Difret (2014)
★★★★☆
Dragging Ethiopia into the modern age, Zeresenay Mehari’s Difret is a compelling account of two women fighting the strong arm of patriarchy.
★★★★☆
Dragging Ethiopia into the modern age, Zeresenay Mehari’s Difret is a compelling account of two women fighting the strong arm of patriarchy.
★★★★☆
Gianni di Gregorio’sGood for Nothing is a quirky tale about friendship and standing up for yourself when it is the only thing left to do.
★★★★☆
Pierfrancesco Diliberto’s The Mafia Kills Only in Summer is an unlikely comedy centred on the bloodshed perpetrated by Sicily’s ruthless Cosa Nostra.
★★★★☆
Fierce and unflinchingly brutal, Kornél Mundruczó’s White God is an unsettling Hungarian allegory brimming with passion, imagination and socio-political resonance.
★★★★☆
Evoking Lynch, Polanski and Buñuel, The Duke of Burgundy is a boldly unique film from an exciting British filmmaker; it’s quite mad, quite funny, and quite brilliant.
★★★★☆
With a delicate, mesmerising performance from Rinko Kikuchi, Kumiko, The Treasure Hunter is a darkly comic tale of misadventure – tragic, odd and uplifting.
★★★★☆
The glorious story of one woman’s emancipation, Anna Muylaert’s The Second Mother is a hilarious and quietly devastating parable of modern Brazil.
★★★★☆
Pieced together out of archive footage, interviews and diaries, Liz Garbus’ What Happened, Miss Simone? makes a soul-stirring melody out of the blues.
★★★★☆
A stunning portrait of life in the trenches during the Great War, Ermanno Olmi’s Torneranno i prati is a handsome tribute to loneliness and fear.
★★★★☆
With a great performance from Alba Rohrwacher, Laura Bispuri’s Sworn Virgin is a stunning but underwhelming glimpse into celibacy in the Albanian mountains.
★★★★☆
A visual extravaganza of the Russian director’s sexual awakening in Mexico, Peter Greenaway’s Eisenstein In Guanajuato is a shameless return to form.
★★★★☆
Chosen to premiere at Berlin (home of Cabaret), Mark Christopher’s 54: The Director’s Cut recreates a bygone age of synth-infused hedonism.
★★★★☆
A scurrilous comedy about degenerate priests, Pablo Larrain’s The Club rides a dark political undercurrent as God’s rejects refuse to see the light.
★★★★☆
More than a biopic, Bill Pohlad’s Love & Mercy is a portrait of musical genius and mental illness with tour de force performances from Dano, Cusack and Banks.