Atlantics (2019)

Winner of the Grand Prix at Cannes this year, Atlantics (2019; Atlantique) has been released by Netflix to stream. The directorial debut of Mati Diop, the film is set in Dakar, Senegal, and observes the coastal terrain where a looming hotel is under construction in the distance. Initially the style of the film is docu-drama, […]

Zama (2017)

Set in the late 18th century, Zama (2017) is about Don Diego de Zama (Daniel Giménez Cacho), a magistrate working in a colonial outpost near the Paraguay River. The opening image sees him in a classic pose of authority, tricorne on his head, sword in his holster, gazing out at the water. The next two […]

Border (2018)

Winner of Un Certain Regard at the 2018 Cannes Film Festival, the Swedish film Border (2018; Gräns) might also take the crown for weirdest sex scene in a movie. Directed by Ali Abbasi and based on a story written by John Ajvide Lindqvist, the author of Let The Right One In, which gives an indication […]

Dolemite Is My Name (2019)

For me, Dolemite Is My Name (2019) was a good time. I was predisposed to like it because of the writers Scott Alexander and Larry Karaszewski. They wrote one of my favourite movies, Ed Wood, and the easy comparison was that this was a Blaxploitation version of that biopic. There’s a similar structure with supporting […]

Color Out Of Space (2019)

The final film I saw at this year’s MonsterFest was Color Out Of Space (2019), which I was very keen to see as a new adaptation of the HP Lovecraft story by cult director Richard Stanley (Hardware), his first film in many years after being booted off the 1996 flop, Island Of Dr Moreau. More […]