Rendez-Vous with French Cinema
Home Tags Sundance

Tag: Sundance

Sundance Film Festival / Sabar Bonda (Cactus Pears) Review: World Cinema Grand Jury Prize Winner is a Gentle, Indian Triumph

Courtesy of Sundance Film Festival There are layers behind the title “Cactus Pears“ (Sabar Bonda in Marathi). In these red pears there’s a soft, juicy flesh that’s bursting with sweet flavor. Filled with vitamins, indigenous people have used the juice for centuries to treat burns and hepatitis. It takes years to grow, but the sweetness…

Sundance Film Festival / DJ Ahmet Review: Music Throbs in Timeless, North Macedonian Charmer

©Courtesy of Sundance Film Festival In a scene in DJ Ahmet, the winner of the Special Jury Award: World Cinema Dramatic, a horde of escaped sheep crash a rave party in the countryside. The beats pulsate as the sheep bleat. The bells jingle in the blinking lights while cool dudes dance and spray graffiti. But in…

Sundance Film Festival: ‘Last Days’ is an Intriguing Story of One Man’s Deadly Quest for Unachievable Salvation

In 2018, American missionary John Allen Chau was killed on North Sentinel Island, located off the coast of India and home to a tribe that has had very minimal contact with the outside world. Some described Chau’s death as a tragedy, while others blamed him for breaking the law and attempting to approach a population…

Sundance Review: ‘Two Women’ is an Entertaining Showcase of Two Great Leads

Society has different expectations for men and women, due in large part to millennia of patriarchal systems where women were typically responsible for staying home to take care of the children. In a modern world, mothers can work after giving birth and function similarly to men, but there are still maternal connections that they’ll make…

Sundance Film Festival: ‘Peter Hujar’s Day’ is a Surprisingly Interesting Dramatization of a Rather Banal Conversation

©Courtesy of Sundance Film Festival. In 1974, photographer Peter Hujar sat down with his friend, writer Linda Rosenkrantz, to tell her everything he did the day before, part of a planned book by Rosenkrantz speaking with all her well-connected friends about their daily lives. The book didn’t end up happening and apparently the tape of…

Sundance Film Festival: ‘The Dating Game’ is an Amusing Look at Romance in China That’s Best When It Gets Serious

It’s not always easy to find a partner, but there can be exacerbating circumstances that make it even more difficult. As a result of China’s one child’s policy, which was ended a decade ago, there are 30 million more men than women. Those odds aren’t great even for the most socially well-adjusted individuals with unlimited…

Sundance Film Festival: ‘The Alabama Solution’ is a Vital, Urgent Call for Prison Reform in a Very Broken System

Conditions within prison facilities aren’t known to be great, and they’re not invitations that many in positions of power believe to be most deserving of resources. Some argue that criminal offenders need to be kept in line and shouldn’t be treated with kindness, and therefore their needs should be at the bottom of any priority…

Sundance Film Festival: ‘Touch Me’ is a Weird, Appealing Story of Cross-Species Attraction

©Courtesy of Sundance Film Festival There are plenty of theories about the existence of extraterrestrial life, and theatrical first contact experiences like the one depicted in Star Trek are hardly the only way in which humanity could become aware of them. Touch Me offers a truly unique method of undeniable confirmation for one human that…

Sundance Film Festival: ‘Omaha’ is a Heartbreaking Family Portrait with Terrific Performances

It’s hard for many people to imagine what it really means to be out of options. There are so many things that would have to go wrong and fall apart for those who live in relative affluence to lose their homes and be forced to live either on the street or out of their cars….

Open Roads: ‘In The Mirror,’ Cinema As A Therapeutic Experience

Director Roberta Torre, inscribes on reel her love letter towards the esteemed Italian actress Monica Vitti. However, In The Mirror is not a biopic, it’s much better. It portrays how the power of cinema may be therapeutic to someone who is struggling with a neurological disorder. Monica (Alba Rohrwacher) suffers from the Korsakoff syndrome that…

Prada Celebrates Miranda July In Milan And Tokyo

Miranda July is an American filmmaker, artist, singer and writer who was raised in Berkeley and currently lives in Los Angeles. In 1996 a series of shorts, titled Joanie4Jackie, initiated her directorial career that reached its peak in 2005 with the independent film Me and You and Everyone We Know. July also starred in this…