Not every sub-genre of cinema needs to contain likable characters for films to be successful. A huge number of affecting films have been produced, for years, concentrating on antiheroes: unpleasant characters not featured for the sake of enjoyment. However, when filmmakers are working within the confines of a tight sub-genre like talk-heavy, NYC-based tales of flawed romance, which is essentially what Negin Farsad and Jeremy Redleaf‘s 3rd Street Blackout is, the characters must be relatively pleasant. That’s because rather than focusing on philosophy or atmosphere, the film chooses the route of a double character study and centers entirely on the mind state of the two protagonists, a seemingly happy couple named Mina and Rudy, played by the directors themselves.

Sometimes, when a director makes the decision to place themselves in the spotlight of their own film, they can become so wrapped up in their own vision that the story becomes overly personal and difficult for those who haven’t shared their life experiences. Here, the opposite is true; Farsad and Redleaf are so naturally able to realize the characters they’ve written for themselves that it’s difficult to remember that they’re the co-directors and not a silly New York couple with a set of eccentric friends.

3rd Street Blackout tells the story of a few days in the life of this couple, during which a blackout occurs across the entire city and they’re forced to actually communicate with one another rather than spending all of their time on their phones, as they usually do. This eventually leads Mina to reveal something to Rudy that she’s been bottling up for some time; said “something” is also revealed to the audience in flashback fragments throughout the majority of the film.

The non-linear style of editing that the film utilizes works to its advantage in raising the emotional stakes of the narrative, and simultaneously, creates a feeling of palpable suspense not common in most lo-fi romantic comedies. The film is indeed a comedy, but not in the pure sense at all because the audience is, for the most part, left in the dark regarding the portion of the story being flashed back to. It’s a sincerely funny film—you could draw comparisons between 3rd Street Blackout and shows like Broad City or High Maintenance with regard to its uniquely New York sense of humor—but its structural fragmentation also makes it an effectively frustrating and anxiety-inducing experience.

One of the main reasons why the film works so well is because of the talented supporting cast. Farsad and Redleaf are fantastic and believable as the leads, but the film wouldn’t have been nearly as strong had the slew of supporting characters not been so comically satisfying. The cast is stacked with recognizable faces such as Janeane Garofalo (Wet Hot American Summer), Devin Ratray (Home Alone), John Hodgeman (Bored to Death), Ed Weeks (The Mindy Project), Michael Cyril Creighton (Spotlight) and Phyllis Somerville (Little Children) who, in particular, gives an utterly delightful performance. Lesser known actors such as Katie Hartman and Becky Yamamoto show that they deserve recognition, the former taking on one of the chief supporting roles in the film and nailing every scene, and the latter having only one scene in the whole film, though it was possibly the film’s most hilarious moment.

Ultimately, 3rd Street Blackout is a simple movie focusing on complex characters. The way that the couple avoids addressing important issues through comedy is a realistic dynamic that’s easy for viewers to understand and even sympathize with. Much of the comedy in the film is admittedly crude, but that’s not necessarily a bad thing. Farsad and Redleaf pull off the crudeness, mostly because the audience can tell it’s not malicious and poorly intended; it feels harmless and reminds one of how important it is to be goofy every once in a while. Characters pop in and out of the film without much introduction, but it doesn’t matter. Actually, it works to the film’s advantage because every character is captivating, and that’s sort of exactly how it is in New York City anyway.

3rd Street Blackout isn’t just great because provides a good laugh; it’ll make you want to sit down and write some comedy of your own. It’s exciting to see a pair of independent directors with such an inspiring and authentic comedic voice.

Paolo Sorrentino’s Youth has the rare power to force recollections of the past as well as anticipations of the future, all the while keeping its viewer completely grounded in the present, grounded in its stunning and symphonic display of human emotion. Indeed, Sorrentino pulls the rug out from under his audience on several occasions throughout the duration of the film’s runtime, dragging them down into the depths of dejection only to raise them back up, just as quickly, into the heights of pure laughter and joy. Watching this film is like being trapped in a game of pinball, only Sorrentino is the game player and his audience is the ball that he’s whacking in every which direction without the slightest bit of hesitation. It’s clear, however, that he’s doing this out of love; if anything, Youth is undoubtedly the director’s most tender and heartfelt film yet. And also his most accessible to date.

Part of this accessibility can be attributed to Sorrentino’s decision, as primarily an Italian-language director, to direct the film in English (a feat which he attempted once prior with his overlooked 2011 output, This Must Be the Place). This immediately increases the number of people that will be interested in seeing it worldwide. Nonetheless, the chief reason why mainstream audiences will be drawn to this film is because of the big-name stars attached to the cast, including Michael Caine, Harvey Keitel, Rachel Weisz, Paul Dano and Jane Fonda in an unforgettable cameo performance.

