Posts by Neely Swanson

Writer Mark Chappell came up with a killer idea when he decided to reverentially spoof Agatha Christie’s unbelievably long-running West End play The Mousetrap. Directed smoothly by Tom George, the action rarely lags and the dialogue crackles with humor. Both satirically referencing Christie’s work while mirroring it.  Cue the voice-over of Leo Kopernick, the blacklisted…

Genevieve Adams, writer, director, and star of “Simchas and Sorrow” (Joys and Sorrows) has successfully waded into quicksand and come out unscathed. Telling a rather autobiographical story, Adams takes on the role of…herself.  Agnes, a struggling playwright who teaches an after school drama class to children, is your basic non-believer, in all the good ways.…

Director and co-writer Julian Higgins is very clear from the outset that he was making a western. How do we know? The first few minutes are a pastiche of 19th Century photos of Western iconography—Native Americans, cowboys, ranches, farmers, settlers – followed by a sweeping shot of a mountain range in a desolate winter landscape. …

Who doesn’t like a good gangster movie, full of over-the-top thugs, killer scenery (where killer has several meanings), and a Don with a commanding presence? “The Mayor of Rione Sanità” carves out its own niche in the gangster canon, mashing up Scorcese-style tough guys with street gang mythology and a little cartel violence, setting it…

Imitation is sometimes the highest form of flattery. Unfortunately, in the case of “The Class,” it’s misplaced. Director/writer Nicholas Celozzi was channeling his inner “John Hughes” when he conceived his film as a modern-day retelling of Hughes’s iconic 1985 film “The Breakfast Club.” “The Breakfast Club” was about random students who didn’t know each other…

“Private Desert” is a remarkably nuanced story about love, masculinity, expectations, and vulnerability. That it involves two men is incidental. Directed by Aly Muritiba and co-written by Muritiba and Henrique Dos Santos, “Private Desert” gently surprises at every turn by unwrapping layer after layer of character and emotion. Daniel, suspended from his job as a…

“Carnal Knowledge,” now being re-released by Rialto Pictures in a new 4K restoration, is as searing today as it was when it was released in 1971. Directed by Mike Nichols and written by Jules Feiffer, the film follows two college roommates through decades of sexual triumphs and failures. It is significant to note that nowhere…

Amartya Bhattacharyya, the writer, director, cinematographer, and editor (as well as the dubber for several of the characters and all the “extraneous” sounds) of “Adieu Godard,” used those talents to create this very enjoyable and thoroughly absurd feature film. Ananda (Choudhury Bikash Das) is addicted to porn. He may not be as elderly as he…

Xavier Giannoli’s truly sumptuous adaptation of Honoré de Balzac’s novel Lost Illusions is prescient, modern, and yet thoroughly grounded in its time. Giannoli, who wrote the screenplay,   shared adaptation credit with Jacques Fieschi and Yves Stavrides. This film recently swept the 2022 César Awards, but more on that later. A classic Balzac story, it’s…

“Spin Me Round,” directed by Jeff Baena and written by Baena and Alison Brie, twirls around quickly, at times breathlessly, and always humorously. Slight in nature, and that’s no slight, the movie tells a story of aspiration, hope, and “be careful what you wish for” because it might be disappointing. Amber is the shining manager…

“The Territory,” a documentary directed by Alex Pritz, is not just an inside glimpse of the ongoing fight in Brazil to protect the rights of the Indigenous Uru-eu-wau-wau people of the Amazon but a larger look at the struggle to preserve the diminishing rainforest, safeguard an endangered people, stop the invasion of this land, and…

“Learn to Swim,” Tyrone Tommy’s debut feature, was a well-intentioned effort at setting an existential drama in the jazz world, an apt choice because nothing is more existential than jazz. Written with Marni Van Dyk, Tommy’s intention was to keep things ambiguous. He succeeded, perhaps too well.  Dezi, a talented sax player, works his magic…

To call “Lie Hard” awful would be an insult to all those bad, mediocre movies that come out every year and quickly disappear. “Lie Hard” is actually a cut below awful, venturing into that realm of films that try too hard to be funny by taking a solid concept and breaking the already stretched rubber…