This is a banner for a review of the documentary Scarlet Girls. Image courtesy of the filmmakers.

‘Scarlet Girls’ Documentary Review: Legal Violence in the Dominican Republic

Throughout the social formation of the Americas, religiosity is fundamental to understanding the rooted traditions of the multiple Latin cultures. In a sense, the moral compass, the ethics, and the comprehension of the world reflect the influences of the Portuguese and Spanish Catholics, who, through the genocidal project, spread the …

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‘Dead Lover’ Film Review: a Gutsy and Glorious Paean to Love, With all its Smells and Squelches

Grace Glowicki’s Dead Lover arrives as Frankenstein tales are having a real cultural moment. With Guillermo del Toro’s film released last autumn (and picking up three Oscars) and Maggie Gyllenhaal’s The Bride currently in cinemas, Glowicki’s picture as director, co-writer (with Ben Petrie, who also stars) and star may not …

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‘Pretty Lethal’ Movie Review: A Masterclass in “Ballet-Fu” Dragged Down by a Thin Script

Whenever the names of 87North Productions or 87Eleven Entertainment are linked to a new project, my interest immediately spikes. After all, we’re talking about the teams that redefined modern action cinema with the John Wick franchise and continued to leave their mark on films like Nobody, Violent Night, or The …

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‘Dhurandhar The Revenge’ Film Review – A Dish Best Not Served

Content warning: descriptions of incredibly graphic violence from the start Sometimes a movie makes it apparent why we do the work we do. For example, if someone stabbed me in the shoulder, twisted the knife, and then stomped on the knife while it was still in my body, I might …

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‘Project Hail Mary’ Movie Review: Ryan Gosling Shines In A Visually Stunning Redemption Story For The Ages

Like a large portion of the audience, I walked into the theater without any familiarity with the literary work by Andy Weir that the film attempts to adapt — yes, the majority of viewers have never read, played, or known the source material on the vast majority of these occasions. …

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‘Scarpetta’ Review: Psychological Family Drama Masquerading As Whodunnit

It has taken decades, but Patricia Cornwell’s iconic literary character, Dr. Kay Scarpetta, has finally been brought to life. Nicole Kidman takes on the role of the unrelenting chief medical examiner trying to prove that the case that made her career wasn’t based on misinformation. Scarpetta is more than your …

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‘GoldenEye’ Film Review: A James Bond Departure That Feels Just More of the Same

Re-released for its 30th anniversary last year, Martin Campbell’s 1995 super spy movie GoldenEye looks and feels particularly vintage, like something you’d watch on a holiday. The seventeenth title in the James Bond franchise, the film introduced a new 007 in Pierce Brosnan, who would end up playing the part …

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‘Fiz Um Foguete Imaginando que Você Vinha’ Film Review: A Playful Road Trip that Challenges Logic and Time

In the Brazilian cinema history, there are classic examples of road trip films. One of them is Iracema by Jorge Bodansky and Orlando Senna, a time capsule on the Northern region of the country during the military dictatorship. Regionally, a landmark of the sensorial cinema in the country is Viajo …

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‘Quezon’ Movie Review: Jerrold Tarog Reckons Yet Again With the Idea of a Great Man in the Final Installment to His Deconstructionist Hero Trilogy

Filipino filmmaker Jerrold Tarog’s historical biopic trilogy, which began a decade ago, may just have run its course with Quezon, notwithstanding the latest installment’s prescient coda. The movie first played in Philippine theaters in October last year and screened in the Limelight program of the 2026 International Film Festival Rotterdam, …

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‘La Belle Année’ Documentary Review: A Bloated Remembering of Teenage Desires

Cinema works as a personal diary for filmmakers. The camera as an instrument substitutes the pen, words shift to images, and the stories build upon a different logic. Similar to the process of writing in a journal, there is a process involved in the act of storytelling. The written story …

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‘The President’s Cake’ Film Review: A Moving, Often Harrowing Portrait of Resilience

Hasan Hadi’s The President’s Cake is a difficult film to watch. For 105 minutes, the Iraqi filmmaker’s directorial debut puts us in the middle of Saddam Hussein’s despotic reign and shows us harsh realities that many Western viewers are unfamiliar with. Even with Iraq’s invasion of Kuwait and economic sanctions …

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