Much like a few of the other films in competition at this year’s Cannes Film Festival, Youth is relatively light on plot and focuses more on conversations between characters, uprooted emotions and recounted memories than a concrete narrative. With that being said, the general storyline follows our protagonist, retired composer Fred Ballinger (Michael Caine), during his stay at a spa resort in the Alps with his daughter, Lena (Rachel Weisz), as well as his longtime best friend, illustrious film director Mick Boyle (Harvey Keitel).

While the cast does a wonderful job realizing their characters, the true star of the film is cinematographer Luca Bigazzi, who has worked on several of Sorrentino’s previous projects including the Academy Award winning, The Great Beauty. As he did with his previous work, Bigazzi seems to channel an aesthetic similar to that of Emmanuel Lubezki’s collaborations with the legendary director, Terrence Malick. Both Bigazzi and Lubezki place great emphasis on the visual composition of each scene, capturing an immense degree of detail through the movement of their ever-gliding cameras.

One particularly memorable example of Bigazzi’s skill can be found early in the film. During a dream sequence, Ballinger walks down a platform surrounded by a rising body of water as it slowly begins to engulf him. There are very few cinematographers that can place us smack-dab in the center of the world they’re shooting like Bigazzi and Lubezki, which is why I continue to enjoy their masterful work.

If there’s one area in which Youth falters a bit, it’s making the 118-minute runtime feel long. Youth would’ve benefited from removing a few unnecessary scenes from its later acts. Instead, the audience may find themselves completely enthralled by its beauty one minute, and then checking their wristwatches the next. Nevertheless, some excessive minutes doesn’t take away from the fact Youth is an enjoyable film with a varied soundtrack, gorgeous locations, spectacular visuals and a deeply philosophical screenplay.

Originally published on June 3rd, 2015 as part of our Cannes Film Festival coverage.

Phil Stevens is the kind of underground, extreme horror filmmaker that we need more of—the kind of filmmaker who places great emphasis on establishing a haunting and memorable atmosphere, and not relying on an overabundance of jump scares. His debut feature film, Flowers isn’t something that I’d classify as being for the faint of heart. Not even remotely. However, there’s a surreal beauty to its grotesqueness that, along with the absence of dialogue, almost forces it into the sub-genre of meditative cinema (which is something scarcely stated about extreme horror films). Though it’s loose in narrative, the general plot of the film focuses on six female spirits (played by Colette Kenny McKenna, Krystle Fitch, Anastasia Blue, Tanya Paoli, Kara A. Christiansen and Makaria Tsapatoris), all recently murdered by the same serial killer (Bryant W. Lohr Sr.), seemingly stuck on the threshold of reality and the afterlife, confined to the labyrinth passageways of a sort of purgatory-esque edifice.

One thing about Flowers on an aesthetic level, is that the location itself is just as much of a character as the six trapped spirits. Stevens seemed intent on building an entire world within one singular structure, and succeeded in doing so by placing great detail in the crafting of a maze-like setting, in which horrifying images are built upon horrifying images, revealing layer after layer of an impenetrable darkness and culminating in a harrowing, cathartic and deeply inspired final sequence. The aforementioned darkness is perpetual, not just in subject matter but in the lighting (or lack thereof) of the intricate production design; even the few scenes that contain ample light are glimpsed only briefly through holes in shadowed walls so that the illuminated visuals are surrounded by black. The claustrophobia felt by the spirits is felt just as powerfully by the viewer.

The complex soundscape is what carries the film, and is restrained not in the sense that it’s seldom utilized but in the sense that it’s composed of fluid, quiet and melancholic waves of subtly disturbing audio (juxtaposing the tragic world that has been created), rather than loud and abrasive noises designed simply to shock the ears. Sometimes certain sounds can produce subjective images in the mind’s visuospatial sketchpad. It’s almost as if Stevens and his crew purposefully fused some of the more dimly lit sequences—in which only outlines of strange and broken shapes can be discerned—with some of the more abstract sounds so that the viewer is free to fill in the blanks of these ambiguous visuals with whatever materializes in their psyche.

There’s no doubt that Flowers exists within its own universe, one in which time is not the same and spirits are able to coexist with their previous physical form during the final moments of their earthly existence. But this is only the case due to the fact that nostalgia and memories are represented as material, whether the women are reflecting back on their past (by conjuring up toy trains and exploring polaroid photographs), their demons (by looking back at sorrowful lives of chemical dependence and issues with body image), or the very moment of their murders. In effect, they become the voyeurs to their own demise.

