Favorite films

Recent reviews

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  Pride 2014

  ★★★★★ Rewatched 06 Jun 2023

  In this case IDGAF about, like, filmic technique. Unions x Queers is automatically top marks from me, forever.  

  Queer and straight actors performing their hearts out (can we please put West and Scott together again, in anything, soon?) on a piece of little-known leftist history that explicitly draws up our intersectionality? LFG.

• 

  The Inspection 2022

  ★★★★ Watched 05 Jun 2023

  Why is it that Jeremy Pope can have multiple Tony and Golden Globe nominations, an Emmy nod, and a Grammy to his name and still be under the radar? (No rush…I’ll wait…)

  He’s just incendiary here - all fireworks trapped under a cast iron pan. The supporting cast are similarly well-calibrated, particularly Union and Castilo.

  Overall, a well-designed and directed film with a superb score that deserves a wider audience.

Popular reviews

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  Before Night Falls 2000

  ★★★★★ Rewatched 22 Jun 2019

  This review may contain spoilers. I can handle the truth.

  A old friend of mine surprised me with a day trip to see this in the only theatre within 100 miles playing it. It was then, and remains now, astonishing. There are images that have remained frozen in my mind, all these years later. It’s not perfect - and some casting choices are super-problematic - but it remains one of the single best adaptations I’ve ever seen in terms of capturing the unique tone and cadence of a writer’s words.…

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  Short Term 12 2013

  ★★★★½ Watched 04 Oct 2020

  If there were a retroactive award for casting generational talent, this film would be an excellent candidate. Larson and Dever give towering performances conveying the throughline of enduring and reckoning with abuse, as well as the humor and charm one needs to survive in a world that often fails to protect children.