Holiday Classics: “Larceny, Inc.” (1942)

If you were to hear the title Larceny, Inc., you likely wouldn’t immediately cop it as a Christmas movie. And yet, this crime comedy’s seasonal appropriateness is immediately evident from the name of its source material: The Night Before Christmas, a short-lived Broadway play penned by Laura and S.J. Perelman. Edward G. Robinson stars in […]

Review: “Saltburn”

Gloomy atmosphere, haunted castles, grotesque characters, cursed families, doomed romances— these elements and more have come to define the gothic genre, the first entry into which is generally considered to be English writer Horace Walpole’s 1764 novel The Castle of Otranto. Walpole’s tale of the lord of a manor and his family was inspired by […]

SLIFF Review: “La Chimera”

The most recognizable definition of a chimera comes from Greek mythology, in reference to a female creature made up of several different animals: a lion’s head, a goat’s body, and a serpent’s tail. But the word can alternately be used as a noun to refer to something one hopes for, but is impossible to ever […]

SLIFF Review: “The Holdovers”

In a lengthy pre-film discussion and post-film Q&A with director Alexander Payne at a screening of his new film The Holdovers at the St. Louis International Film Festival, several films and filmmakers came up in reference to his work, from Billy Wilder to Leo McCarey’s devastating 1937 drama about aging, Make Way for Tomorrow. But […]

Home Video Review: “The Unknown Country”

The snow crunches beneath her feet as Tana (Lily Gladstone) steps into her car. She pauses as she glances at the handicapped tag hanging on the rearview mirror before quietly removing it. A voice on the radio details the perilous weather conditions, but as night turns to day and the snow becomes blindingly white, Tana […]

SLIFF Review: “All Dirt Roads Taste of Salt”

Hands. That’s the first thing you notice about Raven Jackson’s debut feature film All Dirt Roads Taste of Salt: the close-up of Mack’s hands as she runs them through the river water, sifting through the dirt with her fingers, as her father Isaiah (Chris Chalk) teaches her how to fish, patiently telling her to go […]

Review: “The Killer”

“Stick to the plan.” That’s the mantra that the titular assassin of The Killer, played by Michael Fassbender, repeats in his head as he goes about his job, constantly rationalizing the need for a clinical attitude and lack of empathy every time he’s faced with a situation that challenges his inhumanity. The same sentence could […]

Review: “Anatomy of a Fall”

“I really wanted to address the legal issue in its smallest details, to address the issues of the couple, of living together. It was also a pretext to dissect every bit of their life.” Justine Triet stated the above to the magazine Paris Match following the world premiere of her courtroom drama Anatomy of a […]

Review: “The Creator”

A global war between humans and artificial intelligence? The premise of The Creator couldn’t be more timely if Gareth Edwards’ tried, with even the film’s trailer premiering mere days after SAG-AFTRA followed the WGA on strike, better protections for actors and writers regarding the increasing use of A.I. in film production being one of their […]

Review: “Farewell My Concubine” (1993)

In 1993, Chen Kaige’s Farewell My Concubine, a sumptuous, decades-spanning epic based on the Lilian Lee novel, became the first Chinese film to win the Palme D’Or at the Cannes Film Festival, tying with Jane Campion’s period drama The Piano. One of the most notable works from who would become one of the most notable […]