Ultimately, Flowers is both gorgeous and repulsive, beautiful yet sickening; it’s aptly titled, as flowers can be both lovely, or they can be the pattern of the mattress on which a woman is being disemboweled by a psychotic necrophiliac (as seen in the film). The viewer is dropped into a world that they know they shouldn’t be in, seeing things that they know they shouldn’t be seeing. It’s made all the more painful by the fact that the viewer is aware of what the women in the film aren’t: that they’re desperately attempting to escape a fate that has already befallen them. At one point in the film, the word “defect” can be seen in the background, as in the defect in the machine, the fault in the plan, the fact that no matter how hard they try, there’s no escaping what’s been done.

Very few films out there, both inside and outside the genre of horror, are more effective in making the viewer so hyper-aware of the delicate, organic nature and fragility of the human body.

Gaspar Noé’s Love is anything but pornography. Pornography makes no attempt to delve into the psychology of the humans portrayed within; it contains actors as models, rather than actors as characters with any sort of depth. While Murphy (Karl Glusman), Elektra (Aomi Muyock) and Omi (Klara Kristin), the three chief characters, may not be the most complex individuals you’ll come across in the cinema this year, they still have hopes and dreams and aspirations, and undoubtedly transcend the notion of “the pornographic model” by a long shot.

Love has such a loosely constructed narrative that it’s difficult to summarize, but it essentially examines the mind and memories of its American protagonist Murphy, now married and with a child, as he reminisces on the greatest love affair of his life with French ex-girlfriend Elektra. What sparks this nostalgic exploration is a phone call from Elektra’s mother, letting Murphy know that she hasn’t heard from her daughter in months and wonders if he has any knowledge of her whereabouts.

The opening scene is a lengthy static shot of Murphy and Elektra engaged in an explicit, unsimulated sexual act. This directorial decision, which paves the way for the remainder of the film’s imagery, should inspire excitement from audiences, but does the excitement hold up for the rest of Love’s 135-minute runtime? Not quite, because at least half of the film turns out to be repetitive scenes of other sexually graphic acts, from different angles and in different positions, but dull and homogeneous in almost every other way.

It’s clear that Noé’s goal here is to expose his audience to such an immense degree of sexual imagery that it would begin to feel like a natural and comfortable thing to view in a non-pornographic film. Unfortunately, it has the opposite effect; desensitizing the viewer to the sex being portrayed, with excitement quickly fading into exhaustion midway through the second act. At least all of the sex scenes made the dialogue-heavy sequences—like the intense verbal matches between Murphy and Elektra, which effectively portray the bi-polar, love-hate nature of fiercely passionate relationships—that much more fascinating.

Unfortunately, these rare, existential moments in Love aren’t portrayed in enough detail, or given enough screen time, to really pack much of a punch. They come and go, forgotten among the sex scenes. The emotional peak of the film comes in the third act during a beautiful moment of vulnerability for Murphy. He sits weeping in a bathtub while holding his child, who is also weeping. This moment casts the protagonist in a state of pure nakedness more than any elongated scene of copulation. The female characters, on the other hand, are one-dimensional from start to finish and seem to exist merely as sexual objects for Murphy.

All of that said, Love, much like Noé’s previous two films, Enter the Void and Irreversible, is an impressive technical achievement. His cinematographer, Benoit Debie, experiments with longer takes, carefully framed static shots and a camera that hovers above its main characters for most of the film. The fragmented editing style works wonderfully with the non-linear narrative and transports the viewer from past to present smoothly and with meticulous pacing. However, technical greatness doesn’t constitute a great film, and the majority of Love feels like digging into what looks like a delicious cake, only to find more and more icing on the inside. It may be Noé’s tamest and most grounded film yet, but that is not necessarily what audiences want from him as a director. He’d likely find greater success returning to the psychedelic, hyper-violent shock cinema style that he’s known for. It is there that his niche audience will find satisfaction.

A version of this review was originally published as part of our coverage of the 2015 Cannes Film Festival.

To be unable to see must take a toll on one’s self-awareness and one’s self-consciousness. Those with the privilege of sight tend to take the ability to see for granted, not often thinking about or feeling gratitude for what’s been given to them. But what would it be like not to have the opportunity to stare at oneself in the mirror? Not to be able to visualize oneself in one’s mind? It isn’t difficult to imagine that one’s self-image would be affected by such an incomplete sensory experience, as is the case with Ingrid, the protagonist of Eskil Vogt’s wonderful directorial debut, Blind.

