Rambling Film

Official synopsis:  A mother (Fernanda Torres) is forced to reinvent herself when her family's life is shattered by an act of arbitrary violence during the tightening grip of a military dictatorship in Brazil, 1971. Fernanda Torres' win at the Golden Globes earlier this year is a perfect example of how awards can boost a film. Who knows if my theater would've even gotten it without that win and the Oscar nominations to follow. I'm grateful for it.  What sticks out to me the most was how much this cast FELT like a real family. They had such an easy chemistry with each other you almost forget you're watching a movie. The film spends a good amount of time with them before the forced kidnapping that will eventually occur. We see them enjoying the beach, getting a new dog, sending one daughter off on an adventure to London, it makes what happens to them hit all the harder when their life is suddenly shattered.  Torres is the glue that holds all of this together. Eunice h...

Official synopsis: Two highly-trained operatives (Miles Teller and Anya Taylor-Joy) become close after being sent to protect opposite sides of a mysterious gorge. When an evil emerges, they must work together to survive what lies within. At first glance, The Gorge didn't really catch my attention. A made for streaming action thriller isn't always my cup of tea, but the mostly positive reviews swayed me. Now, I'm glad I gave this film my time. Part romantic meet-cute, part Annihilation , The Gorge took me by surprise. I was never really sure where the film was going to go, and Teller and Taylor-Joy made for interesting leads. Plus, Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross can never go wrong together when crafting a score. I was surprised how well the cutesy parts of this worked for me too. Sometimes I feel too cynical for those type of things, but it worked. The film does kind of explain away everything very quickly but it still made for a fine Saturday night viewing at home. The Gorg...

Earlier today the BAFTA's crowned their winners. The Best Picture race at the Oscars is still a giant question mark, right? Below is a list of the nominees with the winners highlighted in blue, plus my thoughts. BEST FILM Anora The Brutalist A Complete Unknown Conclave Emilia Pérez If Anora or The Brutalist would've won here, I would've called Best Picture and open and shut case, but the BAFTAs went with Conclave, the film that I thought would be the easy Best Picture win at the start of the season. Does the Academy follow? Who knows.  OUTSTANDING BRITISH FILM Bird Blitz Conclave Gladiator II Hard Truths Kneecap Lee Love Lies Bleeding The Outrun Wallace & Gromit: Vengeance Most Fowl A double win for Conclave. It's too bad one of the smaller films here couldn't have gotten some love. OUTSTANDING DEBUT BY A BRITISH WRITER, DIRECTOR OR PRODUCER Hoard Kneecap Monkey Man Santosh Sister Midnight Very happy for the Kneecap crew. That film was so fun.  CHILDREN’S AND FA...

The newest binge-able mini series from Netflix revolves around the very real scammer Belle Gibson.  She's an Australian wellness influencer who claimed to have stage 4 brain cancer and used that to launch a healthy eating app and book both titled "The Whole Panty" in the early to mid 2010's. Of course, her illness was a lie and Belle was spectacularly called out for not just her bullshit, but also charity fraud. (The latter which she was forced to pay a fine and apparently still hasn't done so) Kaitlyn Dever puts on her best Aussie accent and tackles Gibson in this 6 episode series.  I was familiar with Gibson before watching this. A lot of you might be without even realizing it. Her 60 minutes interview post scandal went very viral. That blonde in the fluffy pink sweater refusing to confirm her real age and say she's been "living her life as a 26 year old woman?" Yeah, that's her. But what this show does brilliantly is it doesn't focus on Be...

Official synopsis : Copenhagen 1919: A young worker (Vic Carmen Sonne)   finds herself unemployed and pregnant. She meets Dagmar, ( Trine Dyrholm)  who runs an underground adoption agency. A strong connection grows but her world shatters when she stumbles on the shocking truth behind her work I have to say, I went into this Oscar nominee pretty blind. It is very loosely inspired by true events that happened in Denmark at the time, but I wasn't aware of it. So to say I was unprepared would be an understatement. This film rests neatly alongside Loveless and Tyrannosaur in the "Very well made, but I never want to watch you again" category. It's relentlessly bleak. The little moments of reprieve you get are eventually ripped away. Still, I couldn't take my eyes off of it. It's a very transfixing story. Sonne and Dyrholm are great together. Both characters carry so much in different ways, and they easily make you see it. The last meeting between the two characte...

Official synopsis:  When a visionary architect (Adrien Brody) and his wife (Felicity Jones) flee post-war Europe in 1947 to rebuild their legacy and witness the birth of modern United States, their lives are changed forever by a mysterious, wealthy client. (Guy Pearce) The Brutalist might be one of the buzziest films this year. Ever since it started its festival run, I've heard nonstop praise for the nearly 4-hour epic from direct Brady Corbet. Right now, it feels like a serious front runner for Best Picture at the Oscars. So where did I land with all those high expectations? I suppose I landed in the middle. I'm quite torn on this. One one had, it's very well made. Shot entirely on VistaVision over the course of 34 days, Corbet does a lot of directorial flexing here. He's taking full advantage of every angle the camera could go. At times, it felt a little too Malick-y for me, but Corbet is someone I've had a soft spot for since seeing him in Thirteen and Mysteriou...