survival
It’s no fun to criticise an aspiring filmmaker’s low budget passion project- but when the result is as misguided as Quarries, it’s necessary.
Here Alone is a survival story in a zombie apocalypse, but its story struggles to survive against the great zombie films that precede it.
Fantassút, a short documentary about the largest refugee camp in Europe, is a surprisingly beautiful depiction of real people who lived through hellish conditions.
Sugar Mountain is a dark thriller about life in small-town America; with fine character acting and tension building, it’s a unique hit.
“Why are we here? What is life all about? Is God really real, or is there some doubt?
Nearly everything about the film The Shallows seems to indicate that you wouldn’t be at a loss for missing it in theaters. The premise of an attractive woman in turmoil, coupled with an unbelievably vicious shark – each of these stories on their own has been done time and time again. Yet, somehow, The Shallows manages to just surpass the murky depths that most of those films sink to.
The inner urge for survival is the most primitive of all impulses. For the longest time, sex was believed to be the driving force that pushes people, unconsciously and fully-cognizant, towards certain results in life. But after WWII especially, psychologists and holocaust survivors began to revisit the idea, and psychoanalysts took the obvious cue from Darwin:
In the Heart of the Sea was originally supposed to premiere in early 2015, but it was pushed to later in the year at the last second. Ron Howard hoped that more people would come out to see the film now as opposed to in early spring, since some other oceanic adventure films have seen success around this time (Life of Pi, for example). It was my sincere hope that pushing the film to December was also because it would be worthy of premiering next to more awards-friendly films, which could mean that it was better than originally expected.
The tale of survival is a common one in the world of film. These stories present harrowing experiences that an individual or group must overcome before finally seeking rescue by the end. What these films rarely discuss, though, is the aftermath of the experience:
Some of the very best films are those that are immersive experiences. You immediately know after leaving the theater that you have witnessed something special, and for anyone to even suggest otherwise just seems inarguably wrong. The Martian is one of the few films that I have seen this year that has left such an impact.
The first I heard of No Escape was in a radio interview with Lake Bell. I’d been a fan of hers for a while, and being still in awe of her performance in Man Up, I was enthralled by her explanation of why she had taken on an action film. She talked of how it was important to her to gain new experiences so she could learn more about herself and her craft.
A few years ago, I heard about two films going in to production, both on the subject of Mount Everest. The biopic of Mallory fell by the wayside and is still languishing in pre-production. However, the other soared, for about a moment.
If there is ever a fitting description for Arnold Schwarzenegger’s cinematic persona, then it is this: action film hero. Time and time again, we’ve seen the ex-California Governor’s face adorning several iconic titles, portraying mere mortals (or robots in Terminator’s case) possessing near-superhuman ability, an eye for supersized weapons and a knack for crisp one-liners.
To the eyes of international audiences, Nordic countries are stereotypically relied upon to produce gruelling, depressing thrillers, movies in the vein of Sweden’s The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo and TV shows in the vein of Denmark’s The Killing. One country that seems exempt from the current cultural fascination with “Nordic Noir” is Finlan. Whereas other (mostly Scandinavian) countries in Northern Europe are importing their grim and gripping thrillers worldwide, Finnish cinema seems to be playing to a different trend entirely from their neighbouring cousins.
Here at Film Inquiry, we were quite excited about The Rover. The trailer looked very promising; moreover, the movie was directed by famous and notorious director David Michôd. Famous for his hauntingly emotional scripts, notorious for the amounts of violence he tends to feature.