Ingrid (Ellen Dorrit Petterson) is a woman dealing with loss. Not the loss of a spouse or a parent or a child, but as previously mentioned, the loss of vision. It has been a couple of years since her sight has been taken from her, and she’s reaching the point where she’s beginning to have problems visualizing her surroundings; images are finally slipping away from her. As a result, she starts to develop insecurities, not only about herself and her body, but her environment as well. For instance, she questions whether her husband really does go to work, or if he is in fact sitting in silence, watching her, a companion transformed into nothing more than a voyeur.

It is because of these newfound uncertainties that Ingrid, restricting herself to her apartment, takes to her laptop, beginning to write stories through which she expresses frustration with her situation. At this point, director Eskil Vogt begins to play around with audience expectations and provides a whole new meaning to the idea of fusing reality with fantasy. Ingrid’s fiction blends seamlessly with her true life experience, and because Vogt’s mode of filmmaking is so simple and minimalist, there aren’t any fancy editing tricks employed to clearly separate what is real from what’s taking place in her literature. This sounds like it may make for convoluted storytelling, but it is handled with such a degree of care and earnestness that the story rarely regresses into incoherence.

This is part due to Vogt’s excellent screenwriting and his cinematographer, Thimios Bakatakis’ equally impressive camerawork. Vogt and Bakatakis had already proven themselves successful creators with their previous projects. Vogt working hand-in-hand on three films with one of Norway’s most successful directors, Joachim Trier (Reprise, Oslo August 31st, Louder than Bombs), and Bakatakis working with one of Greece’s great filmmakers, the Academy Award nominated Yorgos Lanthimos (Dogtooth). However, it is with Blind that their talents have come into full fruition; Vogt’s internal dialogue carries the film, with Ingrid acting as narrator for all the film’s characters, both in her reality and in her fictions, and Bakatakis’ imagery taking an expressionist approach by focusing more on sensory details and framing than a straightforward representation of Ingrid’s reality.

It was a wise choice indeed for Vogt to provide his protagonist with omniscience, for it’s through many of the characters’ internal lives, daily routines and histories that viewers come to understand things about them and care for them. Most of what the audience learns about these characters is a result of the exposition within Ingrid’s narration, but it never feels invasive or as if Vogt is taking the easy way out by merely explaining rather than showing. There are some things you cannot show. The characters within Blind are ultimately very private people, and the only way viewers are ever going to learn anything about them is through some sort of all-knowing voice. It’s in this sense that Blind nearly transcends being only about literary expression, almost feeling more like a novel than a film inclusive of literary themes. There’s a strong visual emphasis on the sensory experience (or sometimes lack thereof) and a gorgeous original score from Henk Hofstede. In the end, its cinema in the purest form—an imagistic recreation of reality.

Blind opens in New York and Los Angeles this week, and is also available for streaming on Fandor.

Andrew Cividino’s Sleeping Giant is quite an achievement when one takes into consideration that it is the work of a first-time feature filmmaker. It’s more of a slice of life sort of movie than one with a clear and easy-to-summarize narrative, but it’s essentially a very good film concentrating on loss of innocence, scattered with moments of greatness usually brought to the surface by its strong technical aspects (from its stylized editing to its sporadic shifts in tone). On a storytelling level, it excels in its subtleties; there’s a homoerotic undercurrent running throughout the film, and yet emotions are never spelled out, only implied. Cividino leaves his viewers to draw connections between certain images and sounds, and I respect a director who can throw exposition entirely out the window and just show things to viewers rather than tell them every last detail.

There aren’t exactly any standout actors in the film, but I must compliment the three leads on their ability to make me feel like I knew their characters, like I spent my summers with them years ago. This can be attributed to the seemingly loose script; much of the dialogue felt improvised, but in a refreshing way that doesn’t feel distracting. All in all, Sleeping Giant is an impressive display of technical skills and a beautiful exploration of mortality that also has a lot to say about the trials and tribulations of adolescence.

A version of this review was originally published as part of our Cannes 2015 coverage.

A pair of distinct, green eyes make their way through an expanse of endless darkness, darting every which direction like a snake in the grass that can feel the hunger of the hawk soaring above. Only these eyes, this snake, is uncertain; they’re uncertain of whether they’re better off searching for something they’ll surely never find, or whether they should give in, be still, and fall victim to the forces on their tail.

Unwaveringly bleak to the point of being one of the most distressing cinematic experiences of the year, Catch Me Daddy follows the rapid downward spiral of a young runaway couple, the British-Pakistani Laila (Sameena Jabeen Ahmed, making her feature debut) and her Scottish-Caucasian boyfriend Aaron (Connor McCarron). They’re on the run from Laila’s family, an organized crime syndicate of which she longer wants anything to do with. She and Aaron take to the road and hide out in the isolation of the Yorkshire Moors, a hollow and barren landscape that director Daniel Wolfe and cinematographer Robbie Ryan display with a sense of haunting, poetic beauty.

