Movie Reviews

In Dahomey, Mati Diop Gives the Past a Lyrical Voice

Published

1 year ago

October 25, 2024

In Dahomey, Mati Diop Gives the Past a Lyrical Voice

Dahomey is only 68 minutes long, but in that stretch of time, it crosses continents, considers the ongoing effects of colonialism from multiple angles, and moves from the metaphysical to the mundane. Mati Diop’s second feature film shares elements, interests, and a distinctive restlessness with her 2019 debut Atlantics, though it falls, however unconventionally, within the realm of documentary. It’s only appropriate that a filmmaker so focused on interrogating how little borderlines actually circumscribe the people, history, and cultures they are meant to contain would herself make a work that can’t easily be summed up within one genre. Dahomey is nonfiction, observing the November 2022 return of 26 royal artifacts that were looted from the Kingdom of Dahomey by the French in 1892 and that are being repatriated to the present-day country of Benin. But among the voices included in the film, which range from curator Calixte Biah to a collection of students who debate the significance of the restored items, is one belonging to the treasures themselves. In lines spoken by Haitian writer Makenzy Orcel, they speak lyrically about their time in exile and in the darkness of foreign museums. “There are thousands of us in this night. We all bear the same scars, uprooted, ripped out, the spoils of massive plundering,” they say. “I’m torn between the fear of not being recognized by anyone and not recognizing anything.” This choice adds a dreamlike touch to a film otherwise about the brutal realities of not-so-distant acts of rapacious imperialism and a present day in which the West is still able to dictate the terms with which it reckons with the past.

Dahomey is a more expansive film than Atlantics, a supernatural romance set in a Dakar where desperate young men can only see a better future for themselves across the ocean in Spain. But it’s also more aloof, a compact creation that advances itself like a dense, avant-garde essay onscreen. The camera, almost always still, captures odd moments of humanity, whether that’s a guard noodling on their phone while walking the grounds of the Palais de la Marina in Cotonou at night or a student dozing off during the discussion section. Dahomey has bigger concerns, too, which make it a headier and more abstract work to contend with, even as Diop shows off her ability to find poetry in the faces of the people, first workers, then grandees, then members of the public, who come to see the artworks in their new-old home. The film functions on its most basic level as a testament to the ability of the Beninese to properly care for the artifacts, an argument that has been used as justification for withholding their return and one that is refuted with every shot of the Beninese curators receiving the boxes, carefully unpacking their contents, cataloguing the items and their condition, and, finally, putting them on display. The 26 artworks are a mere fraction of the thousands that were plundered and have yet to be repatriated, but their return is still greeted with celebrations in the street and front-page coverage in the newspaper.

I loved Atlantics, whereas, after two viewings, Dahomey remains a work that I like less while admiring its ambition more. Key to that experience is the sequence that fills much of the final third of the film, in which University of Abomey-Calavi students participate in a forum about what the return of the artifacts means to them. As someone who is sensitive to a fault about didacticism, the very existence of this segment had me on edge. But the discussion is lively, wide-ranging, and rarely in accordance with any particular point. One young man says that he feels nothing about the items, while another confesses, to some jeers from the audience, to crying at the sight of them and being in awe of the ingenuity of their ancestors. Some see the paltry number of artifacts returned as an inherent insult, while others protest that the immaterial aspects of their cultural past were never lost and shouldn’t be discounted. There’s talk about the repatriation as a gesture meant to boost the image of France, or as a political act on the part of Beninese president Patrice Talon, who, as one student points out, is the descendant of interpreters who helped allow the thefts to happen in the first place. If the rest of the film takes a somber, poetic perspective on the symbolic and literal nature of this partial restoration of a lost heritage, its youth represents a bold, discordant, and exciting counterpoint — vital and engaged, looking toward a future they demand be better than the past.

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Movie Reviews

Movie Review: Here comes “THE BRIDE!”, audacious and wild – Rue Morgue

Published

2 hours ago

March 5, 2026

Press Room

Movie Review: Here comes “THE BRIDE!”, audacious and wild – Rue Morgue

That’s both a promise and a challenge she delivers, since what follows may rub some viewers the wrong way. Yet Gyllenhaal’s full-throttle commitment to her vision is compelling in and of itself, and she has marshalled an absolutely smashing-looking and -sounding production. The story proper begins in 1936 Chicago, which, like everything and everyplace else in the movie, has been luminously shot by cinematographer Lawrence Sher and sumptuously conjured by production designer Karen Murphy. Her involvement is appropriate given that her previous credits include Bradley Cooper’s A STAR IS BORN and Baz Luhrmann’s ELVIS, since among other things, THE BRIDE! is a nostalgic musical. Its Frankenstein (Christian Bale), who has taken the name of his maker, is obsessed with big-screen tuners, and imagines himself in elaborate song-and-dance numbers. (Considering the reception to JOKER: FOLIE À DEUX, one must applaud the daring of Warner Bros. for greenlighting another expensive film in which a tormented protagonist has that kind of fantasy life.)

