Author: Chad Liffmann

Film Review: “Anemone”

Day-Lewis father and son create a beautifully shot bore

Ray (Daniel Day-Lewis) and Jem (Sean Bean) stare and think and stare in “Anemone.”

Anemone is the directorial debut from Ronan Day-Lewis, son of Daniel Day-Lewis. Both father and son have writing credits on the film, and not coincidentally the film is about a father coming to terms with his past and a son reckoning with his father’s elusive wartime legacy. Ronan, 27, has some prior cinematography credits, and demonstrates a promising grasp of visual staging. However, Anemone asks too much from the audience. Extracting themes and identifying Greek mythological references are welcome forms of audience participation, but Anemone implores the viewer to not only guess narrative context, but then puzzle it together. Lacking a coherent script, Anemone feels underbaked. The film is a style-over-substance exercise in nepo-baby reasoning unfurling at a glacial pace, barely held aloft by Daniel Day-Lewis’s noteworthy performance. Continue reading “Film Review: “Anemone””

Film Feature: MVFF48 Festival Preview #1

The 48th Mill Valley Film Festival  (MVFF) will take place Oct. 2-12, with screenings at theaters across the North and East Bay.

For a full view of special awards, spotlights, and centerpiece films, check out the complete festival guide. Tickets can be purchased here. Below is a preview of the festival, featuring brief looks at three films:

1.) THE SECRET AGENT
(Brazil, France, Germany, Netherlands, 2025. 158 min.)

The Secret Agent is a blistering 1970s-styled political thriller as prescient today as the film could’ve been in the era in which the story takes place. In a tremendously powerful performance, Wagner Moura (Narcos; Civil War) plays an ex-professor in Brazil who is in hiding with other refugees from the country’s military dictatorship, with numerous authoritative officials after them. Director Kleber Mendonça Filho (Bacurau) soaks The Secret Agent in textural viscerality; the characters are drenched in sweat, the colorful costumes and immaculate set design pop off the screen, and the musical score infuses the slow-burn narrative with mystery and energy. 

Screenings (click here for tickets):
– Fri., Oct. 3rd, 6:00pm at CinéArts Sequoia
– Sun., Oct. 5th, 11:15am at Smith Rafael Film Center Continue reading “Film Feature: MVFF48 Festival Preview #1”

Film Review: “One Battle After Another”

Revolutions and zany bombast mix together in Anderson’s stick of cinematic dynamite

“Ghetto Pat” aka Bob Ferguson (Leonardo DiCaprio) is on the run/hunt.

Well-crafted films can accomplish two objectives: entertain audiences and support an artist’s viewpoint (the “message” of the film, if you will). Writer/director Paul Thomas Anderson (There Will Be Blood; Phantom Thread; Licorice Pizza) has established himself as one of the finest filmmakers working today, capable of rewarding audiences and deep thinkers alike. Even though his films haven’t been box office juggernauts, they are strongly respected within the filmmaking and film-loving communities. Anderson’s tenth feature film, One Battle After Another, is his most mainstream film, a potential box office hit and a crowd pleaser, but also his most politically-minded. One Battle After Another is a wild character-driven thriller with an unassailable comic sensibility. The film also presents a poignant critique on the nation’s current sociopolitical climate. Anderson’s sense of action, hijinks, and thematic storytelling are honed to a sharp, surrealist point in One Battle After Another, thus creating a richly rewarding cinematic triumph. Continue reading “Film Review: “One Battle After Another””

Film Review: “The Long Walk”

A punishing yet thrilling tale of diminishing naivete

Ray (Cooper Hoffman) and Peter (David Jonsson) and the lot keeping up the pace in ‘The Long Walk’

Stephen King wrote The Long Walk during his freshman year at college (the first novel he ever completed), though it was published over ten years later in 1979 under his pseudonym, Richard Bachman. The Long Walk harnesses the teenage angst, existential dread, and complicated patriotism many young minds were experiencing in the late 1960s as the Vietnam War escalated and a wartime draft approached. Surprisingly, despite its simple premise and universal themes, The Long Walk hasn’t been successfully adapted to film, though a few directors have tried. Now, under Francis Lawrence’s (The Hunger Games franchise: Catching Fire, Mockingjay Parts 1 & 2, The Ballad of Songbirds & Snakes) confident direction, and with strong performances and a tight script by JT Mollner (Strange Darling), The Long Walk is an fatalistic parable that demands our attention, even if we wish to look away. Continue reading “Film Review: “The Long Walk””

Film Review: “The Roses”

This Roses has jokes, but no thorns.

Theo (Benedict Cumberbatch) and Ivy (Olivia Colman) share a happy moment in ‘The Roses’

Comedies are making a noisy return to theaters this year! With One of Them Days, The Naked Gun, and Freakier Friday successfully attracting audiences, and Spinal Tap II and Good Fortune waiting in the wings, 2025 could be a turning point for the comedy genre’s decade-long theatrical absence. The Roses aims to continue the trend. The Roses comes from director Jay Roach (Austin Powers; Meet the Parents) and is based on the novel The War of the Roses by Warren Adler and the subsequent 1989 film adaptation starring Michael Douglas and Kathleen Turner. In a plea for wider audience approval, The Roses has declawed the source material in favor of a softer, mostly harmless black comedy. If not for the winning duo at its center, The Roses would wilt under the strains of its vignette-styled antics, but fortunately has the chemistry and enough laughs to withstand its structural shortcomings. Continue reading “Film Review: “The Roses””

Film Review: “Eden”

A star-studded affair to relish (then forget)

Frederick (Jude Law) and Dore (Vanessa Kirby) scowl at newcomers.