This exhibition of spectacular visual poetry lurking beneath an incessant dreariness at the film’s core should come as no surprise to those familiar with the previous works of Wolfe and Ryan. Before delving into this project, Wolfe was already an award-winning music video director whose credits included The Shoes’ “Time to Dance,” featuring a murderous Jake Gyllenhaal, as well as the intensely cinematic video for Paolo Nutini’s “Iron Sky,” in which there are a number of aesthetic similarities to Catch Me Daddy.

In fact, one might want to check out the Nutini video prior to delving into Wolfe’s feature length directorial debut, as it almost works as a prologue to the film, at least with regard to the themes of cycles and addiction, which he seems to enjoy (and succeed in) tackling as a filmmaker. Ryan’s cinematographic credits, on the other hand, include the gorgeous films of Andrea Arnold (Fish Tank, Wuthering Heights) and Ken Loach (The Angels’ Share, Jimmy’s Hall), so it came as no surprise when Catch Me Daddy turned out to be just as wonderfully shot as his prior collaborations, especially with regard to his exemplary use of natural light.

The visuals and the atmosphere aren’t the only aspects of the film to be commended. The absorbing performances from the entire cast, a blend of professional and non-professional actors, lets the substance match the style, forcing viewers to become invested in the characters. It’s easy to care deeply about the well-being of Laila and Aaron, which is what makes it all the more difficult when the film descends into violent chaos following a psychedelic dance sequence (choreographed by musician FKA Twigs), acting as a turning point in what had, up until that point, been a relatively loose and eventless narrative.

Indeed, it isn’t until well into Catch Me Daddy’s second act that the film shifts from an exercise in kitchen sink realism to full-blown Shakespearian tragedy. The remainder of the film becomes a fast-paced, migratory journey through gloomy British landscapes reminiscent of the nearly wordless films of Philippe Grandrieux. Audience expectations, nonetheless, will be continuously subverted as a series of shocking scenes constitute the remainder Laila and Aaron’s hopeless odyssey. Then comes the film’s unforgettable final sequence, a culmination of everything that comes before it: an exploration of interpersonal relationships, familial ties and the notions of attachment & co-dependence. As Laila’s vivid, green eyes begin to dart around once more, searching for a non-existent escape route, the beak of the hawk is now only centimeters above, and our understanding of the film’s title takes on a new and frightening meaning.

Catch Me Daddy opens in theaters on August 7th, and will be available to rent on VOD on September 1st.

From the opening scene of Bryan Reisberg’s debut feature Big Significant Things, it’s easy to tell that the film not only has a sense of style but a sense of sarcasm as well. The film’s protagonist stands before the World’s Largest Cedar Bucket and asks a young man to take a photo of him. At this point, it’s apparent that the film will not be about big, significant things, but about the illusion of significance. For an indie road trip comedy, Reisberg’s film is surprisingly bleak.

Big Significant Things focuses on a few days in the life of Craig Harrison (Harry Lloyd), a man who has decided to get in his car and drive aimlessly in order to figure out his life and make sure he’s headed in the right direction. He lies to his girlfriend about the vacation, telling her that he is on a business trip with colleagues when, in reality, he is traveling alone. Craig’s outright dishonesty and decision to desert his seemingly decent life is definitely intriguing, but Reisberg doesn’t do enough with the idea, therefore making the film drag along.

If there were no character arc displayed in the film’s final act, Big Significant Things might have been much worse, but it does eventually seem that Craig has taken something away from his lonely, mobile experience. But what that arc is, and what exactly Harry takes away from his trip aren’t made clear. Craig enters the film obnoxiously ignorant and leaves it obnoxiously indifferent. He learned something from his experience on the road, but what exactly is it that he learned? And is he better off having learned it?

With all of that said, Big Significant Things certainly has its strong points as well, including Harry Lloyd’s performance and Reisberg’s clever screenplay. Lloyd appears to be a natural fit for these kinds of small character pieces, and with the assistance of a more seasoned director, he could eventually crank out a great performance. Reisberg shows potential as well, especially as a screenwriter. Scenes like Craig talking with teenagers at a motel swimming pool, or his initial exchange with the film’s female lead Ella (Krista Kosonen) are two of the stronger moments in the film.

Ultimately, Reisberg’s debut could have worked better as a short film; cutting the runtime might have done some good with regard to retaining the viewers’ attention. But a shorter version still wouldn’t address the fact that it’s hard to understand what the film is trying to say. Is it saying that things are better experienced in the company of others? That it’s important to be realistic by not expecting too much out of life? The moral implications of such thinking aside, it’s telling that the version of Craig we meet in the film’s beginning is by far more interesting and likable than who he becomes by the film’s end. A sure sign that as a character study alone, Big Significant Things is wildly unsuccessful.

