Frank Perry deserved a lot better than he got during his lifetime. A director whose work was always defined by an uncompromising fascination with the human condition, he directed several films that may have not received the acclaim they warranted in their initial release, but certainly could be considered ahead of their time, with Perry…
Author: The Postmodern Pelican
Hour of the Wolf (1968)
Johan Borg (Max von Sydow) is a painter who lives with his wife Alma (Liv Ullmann) in the relative isolation of the Swedish countryside. They have retreated here to escape the rush of the modern world, so that Alma may spend the rest of her pregnancy in peace. However, everything is not quite as it…
Spirited Away (2001)
I’d like to break from decorum for just a moment and speak on a personal note. This review is one that I have been anxiously awaiting to write for a while now. For those of you who have followed me for a while, you’ll know that I normally commemorate milestone reviews with films that are…
Force Majeure (2014)
Tomas (Johannes Bah Kuhnke) and Ebba (Lisa Loven Kongsli) are a married Swedish couple that decide to take a short vacation in the French Alps, where they hope to spend a few days with their children (Clara Wettergren and Vincent Wettergren) skiing through the snow-white landscapes and appreciating the tranquillity of the gorgeous countryside. However,…
Mister America (2020)
Tim Heidecker plays a fictionalized version of himself, a concert promoter who has recently been acquitted from a trial in which he was accused of inadvertently killing a large portion of the guests at one of his recent events. As a result of his disillusionment with the justice system, he decides to run for District…
Emma (2020)
Literary adaptations come in many different forms – there are those that remain very close to the source material, and those that update it, whether contemporizing it or just extracting a few general themes and infusing them into a more loosely-structured version of the story. Occasionally, there are adaptations that somehow manage to do both…
The Nanny Diaries (2007)
Annie (Scarlett Johansson) has just graduated college, where she was pursuing a degree in Anthropology, a subject that she was always passionate about, as evident in her fascination with the people around her and how the world is composed of many different intersecting lives. However, her prospects for the future are not as bright as…
Synonyms (2019)
Discussing Synonyms, the astounding psychological drama made by Nadav Lapid, and looking at its fundamental qualities is an incredibly difficult task, especially because this is a film that works as both an intricate exploration of the human condition, as well as a meaningful manifesto on the various challenges an individual tends to encounter when finding…
Gretel & Hansel (2020)
“The door slammed at our backs, and the big, bad world opened up to us” By the time these chilling words are heard towards the beginning of Gretel & Hansel, we are already ensconced in the grim fairytale world director Osgood “Oz” Perkins has thrust us into, and escape is extremely unlikely, by virtue of…
The Immortal Story (1968)
If you put aside his prowess for the visual form, his depth of knowledge of both acting and directing in practically any medium, and his masterful control of character, whether central or peripheral, Orson Welles was simply a gifted storyteller – all of his films, whether his towering masterpieces or his more obscure works of…
The Postmodern Pelican 