This tense German drama about a theft incident in a school perceptively reflects the state of the world today in a classroom, backed by an excellent lead performance by Leonie Benesch.
An Austrian woman goes to Kenya in search of intimacy and connection as Seidl, in his usual provocative mode, explores ‘sex tourism’ as both a curse and an antidote to sheer human loneliness.
A sweeping if unremarkable, ‘globe-trotting’ drama about a father who tries to locate his daughters after surviving the Armenian genocide of 1915 by the Ottoman Empire, with Faith Akin’s approach too conventional to really compel.
Akin goes terribly off-course with this vile and nihilistic serial killer movie, based on a true story, yet with nothing valuable to say.
A young woman’s unwavering stand against the shameful Iranian legal system is captured with both intimacy and exasperation in this insightful documentary about the case of Reyhaneh Jabbari, who was hanged for acting in self-defence against a rapist in 2014.
Petzold’s Berlinale Grand Jury Prize winner, about a group of friends and strangers at a holiday house as a forest fire blazes many miles away, is a strong, terrifically scripted and effortless portrayal of human relationships under scrutiny and pretence.
It’s difficult to have an opinion on Schanelec’s new film, which is decidedly inscrutable though it retains the German slow cinema auteur’s unique sensibilities as it explores themes of fate, guilt and grief in an elusive way.
We haven’t had a great anti-war film in years—this WWI piece comes just as timely in the wake of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, and is as technically accomplished and emotionally involving as some of the finest entries of the genre.
This is one of Akin’s most rollickingly pleasurable films, a high-energy comedy filled with absurd moments about an F&B manager who is faced with making hard business and romantic decisions.
Akin’s entertaining debut feature about gangsterism, brotherhood and petty crime may be raw and occasionally uneven, but it possesses a spirit so vital to the portrayal of multiculturalism in late ‘90s German filmmaking.
Eternality Tan 