My Life as a Zucchini (2017; Claude Barras) GRADE: B By Daniel Barnes Spoiler alert: this film is not about a little boy who transforms into a zucchini. That goofball title and the Pop Art-meets-Cubist character designs do nothing to prepare you for this relatively realistic and fairly […]
Rogue One: A Star Wars Story (2016; Gareth Edwards) GRADE: B- By Daniel Barnes *Opens everywhere December 16. After the joyless vapidity of the prequels, J.J. Abrams’ Star Wars: Episode VII – The Force Awakens rebooted the franchise back to its original settings. The film honored the past […]
Evolution (2016; Lucile Hadzihalilovic) GRADE: B- By Daniel Barnes *Opens today at the Roxie Theater in San Francisco. Evolution is an unusual, fairly original entry into the horror genre, blending Lost-style intrigue, Cronenberg-ian body horror and European neo-miserable disaffection. Unfortunately, despite a truly disturbing core and some nightmarish […]
Daughters of the Dust (1991; Julie Dash) GRADE: B By Daniel Barnes It took Julie Dash fifteen years to make Daughters of the Dust, and although it’s raw and occasionally impenetrable, it’s also the sort of breakthrough low-budget movie that should have been the stepping stone to a […]
The Handmaiden (2016; Chan-wook Park) GRADE: A- By Daniel Barnes The best film of the year so far. Anyone who has followed me over the years knows my love-hate relationship with the act of taking notes during a film. My chief concern: it interferes with the act of […]
Being 17 (2016; André Téchiné) GRADE: B By Daniel Barnes *Opens Friday, October 27, at the Landmark Opera Plaza in San Francisco and the Landmark Shattuck in Berkeley. Pampered, white, tentatively out teen Damien (Kacey Mottet Klein, who also starred in the MVFF39 offering Keeper) gets driven to […]
