretend, transforming into the deceased. What begins with a game of dress-up will blur the lines of reality and family roles.
"GHOST SCHOOL" - Review
THE STORY – Ten‑year‑old Rabia defies rural superstition and bureaucratic neglect to uncover why her school abruptly closed. Untangling eerie rumors, corrupt local power, and silence, she undertakes a solitary, courageous search for truth and justice.
Movie Review (TIFF 2025): ‘Aki’ Is A Serene Call For First Nation Sovereignty
Director: Darlene Naponse Writer: Darlene Naponse Synopsis: A visual art documentary captures seasonal changes in Atikameksheng Anishnawbek (formerly Whitefish Lake), director Darlene Naponse’s Northern Ontario home community. Film festival screenings tend to have their own set of obligatory advertisements that play before the feature presentation, as opposed to the typical slew of trailers (now featuring car commercials!) that roll prior to multiplex offerings.
"NOVIEMBRE" - Review
THE STORY – Amid the chaos of the 1985 Palace of Justice siege in Bogotá, a group of guerrillas, magistrates, and civilians become trapped in a bathroom while hell breaks loose around them. For over 27 hours, their forced confinement reveals the deepest aspects of human nature: fear, convictions, contradictions, and the desperate need to survive. Outside, tanks and fire; inside, words as weapons.
Movie Review (TIFF 2025): ‘Wasteman’ Fearlessly Positions Prison Brutality As A Means Of Survival
Director: Cal McMau Writers: Hunter Andrews, Eoin Doran Stars: David Jonsson, Tom Blyth, Alex Hassell Synopsis: Parolee Taylor’s hopes for a fresh start are jeopardized by cellmate Dee’s arrival. As Dee takes Taylor under his wing, a vicious attack tests their bond, forcing Taylor to choose between protecting Dee and his own chances at freedom.
Movie Review (TIFF 2025): ‘Little Lorraine’ Is The Kind Of Crime Flick They Write Songs About
Director: Andy Hines Writers: Andy Hines, Adam Baldwin Stars: Stephen Amell, Sean Astin, Rhys Darby, Stephen McHattie, J Balvin Synopsis: Little Lorraine, a North Atlantic seaside town with a population of 60, becomes embroiled in an international cocaine smuggling operation under the noses of multiple governments, distributed in coffins through a network of funeral homes.
Movie Review (TIFF 2025): ‘Charlie Harper’ Takes The Easy Way Out Of Heartache
Directors: Tom Dean, Mike Eldridge Writer: Tom Dean Stars: Emilia Jones, Nick Robinson Synopsis: The journey of a young woman, Harper, and a young man, Charlie, as they meet, leave their respective homes, and attempt to build a life together in a new city. As the driven and ambitious Harper works to build a career as a chef, and the brilliant-yet-stuck Charlie struggles to get himself on track, their relationship faces growing challenges. Jay Kelly. Peter Hujar’s Day. The Testament of Ann Lee.
Movie Review: ‘The Roses’ Blooms, But Not Brightly
Director: Jay Roach Writer: Tony McNamara Stars: Benedict Cumberbatch, Olivia Colman, Andy Samberg Synopsis: Life seems easy for picture-perfect couple Ivy and Theo: successful careers, a loving marriage, great kids. But beneath the façade of their supposed ideal life, a storm is brewing – as Theo’s career nosedives while Ivy’s own ambitions take off, a tinderbox of fierce competition and hidden resentment ignites.
Movie Review: ‘Splitsville’ is Sidesplittingly Funny and Incisive
Director: Michael Angelo Covino Writers: Michael Angelo Covino, Kyle Marvin Stars: Dakota Johnson, Adria Arjona, Kyle Marvin, Michael Angelo Covino Synopsis: After Ashley (Arjona) asks for a divorce, good-natured Carey (Marvin) runs to his friends, Julie (Johnson) and Paul (Covino), for support. He’s shocked to discover that the secret to their happiness is an open marriage, that is until Carey crosses the line and throws all of their relationships into chaos.
Movie Review: ‘Sketch’ Barely Scribbles Its Contrivances Away
Director: Seth Worley Writer: Seth Worley Stars: Tony Hale, D’Arcy Carden, Bianca Belle, Kue Lawrence, Kalon Cox Synopsis: When a young girl’s sketchbook falls into a strange pond, her drawings come to life—chaotic, real, and on the loose. As the town descends into chaos, her family must reunite and stop the monsters they never meant to unleash.
Will Bjarnar, Author at Next Best Picture
Next Best Picture is one of the newest leading voices on the film awards season race while also providing commentary for the Tony and Emmy awards. We are on a year long search to find the next Best Picture Oscar winner. We do this through weekly podcasts, reviews, interviews with people in the industry and blog posts expressing our own thoughts, opinions and love for all things cinema.
Movie Review: ‘40 Acres’ Nearly Transcends Its Familiar Apocalyptic Tropes
Director: R.T. Thorne Writers: R.T. Thorne, Glenn Taylor, Lora Campbell Stars: Danielle Deadwyler, Kataem O’Connor, Michael Greyeyes, Milcania Diaz-Rojas Synopsis: Hailey Freeman and her family are the last descendants of African American farmers who settled in rural Canada after the Civil War.
Movie Review: ‘Dangerous Animals’ is Wicked Fun
Director: Sean Byrne Writer: Nick Lepard Stars: Jai Courtney, Hassie Harrison, Ella Newton, Josh Heuston Synopsis: When Zephyr, a rebellious surfer, is abducted by a shark-obsessed serial killer and held captive on his boat, she must figure out how to escape before he carries out a ritualistic feeding to the sharks below. If it were up to me, I’d tell you to go into Sean Byrne’s Dangerous Animals (almost) completely blind.
"THE SHADOW SCHOLARS" - Review
THE STORY – When Oxford Professor Patricia Kingori travels to Kenya, she uncovers the murky, multi-billion global underworld of essay-writing. Thousands of young and highly educated Kenyans – overqualified and chronically underemployed – have found lucrative work writing essays for students around the globe who are able and willing to pay for them. It’s a complex portrait of an issue that undermines the foundations of a pillar of humanity: education.
"BIRTHRIGHT" - Review
THE STORY – It’s every adult’s worst nightmare: moving back in with their parents. Having done just that, a down-and-out husband and his pregnant wife quickly realize that his folks don’t want them around, triggering a raucous power struggle that goes off the rails.
"SHAM" - Review
THE STORY – When a young student shows signs of trauma, his parents act swiftly against his middle school teacher. But all may not be as it seems, leading the scales of justice to tip in fascinating, heartbreaking ways.
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