From watching her atmospheric horror debut, Rebound, it isn’t difficult to tell that Megan Freels Johnston shows promise as a budding director. Unfortunately, the film does suffer from some of the same issues that many contemporary low-budget genre films suffer from. Rebound is at its best when the characters are silent, committed to action, or interacting with their strange and otherworldly environment. The budget only begins to show when the actors actually have to act, when they have to recite lines from the script and converse with one another in order to propel the storyline forward. Clearly the funds in this film went more toward its production, and their appears to be some talent in the directing and editing, but all its major flaws lie within the performances and the shoddy script they are given to work with.

Rebound follows Claire (Ashley James), a young woman who catches her boyfriend cheating on her and then drives away in a hurry, without a particular destination in mind, in hopes of escaping her current living situation and toxic relationships. Essentially, she’d like to start anew and find happiness elsewhere. However, this is a horror film, not a rom-com, so instead of moving forward, Claire’s journey becomes her downward spiral. The atmosphere of her doomed road trip is almost instantly strange. Early on in the film, she enters a stall at a rest-stop and, after only a few moments, begins to hear a pounding at the door. “Got any toilet paper!?” a distraught woman screams repeatedly from the other end of the stall. This is a moment that will most likely catch audiences off guard, as it is so abrupt and darkly humorous—though in an effectively surreal way—that it forces one to call into question the reliability of the narrator.

If only Johnston, as the screenwriter, would have retained that sense of psychological ambiguity throughout the remainder of the film. What follows instead is a regression into the banality of the modern psycho-killer genre. When Claire’s car breaks down along the side of the road in a rather desolate area, she is brought to a small town by Gus (Wes O’Lee) to meet Eddie (Mark Scheibmeir), the creepy and standoff-ish mechanic who she convinces to fix her car free of charge. Eddie, of course, is hiding some secrets of his own, and so violence ensues. Even in the weaker, latter half of the film (in which character motivations become quite confusing), I admire Johnston and her cinematographer, Stephen Tringali, for their confidence as visual storytellers. For instance, they allow the camera to linger on certain images in order to increase the discomfort of their viewers, and succeed in doing so.

Johnston’s writing does show hints of promise, and even effective humor. In one scene Claire enters a nearly deserted bar during the film’s second act and proceeds to declare to the bartender, “I definitely need a large glass of wine.” These moments of subtle comedic relief tend to work well in atmospheric horror and thrillers. The inconsistency of the writing is the real shame here, for this glimmer of effective humor is immediately followed by the awkward and excessively formal line, “I’m so famished.” The improbability and unrealistic verbiage quickly pulls us out of any rapport built by accidentally clever lines.

All in all, Rebound works as an atmospheric experience but fails as an exercise in narrative horror. Any understanding of why the film’s chief characters are behaving the way that they are goes out the window during the third act. Fortunately, the cinematography and score provide the film with a slight audio-visual saving grace, though not enough to render the film recommendable.

Debut filmmaker László Nemes’ Son of Saul is, by a fair margin, the best film that I saw at the 2015 Cannes Film Festival. It follows our protagonist, Saul (portrayed with great nuance and facial acting skill by first time actor Géza Röhrig), over the course of two chaotic days in Auschwitz as the camp nears its liberation. Saul is what is known as a Sonderkommando, a prisoner marked with a red X on their back to signify that they’re responsible for helping dispose of the bodies of fellow Jews whose lives have been taken in the gas chambers. Saul’s motivation in the film is introduced when he spots the body of a young boy who he takes to be his son, and he spends the rest of the film in search of a rabbi who can assist him in providing the boy with a proper burial.

As one can imagine from only having read a summary of the film’s narrative, Son of Saul is a deeply dark and devastating experience. In total, it’s composed of what can’t be more than one or two dozen long takes. Nemes and his skilled cinematographer, Mátyás Erdély, already had me in tears within the first few lengthy shots. I cannot think of a film that better utilizes shallow focus; there is so much noise and movement and chaos within the first ten minutes of the film that one may not understand exactly what is going on, until a pile of still bodies sneaks into the corner of a frame, almost wholly out of focus, and suddenly the realization hits. That was when I first lost it.

