This is middle of the pack Schrader. That said, middling Schrader eclipses most American filmmakers on their “A” game. Despite playing its narrative cards a bit too loosely, I nonetheless appreciated The Card Counter’s unflinching and scrupulous examination of a layered moral quagmire. The film definitely suits Schrader’s recurring motifs & sensibilities like a spade — dealing out a hyper-reflexive character study of a tortured figure carrying immense ethical weight, contrition, and self-loathing. But it’s also so glibly content with itself that…
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Rollerball 1975
Rollerball is a slippery, stylish, paranoid 70s thriller with a cool subversive energy. As protagonist Jonathan E., James Caan sports overgrown chest hair, bell bottoms, & a glib smirk befit for a porno movie. His smarmy countenance, however, grows increasingly quizzical and jaded as he investigates the totalitarian powers invisibly pulling levers behind the scenes. Turns out the ultraviolent, futuristic roller-derby game he’s devoted his life to may not be all it seems. This newfound disillusionment is punctuated by a dreamy interlude…
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False Positive 2021
The biggest false positive here is the A24 logo. Easily one of the studio’s least fecund entries. Worse than terrible, it’s just mediocre — bereft of narrative indirection or ingenuity. The terror-induced hallucinations are redundant, the suspense barren, and the big reveal predictable as anything I’ve seen. For the true horrors of infertility, watch Private Life instead.
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Bo Burnham: Inside 2021
Jean-Luc Godard once famously said that “all you need to make a movie is a girl and a gun.”
Bo Burnham just upped the ante, proving that all you really need is a single human being confined inside a single room—and maybe a caustic sock puppet, too.
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Sound of Metal 2019
Fu#!. As a once broke touring musician, this film hit hard. Really hard.
And the sound design is straight up impeccable.
