We all know how much cinema adores a good historical story, with the very origins of Hollywood being rooted in historical epics and period pieces that aimed to transport us to a different time and place, giving us the chance to sample from the people who preceded us. It has become a genre so saturated,…

Despite having flourished into one of the most acclaimed and arguably inventive filmmakers of her generation, Claire Denis has always been quite a reflective filmmaker, someone whose work is driven by her memories and experiences of the past. The majority of her most celebrated films tend to be examinations of postcolonial Africa, which comes from…

There was a time when Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne were considered the heirs apparent to the role of greatest social realist filmmakers, their work being the gold standard for films about the lives of ordinary people navigating challenging circumstances, each one reflecting deeper conversations on the nature of life and death and everything in between….

Anyone who has spent any amount of time with a paramedic will know that it is a career path made for those who are not only physically at their peak, but also willing to handle the mental strain that comes with this profession. It’s quite obvious that saving lives can take a psychological toll on…

It’s always a peculiar experience to sit through a film that dramatizes events that you saw unfolding in real life since it almost feels redundant (and we often forget that films aren’t solely made for the present generation, but also for those that are still to come, with the contemporary dramas of today being the…

The sight of a young woman walking through the pastoral winelands of rural France remains one of the most enduring and complex images in the history of cinema, and is the foundation on which Agnès Varda builds Vagabond (French: Sans toit ni loi), which remains one of her signature films, and one that has come…

Misery loves family – and you’ll find few families whose entire existence is more propelled by sheer conflict than the Giddens, who spend their days bickering about the future, genuinely believing it is their birthright to be the embodiment of wealth and affluence, to the point of causing a range of crises within the family…

Growing up, I was surrounded by friends and family who were generally agnostic to the idea that there is any real difference between governmental candidates and carried a general distrust of politicians, particularly those who seemed to be driven less by serving their constituents and more the ego and agenda tacked onto whatever campaign they…

As writers, there are two general guidelines that we are inclined to follow when discussing art – we are supposed to be objective as far as possible, as well as exercise enough restraint to make our arguments nuanced and detailed, using our words to explain why certain work is particularly intriguing. However, there are some…

In a career that has allowed him to explore various genres and stories, Gus Van Sant has proven himself to be extremely versatile at handling a diverse set of narratives, which are usually intrinsically tied to the concepts that fascinate him as a storyteller. Whether working with original material or adapting the work of others,…