DroxineArdana

Gretel & Hansel, a moody adaptation of the Grimm Brothers fairytale, looks incredible but proves itself to be a remarkably superficial affair. The setting is confusing ( why does Gretel speak in a modern American west coast accent while everybody else speaks in variances of old English?) and the story ambles around. There's this inner monologue from Gretel that sounds like voice over from an insurance commercial and there's pretty awful stilted performances from Sophie Lillis and Samuel Leakey throughout.

Not all is bad - Alice Krige as the witch is delightful and the music is wicked. Production design and cinematography are masterful and are evocative of The Witch or The Village but lack the authority of those films. With tepid dialogue, weak story and pandering themes, Gretel & Hansel would be better served as a short film or a multimedia art piece in a gallery than a 87 minute narrative film. Check out Hansel and Gretel (1987) instead.

There are few shorts films that can, in under ten minutes, elicit both a feeling of novelty and inventiveness at the same time. "Envoy" does just that. It's a simple story that details the relationship between a boy and the thing he found in a cornfield. The VFX and production values are off the charts and the film entire is evocative of early Shyamalan or Spielberg. What makes this film compelling is what it doesn't tell or show you; the mystery in the field, the photographs on the table, the story of the boy's parents. Unfortunately it's also what makes the film a little thin. The story isn't entirely original and the nine minute runtime is far too short for any sort of investment. Still, it's a laudable effort to craft such an engaging film with such limited resources.

This film follows a little English girl who's life is riddled with bullying, domestic abuse and poverty (there are a lot of uncanny similarities with the film "Fish Tank"). Reeling from the death of a close family member, the little girl confides in old American Western serial dramas where her imagination is free to grow, that is until she finds an old revolver in a cardboard box. The short looks like a million dollars with excellent production values and a great cast but the story drains into the most lazy of endings. There's nothing clever here, no great statement is made despite the directors "gotcha" ending that was supposed to be powerful but just comes across as gimmicky, cynical and gratuitous. 4 stars for the production values.