C.J. Prince
378 articles written by C.J. Prince
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The Selfish Giant
After making the incredibly devastating pseudo-documentary The Arbor, Clio Barnard has returned with her own original story for The Selfish Giant. Loosely inspired by Oscar Wilde’s short story of the same name, it takes place in the same area...
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Let The Fire Burn
In Jason Osder’s bleak, infuriating documentary Let The Fire Burn there’s a feeling of amazement at what he and editor Nels Bangerter have achieved through their self-imposed limitations. The subject matter, a long battle between the City of Philadelphia...
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A Touch of Sin
The opening of Jia Zhangke’s A Touch of Sin shows a conversation communicated entirely with violence. A migrant worker (Wang Baoqiang) travelling on his motorcycle is stopped by three young men in an attempt to rob him. The man...
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The Broken Circle Breakdown
A major success in its home country of Belgium (and the country's submission for Best Foreign Film at the Oscars), The Broken Circle Breakdown is prime material for audiences craving more sombre and dramatic content during this fall's awards...
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Bastards
No matter what your opinion is on Claire Denis‘ films (full disclosure: I’m not the biggest fan of her work myself), it’s impossible to deny her skills at making one hell of an image. The opening moments of Bastards merely...
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Haunter
It doesn’t take very long for Vincenzo Natali‘s Haunter to get to the point. What starts out as a typical boring Sunday for Lisa (Abigail Breslin) takes a turn when her parents take issue with her weird behaviour. She...
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Ass Backwards
Sometimes a film can be so bad its existence is baffling. Ass Backwards, a comedy co-written by stars June Diane Raphael and Casey Wilson, is a perfect example of that kind of movie. With a script so painfully unfunny...
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Prisoners
Denis Villeneuve, the French-Canadian director of Polytechnique and Incendies, has seemingly hit the jackpot with his English language debut. Teaming up with a cast of terrific actors along with legendary cinematographer Roger Deakins, Prisoners sadly spends most of its...
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TIFF 2013: Top 20 Films of the Festival
Over the last 2 weeks my opinions have changed towards some of the films I’ve seen. Watching up to 4 films in one day can be exhausting, and sometimes through reflection films can seem better or worse in retrospect....
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TIFF 2013: Stranger By The Lake & Moebius
Having missed Blue is the Warmest Colour at TIFF this year, I went for another gay-themed film from Cannes: Alain Guiraudie’s Stranger By The Lake. Blue might have won the Palme D’Or, but Stranger actually took home the Queer...
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TIFF 2013: Blind Detective, Why Don’t You Play In Hell?, R100
Blind Detective On my second-last day of the festival, I was not expecting to have one of the craziest days I’ve ever had at TIFF in my six years of going. Starting off, I was getting ready for one...
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TIFF 2013: Stray Dogs & A Field in England
After spending the previous day watching two very slow-moving films, I figured I was ready to take on the latest film from one of the masters of ‘slow cinema.’ I’ve been a huge fan of Tsai Ming-Liang’s work over...
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A Field in England (TIFF Review)
Over the last five years, Ben Wheatley has shown himself to be someone hard to pin down. His brilliant 2009 debut Down Terrace was a hilarious small-scale crime drama that got comparisons to Mike Leigh and Guy Ritchie. His...
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Interview: Mike Flanagan of Oculus
Last Sunday TIFF’s Midnight Madness program unveiled the world premiere of Oculus. Mike Flanagan, whose last film Absentia was a great understated horror film, finds himself working with a bigger budget and cast this time around, including Doctor Who’s...
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TIFF 2013: Night Moves, Gravity, October November, Under The Skin
My previous day at TIFF was originally going to comprise of four films as well, but unfortunately I had to bail out of one film due to pure tiredness (I’ll keep the film’s title unnamed here, but if it...