A married Korean man finds himself staying in Paris in Hong’s thought-provoking and layered work about the inherent affinities and contradictions of living a present life to one’s desire, as he gets caught up in an incompatible romance with a younger woman.
A tense, suspense-driven war thriller centering on a bomb squad that thrives on unpredictability, even though its shaky-cam excesses and lack of a traditional narrative may wear thin at more than two hours.
An anti-thriller almost, in this assured film of two distinct halves about a vengeful criminal, an exploited prostitute, and a guilt-ridden policeman who all become implicated in life’s luck of the draw.
Escalante’s sophomore feature is slow and deliberate, yet extremely exacting in what it wants to do, which is to portray with docu-style authenticity one day in the life of two illegal Mexican labourers, with shocking results.
Surya’s debut is a charming and unexpectedly gleeful take on the freedom and limits of telling stories, built around a rich if lonely young woman who has a way with violence and deceit.
An outrageously fun kimchi western for the ages, this is one of the most accomplished action films from South Korea.
An underrated thriller that benefits from strong performances by the lead cast and an outstanding score by Marc Streitenfeld.
This companion piece to ‘881’ is the lesser of the two – craft-wise it is pretty good, but characterisations are much less convincing here.
Inspired by Kiarostami’s ‘Taste of Cherry‘, this standout American indie about a young effervescent Senegalese taxi driver befriending a suicidal old man features two extraordinary, emotionally affecting performances from Souleymane Sy Savane and Red West.
Kiarostami shoots the close-ups of more than a hundred actresses as they watch a theatrical presentation unfold in this conceptually bold but ultimately uninvolving treatise on the nature of spectatorship.
Eternality Tan