Pedro Lima 
The Semaine de la Critique (Critics Week) is a crucial sidebar at the Festival de Cannes. It focuses on debut and sophomore films. A Useful Ghost (Pee Chai Dai Ka) by the Thai director Ratchapoom Boonbunchachoke is another hyped first-time directorial effort. The semaine is responsible for unveiling buzzy titles …
In recent years, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has become a central part of the geopolitical discussions due to his scandals as the leader of his country. In 2016, Netanyahu was investigated for corruption and bribery. Over two years, Justice interrogated everyone near him. The result was thousands of hours …
On October 11th, 1975, television changed forever. NBC premiered a revolutionary concept. It combined a bunch of young and innovative comedians who would perform sketches written during the week. The show, commanded by the young Canadian writer Lorne Michaels, was Saturday Night Live. Fifty years later, SNL became a place …
The advance of societal organization in urban centers granted us a massive challenge: coexisting with nature on a grander scale. Cities have had to coexist with wild animals since their inception; however, the newer styles of glass, construction, and wildfires offer a dangerous obstacle to different species, especially birds. Director …
Ahmir ‘Questlove’ Thompson returns to the directing chair with SLY LIVES! (aka The Burden of Black Genius). He became a legend in the music industry with the iconic hip-hop group The Roots. Alongside Black Thought and company, the group achieved critical success with their albums and popularized jazz rap within …
In early 2021, the then-President of the United States of America, Joe Biden, announced that American troops would withdraw from Afghanistan. As part of their strategy in the war on terror after the 9/11 attacks in NYC, the U.S. troops would arrive in 2001 and stay until 2021. In the …
There are moments in human history that become monumental marks of passage. They shift the years to come and how humanity reacts to the world around it. However, the stubborn characteristics of the individuals ignore warnings that may protect them from a grander danger. In Blame, Christian Frei covers a …
In 1954, the General of the Paraguayan army, Alfredo Stroessner, performed a military coup in which he would become the country’s President. At that time, Paraguay would be an internationally unknown territory between two massive South American potencies: Argentina and Brazil. In Under the Flags, the Sun, the Paraguayan director …
Since Russia annexed the Crimean Peninsula in 2014, film production has shifted to narrating the intricacies of geopolitical matters. The 2022 Russian aggression and declaration of war by invading the Ukrainian borders provided different approaches to the reality in filmmaking. Therefore, the major film festivals in the world became a …
During the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR), cinema was a meaningful tool for propaganda and Soviet cultural identity development. As the USSR had a massive territorial length, each region would have a unique voice in its approach regarding filmmaking. Therefore, plenty of the productions from the Soviet period are …
In 2021, the well-known director Stanley Nelson received his first Academy Award nomination for Best Documentary Feature for his film Attica. The film uses archival footage to tell an untold story about the most significant uprising in the American criminal system. Nelson fills a crucial vacancy in American filmmaking. He …
The grand Austrian director Michael Haneke famously stated, to paraphrase, that a film is 24 lies per second in service of the attempt to find the truth. In this sense, cinema is a mere representation of the reality. This conceptualization allows multiple directors to experiment with the understanding of the …
The sophomore effort in the Napo River (Toroboro) in Manolo Sarmiento’s diptych about the local communities is La Consulta Popular, or The People’s Referendum. He focuses on the political aspect of the situation. With this film, he shifts his lenses to the isolated tribes, who decided to continue far from …
The Ecuadorian director Manolo Sarmiento is a crucial figure in the local documentary community. He is the co-founder and executive director of EDOC, Encuentros del Otro Cine, a singular festival for Ecuadorian cinema. Sarmiento produced a diptych, a two-piece work on the native people of the Rio Napo. The indigenous …
Lúcia Murat is a noteworthy filmmaker in Brazilian History. She engaged in an armed fight during the Brazilian dictatorship – She was jailed and tortured. Murat became a journalist and then a film director. Forty years later, she is still directing films and splitting her filmography between non-fiction and fiction. …
In 2016, the press revealed an espionage scheme for the asbestos industry. A hired person would infiltrate the anti-asbestos organizations and leak their plans to the hirers. That man is Robert Moore, a former TV producer of popular prank shows like Da Ali G Show and Candid Camera. After a …
Since the first presentation in Paris in 1896, moving pictures have been compiled to create kinetic movement and impress audiences. The fascination of the frames moving created a collective memory in society. Technically, the media’s pushing became the obsession of cinematographers, who aimed to point their cameras to the perfect …
Director Erico Rassi has become one of the most fascinating voices of the newest Brazilian cinema. He combines the classical codes of the Western genre and gives them another significance. In his debut feature, the 2016 Comeback, he narrates the story of a man who lost the magnificence of his …
Cinema represents reality by allowing us to imagine ourselves in situations that may seem far from our daily existence. In her directorial debut, Mexican director Urzula Barba Hopfner envisions the life of Corina (Naian González Norvind), an agoraphobic woman. She has an anxiety disorder that affects her when she is …
Throughout its violent process of independence and establishment of national identity, Ireland grew tentatively separating from the colonial exploitation of the British Empire. The Catholic church contributed massively to the societal construction of the Irish; however, it led to a misogynist and oppressed culture in the earliest years. As the …