THE BRIDE! may be revisionist on many levels, but its characterization of its “monster” holds true to past screen incarnations from Karloff’s to Elordi’s: His scarred appearance masks a lonely soul who desires companionship. Frankenstein has arrived in Chicago to seek out Dr. Cornelia Euphronious (Annette Bening), correctly believing she has the scientific know-how to create an appropriate mate for him. Rather than piece one together, Dr. Euphronious resurrects the corpse of Ida (Jessie Buckley), whose consorting with underworld types led to her brutal death. Previously chafing against the man’s world she inhabited in life, she becomes even more defiant and unruly as a revenant, apparently possessed by the spirit of Shelley herself, declaiming in free-associative sentences and quoting rebellious literature.

Buckley, currently an Oscar favorite for her very different literary-inspired role in HAMNET, tears into the role of the Bride (who now goes by the name Penny) with invigorating abandon that bursts off the screen. Unsure of her identity yet overflowing with self-confident bravado, she’s the opposite of the sensitive “Frank,” but they’re united by the world that stands against them. That becomes literal when a violent incident sends them on the lam, road-tripping to New York City and beyond, on a trail inspired by the films of Ronnie Reed (Jake Gyllenhaal), Frank’s favorite song-and-dance-man star.

With THE BRIDE!, Gyllenhaal has made a film that’s at once her very own and a feverish homage to all sorts of cinema past and present. It’s a horror story, a lovers-on-the-run movie, a crime thriller, a musical and more, and historical fealty be damned if it makes for a good scene (as when Penny and Frank sneak into a 3D movie over a decade before such features became popular). In-references are everywhere: It might just be a coincidence that the couple’s travels take them past Fredonia, NY (cf. “Freedonia” in the Marx Brothers’ DUCK SOUP), but it’s certainly no accident that the former Ida is targeted by a crime boss named Lupino, referencing the actress and pioneering filmmaker whose works included noirs and women’s-issues stories. Penny’s exploits lead legions of admiring women to adopt her look and anarchic attitude, echoing the first JOKER (while a headline calls them “Twisted Sisters”), and the use of one Irving Berlin song in a Frankensteinian context immediately recalls a classic comedic take on the property.

Whether the audience should be put in mind of a spoof at a key point in a film with different goals is another matter. At times like these, Gyllenhaal’s pastiche ambitions overtake emotional investment in the story. As strong as the two lead performances are (Bale is quite moving, conveying a great deal of soul from behind his extensive prosthetics), it’s easier to feel for them in individual scenes than during the entire course of the just-over-two-hour running time. The diversions can be entertaining, to be sure, but they also result in an uncertainty of tone. The dissonance continues straight through to the end, where the filmmaker’s choice of closing-credits song once again suggests we’re not supposed to take all this too seriously.

There’s nonetheless much to admire and enjoy about THE BRIDE!, and this kind of risk-taking by a major studio is always to be encouraged (especially considering that we’ll see how long that lasts at Warner Bros. once Paramount takes it over). Beyond the terrific work by the aforementioned actors, there’s fine support from Peter Sarsgaard and Penelope Cruz as detectives on Penny and Frank’s heels, with Sandy Powell’s lavish costumes and Hildur Guðnadóttir’s rich, varied score vital to fashioning this fully imagined world. Kudos also to makeup and prosthetics designer Nadia Stacey and to Chris Gallaher and Scott Stoddard, who did those honors on Frank, for their visceral, evocative work. Uneven as it may be, THE BRIDE! is also as alive! as any film you’ll likely see this year.

Movie Reviews

Maxime Giroux – ‘In Cold Light’ movie review

Published

14 hours ago

March 4, 2026

Press Room

Maxime Giroux – ‘In Cold Light’ movie review

(Credits: Far Out / Elevation Pictures)

Wed 4 March 2026 9:30, UK

Maxime Giroux – ‘In Cold Light’

The action is relentless in the complex thriller In Cold Light, a tense combination of crime and fugitive tale and family drama. It is the third feature and first English language film by Maxime Giroux, best known for a very different kind of film, the critically acclaimed 2014 drama Felix & Meira.

The tension and high energy of In Cold Light almost overwhelm the film, but are relieved, barely, by moments of character development and introspection that keep the audience pulling for the restrained and outwardly cold main character.

