Don’t Think I’ve Forgotten: Cambodia’s Lost Rock and Roll (2015; John Pirozzi) GRADE: B By Daniel Barnes *Opens today at the Balboa Theater in San Francisco, the Rialto Cinemas Elmwood in Berkeley, and the Rialto Cinemas in Sebastopol. With The Wrecking Crew, Lambert & Stamp, and now this […]
Meet Marlon Brando (1965; Albert and David Maysles) Grade: B By Mike Dub In the introduction to last year’s ESFS Festival about the “Dark Ages” of Marlon Brando, we discussed the unrelenting stream of box office bombs that afflicted Brando throughout the 1960s. Hamstrung under a difficult contract […]
Kung Fu Killer/Jungle (2015; Teddy Chan) GRADE: B By Daniel Barnes *Opens today in San Francisco, Daly City and San Jose. I honestly have no idea what to call this Hong Kong action epic about a serial killer who targets martial arts masters. The IMDB page and all […]
Clouds of Sils Maria (2015; Olivier Assayas) GRADE: B+ By Daniel Barnes *Now playing at the Embarcadero Center Cinemas in San Francisco, the Albany Twin in Albany, and the Christopher B. Smith Rafael Film Center in San Rafael. Oliver Assayas directs Juliette Binoche as an insecure actress who […]
Cheatin’ (2015; Bill Plympton) GRADE: B- By Daniel Barnes In a genre overwhelmingly dominated by major studios, nine-digit budgets, digital animation, wisecracking animals, A-list voice casts, and costly pop song licensing rights, animator Bill Plympton remains an iconoclast. Cheatin’, which premiered at Slamdance 2014 but is only now […]
Man from Reno (2015; Dave Boyle) GRADE: B- By Daniel Barnes *Opens today at the Sundance Kabuki in San Francisco. This subdued, almost ephemeral, bilingual murder mystery seems designed more for fans of detective fiction than for film noir nuts. That said, it still possesses a sly potency. […]
