Even a master filmmaker can misfire big time in this shallow and messy star-studded stab at telling the narrative of the infamous ‘Cuban Five’.
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Wasp Network (2019)
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Tag / Netflix
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Da 5 Bloods (2020)
An interesting mess of ideas, genres and styles, Spike Lee’s lengthy new joint is effective when it is polemical, but the main message about how we could draw urgent relevancy from the contemporary Black Lives Matter movement in relation to the painful lessons of the Vietnam War gets muddled in the film’s excesses.
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First They Killed My Father (2017)
An excellent lead performance by a child aside, this is too postcard picture-perfect and poorly-paced a film about the torrid experiences of surviving the Khmer Rouge regime to be considered essential viewing.
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Divines (2016)
Electrifying filmmaking at times, this Cannes Camera d’Or-winning feature debut depicts a rebellious minority female teen from a French suburb who is suffering from social disenfranchisement as she seeks to make a better life for herself.
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Sand Storm (2016)
A modest but effective Sundance award-winning drama about patriarchal conservatism rearing its ugly head as an older Bedouin daughter in a traditional Arab family awaits her fateful future.
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Other Side of the Wind, The (2018)
Superbly-edited and exuding a sense of ‘new wave’ energy, Welles’ previously incomplete film before his death is now complete (or not?) in this strange, kaleidoscopic but rather uncompelling work.
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Edge of Democracy, The (2019)
A largely engrossing crash course on how the current Brazilian political landscape, warts and all, came to be in this incisive Oscar-nominated documentary.
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Atlantics (2019)
It does feel overreaching at times, but Mati Diop’s French-Senegalese first feature is a beguiling take on how tragedy can haunt the present.
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Two Popes, The (2019)
You’ll be surprised that two religious old men chatting about their struggles with faith and their pasts can be so engrossing in Fernando Meirelles’ breezy drama.
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Uncut Gems (2019)
Breathless filmmaking by the Safdies that also sees Adam Sandler producing his best performance yet.
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