It’s easy to tell that Nemes worked as an assistant to master filmmaker Bela Tarr, since Son of Saul’s atmosphere is reminiscent of the intense riot scene in Tarr’s Werckmeister Harmonies. Both filmmakers craft complex and extended one-shot scenes with as much, if not more, going on in the background as the foreground. Nonetheless, the way Erdély’s 35mm camera follows Saul throughout the camp, never breaking concentration on either his face or the back of his head, is more reminiscent of the legendary Alain Marcoen’s famous tracking shots (Rosetta, La Promesse, etc.) than Tarr’s cinematographers. Erdély is even smoother and more precise than Marcoen with the movement of his camera though, further allowing the audience to forget they are watching a film and experience full immersion. I can’t remember the last film I watched that was able to transport me into a frightening past the way Son of Saul is able to.

Another one of my favorite directorial decisions made by Nemes was his choice to avoid tapping into Saul’s mind or providing an inner dialogue. Rather, the camera hovers around his head constantly, always remaining external, his audience perpetually existing as flies on the walls of Auschwitz. Some viewers may have difficulty with this decision, as it makes it more difficult to understand the reasoning behind Saul’s actions, especially if the boy is not actually his son. Fortunately, the ending sheds some light on the significance of the role of children in the film, although admittedly, it was a denouement that caused a couple of my viewing companions to scratch their heads.

To me, however, it isn’t so much a confusing ending as it is a complex one (much like the entirety of the film), and a conclusion that I feel is attempting to make a commentary on how each generation is affected by the actions of the last. In order to assess the finale beyond that though, I will most certainly need to see the film another time or two. Until then, I can safely deem László Nemes as a novel name to look out for in the world of cinema, and I’m anxiously anticipating his next effort.

The 2015 Cannes Film Festival jury shocked everyone when they awarded Jacques Audiard the Palme d’Or for his social realist drama turned hyper-violent thriller, Dheepan. This decision was met with very mixed reactions on social media. People seemed to be confused about why a film that didn’t receive much buzz when it premiered during the festival was taking the top prize. Others were just surprisingly pleased. I fall into the latter category, as Dheepan is an extraordinary achievement on a number of levels: its concentration on the frightening reality of escaping one war zone for another, as well as its simultaneous micro-level commentary on French poverty and macro-level commentary on civil war in Sri Lanka (or simply civil war, in general).

Dheepan tells the story of its titular character and his attempt to rebuild his life after his wife and children were killed in Sri Lanka. He, a woman he meets at random, and an abandoned nine-year-old girl they found come together as a faux family in an attempt to escape the Sri Lankan civil war for a better life in France. Unfortunately, the area of France that they move into is dominated by gangs who use the territory for distribution of narcotics and other illegal activities. Dheepan is forced to sit back and watch as the environment he has brought his makeshift family unit into becomes more and more dangerous, and eventually he reaches his breaking point.

Although there are hints of Audiard’s fascination with international politics in his 2008 film, Un Prophete, Dheepan doesn’t feel like anything the director has done before. The biggest reason for this his choice to portray Sri Lankans in a French environment, rather than the French themselves as Audiard has primarily done in the past.

If one is going to discuss Dheepan, it’s difficult to do so without commenting on its explosive ending. The film retains great suspense throughout, as it implies the family’s eventually going to get mixed up in some sort of intense or violent encounter, but it’s hard to predict the final fifteen minutes. Those who have seen Un Prophete know that Audiard is capable of executing abrupt and graphic acts of violence in truly shocking ways, but he takes this idea to its extreme in Dheepan. No other film that I saw at Cannes this year affected me in such a visceral way.

That being said, it’s difficult to make up one’s mind on an ethical level about the penultimate sequence. In war there is often no clear “good” side, and knowing who to cheer for can be difficult. But somehow, Audiard convinces us to love the main character even when he is delusional or violent or straddling the line between protagonist and anti-hero. It’s a complex ending and one that will take repeat viewings to fully understand. But it’s not a perfect film. Dheepan nearly forgets about one of its characters in the third act and the ending feels a bit out-of-place despite being refreshing and uplifting. However, the minor flaws are completely overshadowed by everything that it does right. Dheepan fully deserves the enormous accolade it received and is sure to continue receiving as the rest of the world is exposed to it.

Did somebody say punks versus skinheads?

If you were to randomly select a group of individuals at the 2015 Cannes International Film Festival and ask them what the biggest Out of Competition surprise has been thus far, it’s almost guaranteed that at least half of them would answer Green Room without hesitation. The amount of buzz that this film has received on the grounds here has been incredible, and the best part is that it’s totally deserved. Nothing could have prepared me for the experience of watching this film. Nothing.

Green Room follows a punk band’s journey into an abyss of madness and violence after they accidentally witness a brutal murder committed at an isolated concert venue. Their neo-nazi hosts, of course, do not want to leave any witnesses, and after the punks lock themselves in the titular Green Room, all hell breaks loose. The ensemble cast do a wonderful albeit simple job in their equally minor roles; there aren’t really any “main characters” because director Jeremy Saulnier is not afraid to subvert clichés and kill off whoever at any time. The impressive cast includes Imogen Poots, Alia Shawkat, Anton Yelchin, Patrick Stewart, and Mark Webber.

