As disorienting as it is delightful, Matthew Rankin’s “Universal Language” takes its avant-garde filmmaker’s irreverent approach to history—previously on display in “The Twentieth Century,” his ersatz reinterpretation of former Canadian prime minister William Mackenzie King’s rise to power—in feverishly fresh, surprising directions.  Imagining a surreal interzone between Tehran and Winnipeg where the official languages are

Excess is sorely needed in today’s cultural landscape. Maximalism in American cinema today is often regulated to a muted kind of spectacle, rendered in ugly computer-generated action sequences and amorphous color palettes that soften the impact of blockbuster films. There is a distinct absence of the kind of work Joel Schumacher mastered and brought to

I was watching a documentary the other night—I’m not going to say which one here, because it was good and intelligent overall, and the filmmakers might be reading this—and got annoyed immediately because it was steeped in the same storytelling cliches as so many other documentaries made nowadays.  It started with a sort of compressed,

There are problems with “A Muerte” / “Love You to Death,” Apple TV+’s new Spanish series. For one, the pilot is frustratingly slow, lacking future episodes’ heart, charm, and action. It’s all set up and done in such a perfunctory (aka boring) way that I imagine many viewers won’t get past it.  Particularly because we

CHAMPAIGN, IL (February 3, 2025) — Roger Ebert’s Film Festival, also known as Ebertfest, announced today the addition of three new films to this year’s festival: 40th Anniversary Screening of Susan Seidelman’s DESPERATELY SEEKING SUSAN starring Rosanna Arquette, Aidan Quinn, and Madonna Azazel Jacobs’ HIS THREE DAUGHTERS starring Carrie Coon, Natasha Lyonne, and Elizabeth Olsen

With the state of Democracy a shambles and hope being sucked out of the country like helium from a balloon, I thought I’d offer a micro vision of hope, a poem about the humble beginnings of a man who would, one day, do great and terrible things, but who believed in whatever this country is.

I’m sometimes overly forgiving of the state of network TV. I’m also overly forgiving of a serial killer procedural that was done well. I found escapist value in the “CSI” and “Criminal Minds” franchises, along with some of their wannabes. And the concept of NBC’s “The Hunting Party” feels like a slam dunk: A bunch

Unlike the rest of the dispatches I’ve written out of Sundance, the selections here are not defined by their competitive category. This one is a little bit more of a hodgepodge. “Sabar Bonda (Cactus Pears)” and “DJ Ahmet,” for instance, are from the World Dramatic section, while “André Is an Idiot” premiered as part of