The “Galapagos Affair” is a fascinating and troubling true story. Multiple eyewitness accounts have been published, as well as a documentary and non-fiction books, about the incident. Director Ron Howard, no stranger to the “based on a true story” aspect of filmmaking (Apollo 13, A Beautiful Mind, Frost/Nixon, Thirteen Lives, among others), depicts the “Galapagos Affair” in his new film, Eden, a thriller set among paradise-seeking settlers on the island of Floreana in the 1930s. Eden is a star-studden affair, a sexually-charged collision of characters unfolding in a harsh natural environment, but the crucial “why” behind the proceedings is never explored, resulting in the film’s inability to be anything more than a diverting thriller. Continue reading “Film Review: “Eden””

Film Review: “Ne Zha 2”

A cinematic fireball of epic proportions and rich mythology

Ne Zha prepares for battle in ‘Ne Zha 2’

Here’s a couple movie tidbits to know before your next trivia night: 1) the highest grossing animated film of all time is Ne Zha 2; and 2) the highest grossing non-English language film of all time is, you guessed it, Ne Zha 2. With a global haul of over $2.1 billion and counting, this box office record-buster is a Chinese animated sequel to a 2019 animated movie about a popular Chinese mythological figure and humanity’s deity/demon protector, Nezha. The Ne Zha films are directed by Jiaozi and developed and produced through his production company, Chengdu Coco Cartoon. Now, after setting international box office records and following a short stint in a few North American theaters in February, Ne Zha 2 takes aim at American audiences with an English-dubbed version in theaters. Despite its complex plot and intimidating mythological context, its stunning visuals and epic scale more than earn its theatrical experience. Continue reading “Film Review: “Ne Zha 2””

Film Review: “Highest 2 Lowest”

Lee and Denzel’s fifth collaboration is a mix of many highs and 2 many lows

David King (Denzel Washington) strolls through the office in ‘Highest 2 Lowest.’

It’s tough to avoid comparing a remake to the original, especially if the original is a five-star masterpiece. Such is the case for Spike Lee’s Highest 2 Lowest, which is based on Akira Kurosawa’s 1963 procedural crime drama, High and Low (which is based on a 1959 book, King’s Ransom by Ed McBain). Kurosawa’s High and Low explores stark class divisions within post-war Japan, challenging the characters with life-threatening moral dilemmas and utilizing a detailed police procedural plotline to expose these divisions, literally and metaphorically. Lee moves the 1960s Japan setting to a present-day New York City, shifts the protagonist’s business empire from a shoe company to a music label, and abandons High and Low’s slow burn pace for a thriller, all of which deliver a mixed bag of results. Continue reading “Film Review: “Highest 2 Lowest””

Film Review: “Nobody 2”

The first Nobody does it better

Hutch (Bob Odenkirk) lets his dark side emerge in ‘Nobody 2.’

Hutch Mansell, the deceptively mild-mannered, disgruntled everyman (and former elite assassin), is back. Hutch pleased audiences with a barrage of brutal bad guy beat downs in 2021’s Nobody, directed by Ilya Naishuller (Heads of State), a self-aware, more grounded version of a John Wick-esque action flick. Nobody was a surprise hit, considering its non-action star, Bob Odenkirk (Better Call Saul; Mr. Show), and because its release coincided with the controversial return to theaters from Covid-19 lockdowns. And yet its success greenlit a sequel, and Nobody 2, from director Timo Tjahjanto (The Shadow Strays), mostly delivers the same ruthless fun as the original, but with more than a few questionable choices. Continue reading “Film Review: “Nobody 2””

Film Review: “The Naked Gun”

One hundred percent pure, unadulterated co… medy

Frank Drebin Jr. (Liam Neeson) fashionably thwarts a robbery in ‘The Naked Gun’.

A cop is thwarting a bank robbery, engaging in hand-to-hand combat with one of the robbers. At first, they block punches, then their actions become a game of patty-cake, and then it’s a pantomime as the cop dispenses with the robber with a finger gun. Ah yes, the healing power of comedy! From the minds of legendary filmmaking trio Zucker, Abrahams, and Zucker (Jim Abrahams and brothers David and Jerry Zucker) came Airplane! (1980) and Top Secret! (1984) and then The Naked Gun (1988), a feature film version of the TV show, Police Squad! Yes, ZAZ really liked exclamation points. The trio’s brand of humor redefined blockbuster comedies, continuing Mel Brooks’s 1970s “spoof” style of adult, metanarrative, slapstick humor. A remake of The Naked Gun has been circling Hollywood for a long time, and it has finally arrived in the form of a legacy sequel directed by The Lonely Island’s Akiva Schaffer (Popstar; Chip ‘n Dale: Rescue Rangers). Could the new Naked Gun capture the unapologetically silly nature of the original, and is that type of parodic comedy still funny today? The answer to both is ‘yes, of course, now shut up and watch the movie.’  Continue reading “Film Review: “The Naked Gun””