Ebertfest 2018, Days 4 & 5: Daughters of the Dust, The Big Lebowski, 13th and More One of the most rapturous ovations I’ve seen in the six years I’ve been attending Ebertfest was received by Ava DuVernay, the celebrated director who flew to Champaign, Illinois, amidst a busy schedule, in order to attend the Saturday

Say what you will about “Stress Positions,” the new indie comedy that marks the feature debut of writer-director-costar Theda Hammel: it’s not overly consumed with coming across as likable to potential viewers. Not only does it take us back to the early days of COVID-19 (an era that many audiences may not feel particularly inclined

Nine years after that landmark TV show, Jarecki and his team have returned with a six-episode follow-up titled simply “The Jinx – Part Two.” The four episodes sent to press don’t really answer that question other than to further reveal a man with such a strong ego and corrupt support system that he thought he

The main job of Will and his colleague/best friend Kyo (Benedict Wong), who lives in a house not so far from the one belonging to Will, is monitoring the everyday lives of souls who were born into our world after being evaluated and then selected by them. Via a bunch of old-fashioned televisions assembled in

A ten-year anniversary might not sound like a great milestone; it can feel a lot longer when you consider how much has happened since then. Last week, prolific showrunner and filmmaker Mike Flanagan attended a screening of “Oculus,” his ten-year-old breakthrough feature, at New Orleans’s Overlook Film Festival, where Flanagan also received the event’s annual

Over the course of filming the deeply compassionate “Veselka: The Rainbow on the Corner at the Center of the World,” the War in Ukraine broke out, giving the piece a different kind of scope and emotional power. Like the title that goes on a bit longer than it needs to, the filmmakers here have a

On June 12, 1994, Nicole Brown Simpson and Ron Goldman were brutally murdered outside her home. O.J., who had a history of domestic violence against both Marguerite and Nicole, including police being called to their residences, was pursued by the L.A. police as a suspect. Rather than report to the police, on June 17, he

Loach has always told stories that use real locations and some nonprofessional actors, encourage improvisation, and take their stories from contemporary or historical events that affect the everyday lives of working and/or struggling individuals. These are not the kinds of films where billionaires fly to Norway on a private jet to plot a corporate takeover, nor

It’s no longer the tired story of seducing one powerful man but rather about the effects of power. What will George do with his new station? How will it change him? How will he use it to change his nation and Europe at large? Yes, these questions are more typical of period pieces but it’s

Tragedy has rendered Linda (voiced by Melinée Leclerc) into a deeply dissatisfied child: She suddenly lost her culinary father when she was a baby due to a dinnertime accident; her mother Paulette (voiced by Clotilde Hesme) now fixes meals in the microwave; mom hasn’t been able to fix the leaky sink in their kitchen; she