This could be the ‘Mulholland Drive’ for this generation—a deliberately-paced hallucinatory deep dive into the physical and psychological realities of a world-famous (if fictional) composer-conductor that sees Todd Field and Cate Blanchett in extraordinary form.
Brando’s only directorial effort is truly exceptional—a soulful revenge Western with stunning picturesque imagery and a commitment to exploring and subverting the ethos of the genre.
Spielberg’s polished, but rather underwhelming workmanlike by-the-numbers tale of his formative years as a child and teenager chronicles the tension between family disputes and his passion for filmmaking.
It’s tragic and overly melodramatic for sure, but Ann Hui’s then-controversial work about the sufferings of the Vietnamese post-Vietnam War remains a significant entry of the burgeoning Hong Kong New Wave.
Even when it falls back into a kind of televisual style, Kwek’s work is always engaging as it tackles the thorny local LGBT issue with a kind of reactionary bite that is rare in Singapore cinema.
A masterwork of post-2000s East European cinema, this is an intense and uncompromising Romanian drama about illegal abortion that draws power from its stark visuals and ultra-long takes.
Meditative yet at times tonally dissonant, Liao’s work about the shifting temporalities of identity and memory is ultimately elusive.
It may be ambitious and sprawling to a fault, but Chazelle’s bravura direction and the top performances all-round keep this largely fictional tale of ‘20s and ‘30s Hollywood brimming with infectious energy.
Interesting and meditative in its treatment of the metaphysical in the real world, this Polish work, however, is vague about what it wants to say as a mysterious Ukrainian massage therapist works his charm on a gated community of oddball residents.
One of Marker’s defining works about time and memory, this is an experimental documentary of the highest order, capturing the wonder and bizarreness of human cultures and existence amid technological change.
Eternality Tan 