Speaking at the film’s Canadian premiere, director Giroux admitted he found creating an action film a challenge. Part of his approach was using very minimal dialogue, especially for the central character, letting the action speak for itself, and allowing silence to intensify suspense. Giroux has said he likes the lack of dialogue and speaks highly of the importance of silence in cinema; he prefers using “physical aspects of communication” in his films.

Young Ava Bly (Maika Monroe) is a competent and businesslike drug dealer, working in partnership with her brother Tom (Jesse Irving) and a small team. As the film begins, Ava has just been released from a brief prison sentence. She is hoping to return to her former position, but her brother’s associates consider her a risk due to her recent incarceration. While she works to re-establish herself, a shocking encounter with a corrupt police officer sends Ava’s life into chaos and forces her to go on the run.

Ava’s fugitive experience introduces a new character, to whom Ava turns for help: her father, Will Bly, played by Troy Kotsur, known for his excellent performance in CODA. Their first interaction is handled in a fascinating way, as Will is deaf and the two communicate through sign language. This, of course, provides another form of the silent interaction the director prefers; he explained that much of the father-daughter interaction was rewritten with the actor in mind. Their conflict is nicely expressed through a scene in which their initial conversation is intermittently cut off by a faulty light which goes out periodically, making communication through sign momentarily impossible, nicely expressing the rift between father and daughter.

As Ava continues to evade danger, her escape becomes complicated by new information, placing her in a painful dilemma. We gradually learn more about Ava, her background, and her character through occasional flashbacks and glimpses of her dreams. The plot becomes more complex and more poignant, and gains features of a mystery as well as an action tale, as she is pressed to choose from among equally unacceptable alternatives.

The climax of her efforts to protect both herself and those close to her comes to a head as she meets with the director of a rival drug gang. Veteran actress Helen Hunt is perfect in the minor but significant role of Claire, the rival drug lord, who plays odd mind games with Ava in an intriguing psychological fencing match. It’s an unusual scene, in which Ava’s personality is made clearer, and Claire’s understated dominance and casual speech do not quite conceal the threat she represents.

The frantic pace and emotional turmoil are enhanced by the camera work, which tends to focus tightly on Ava, and by a harsh, minimal musical score that sets the tone without distracting from the action. Giroux chose to shoot the film in Super 60; he describes digital as “too perfect” for the look he was going for, and since “Ava is rough,” the film portrays her better. The director describes the entire movie as “rough,” in fact, and deliberately chose a dark, washed-out look for much of the footage, occasionally using light and colour, in the form of fireworks, lightning, or a colourful carnival, to both relieve and emphasise the darkness.

The dynamic, intense story holds the attention in spite of the lengthy, sometimes repetitive chase scenes and subdued dialogue. Ava’s predicament, and the difficult decisions she is forced to make, are made surprisingly relatable, from the initial disaster that starts the action to the surprising flash-forward that concludes the film, on as high a note as the situation could allow. Fans of action movies will definitely enjoy this one.

Movie Reviews

Jeremy Schuetze’s ‘ANACORETA’ (2022) – Movie Review – PopHorror

Published

1 day ago

March 4, 2026

Press Room

Jeremy Schuetze’s ‘ANACORETA’ (2022) – Movie Review – PopHorror

PopHorror had the chance to check out Anacoreta (2022) ahead of its streaming release! Does this meta-horror flick provide interesting story telling or is it a confusing mess.

Let’s have a look…

Synopsis

A group of friends heads to a secluded woodland cabin for a weekend getaway, planning to film an experimental horror movie. As the shoot progresses, the project begins to fall apart—until a real and terrifying presence emerges from the darkness.

Anacoreta is directed by Jeremy Schuetze. It was written by Jeremy Schuetze and Matt Visser. The film stars Antonia Thomas (Bagman 2024), Jesse Stanley (Raf 2019), Jeremy Schuetze (Jennifer’s Body 2009), and Matt Visser (A Lot Like Christmas 2021)

My Thoughts

Antonia Thomas delivered an outstanding performance as the female lead in Anacoreta. It was remarkable to watch her convey such a wide range of emotions with authenticity and depth. I was continually impressed by her ability to switch seamlessly between different dialects. I absolutely loved her delivery of the dialogue of telling The Scorpion and the Frog fable.

Anacoreta employs a distinctive, meta-horror style of storytelling. The narrative follows a group of friends creating a “scripted reality” horror film, and as the plot unfolds, the boundary between their staged production and their actual lives becomes increasingly blurred. This was interesting, but at the same time frustrating as a viewer.