Ultimately, Green Room is an exploitation horror film disguised as a fast paced thriller, only it’s actually scarier and more stunning than most of the traditional horror films released lately. It’s exploitative in the sense that the gore is gratuitous in a very nasty way, but for me the violence was always more impressive and fascinating than disengaging. For those who appreciated Saulnier’s hard-edged film Blue Ruin last year, and for anyone who needed more convincing, Green Room is sure to grab attention and make a splash back home in the States.

Andrew Cividino’s Sleeping Giant is quite an achievement when one takes into consideration that it is the work of a first time feature filmmaker. It’s more of a “slice of life” sort of movie than one with a clear and easy-to-summarize narrative, but it’s essentially a very good film concentrating on loss of innocence, scattered with moments of greatness that are usually brought to the surface by its strong technical aspects (from its stylized editing to its sporadic shifts in tone). On a level of storytelling, it excels in its subtleties; there’s a homoerotic undercurrent that runs throughout the duration of the film, and yet emotions are never spelled out, only implied. Cividino leaves his viewers to draw connections between certain images and sounds, and I respect a director who can throw exposition entirely out the window and show his audience things rather than tell them every last detail.

The performances are fine—there aren’t exactly any standout actors in the film, but I must compliment the three leads on their ability to make me feel like I knew their characters, like I spent my summers with them years ago. This can be attributed to the seemingly loose script; much of the dialogue felt improvised, but in a refreshing way and not a distracting one. All in all, Sleeping Giant is an impressive display of technical skills that also has a lot to say about the trials and tribulations of adolescence. Above all else though, it’s a beautiful exploration of mortality.

How does one even begin to describe the enigma that is Yorgos Lanthimos’ The Lobster? Since reading a brief description of its bizarre narrative months ago, it has been one of my most anticipated films of the year (and made our list for most anticipated films of 2015), and those familiar with Lanthimos’ previous work (most notably his 2009 Academy Award nominated film Dogtooth) are probably aware of how strange his work can be—but never without justification. The Lobster tells the story of David (Colin Farrell), a man who has recently been left by his partner and decides to check into The Hotel, where he has a month and a half to meet a new, suitable partner, otherwise he will be transformed into an animal of his choice.

The Lobster functions as part absurdist comedy, part dark romance and part social satire. The comedy is sharp and the romantic elements provide it with a sense of lightness which would have otherwise been absent; the execution of its societal commentary, however, is what sends it into uncharted territory, and the main reason why it comes across as such a deeply original work. Lanthimos pokes fun at certain commonalities of the modern romantic relationship, such as the notion that “birds of a feather flock together,” by utilizing the element of exaggeration. For instance, each character in the film has their singular unique characteristic. David is nearsighted, and thus is only interested in finding a woman who is nearsighted as well. The Limping Man (Ben Whishaw) pursues a woman who suffers from frequent nosebleeds, so in order to capture her attention and fool her into thinking that they are a match, he begins inflicting trauma on his nose, causing it to bleed when in her presence.

When I first saw Dogtooth, I praised it for its technical mastery: its carefully framed static shots, sharp editing and claustrophobic production design. Still, something held me back from fully embracing it, and looking back on the viewing experience now, I’m certain it was that I had a difficult time trying to figure out what it was saying about civilization. Its surreal and otherworldly, for sure, but what sort of comment is it trying to make about the human condition? It is indeed a tough egg to crack. The Lobster, on the other hand, is much more coherent (and dare I say accessible) in its satire. I don’t want to get ahead of myself, as I never thought I would be describing a Lanthimos film as accessible, but I definitely think people will have an easier time figuring out the meaning behind all of the madness here.

The technical elements of The Lobster are just as sound as those of Dogtooth, and aesthetically similar. The camera is almost perpetually static, and much attention is paid to the framing of certain shots, which is interesting because it allows the director to isolate aural elements such as off-screen noises that, though they cannot be seen, having a significant bearing on specific scenes. The musical score is jarring, but not in a negative way; I imagine it will be one of the first technical aspects that viewers take notice of, as its a loud and powerful score which makes itself known within the first few minutes. There isn’t much that I would change about The Lobster; if I was to suggest anything to the editors, it would be to pick out and remove certain scenes which might not seem as pertinent as others, for the film does exhaust a bit in its third act. Aside from that, it is a hilarious and biting critique of interpersonal relationships that is sure to appeal to a wider audience than Lanthimos’ previous works, and may bring him back into the limelight when award season rolls around.