Author Archives: philipbrasor

Review: Tár

Posted on May 10, 2023 by philipbrasor

Lydia Tár (Cate Blanchett) isn’t the first cinematic protagonist whose entire being seems designed to be disagreeable, but it’s difficult to tell if writer-director Todd Field, making his first movie in almost two decades, wants the viewer to pick up … Continue reading →

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Media watch: Resolution of defamation case better late than never, but still too late

Posted on May 6, 2023 by philipbrasor

On May 1, the legal affairs website Bengoshidotcom reported on a press conference given by human rights activist Shin Sugok of the citizens group Norikoe Net. Shin talked about the Supreme Court’s decision on April 26 to reject an appeal … Continue reading →

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Review: EO

Posted on May 5, 2023 by philipbrasor

It’s no spoiler to say right at the outset that Jerzy Skolimowski’s impressionistic take on the life of a donkey ends with the claim that absolutely no animals were harmed or otherwise inconvenienced during its making, even if there are … Continue reading →

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Review: One Fine Morning

Posted on May 4, 2023 by philipbrasor

Hot on the heels of Francois Ozon’s Everything Went Fine (though I acknowledge that in some territories the release order was the reverse) comes another French movie about a woman struggling with her father’s end-of-life arrangements. And while the circumstances … Continue reading →

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Media watch: The inevitability of the immigration law revision

Posted on May 1, 2023 by philipbrasor

We’ve written in the past about the Japanese government’s treatment of asylum seekers, and the revision to the Immigration Control and Refugee Recognition Law that the ruling coalition has been working on for years to close inconvenient loopholes was supposed … Continue reading →

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Review: I, Olga Hepnarova

Posted on April 29, 2023 by philipbrasor

Tomas Weinreb’s and Petr Kazda’s fictionalized reimagining of the last woman to be executed in Czechoslovakia, in 1975, maintains a brutal fascination for its subject, played with unstinting sad-sack bravura by Michalina Olszanka, with an almost comical attention to detail. … Continue reading →

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Review: In Our Prime

Posted on April 28, 2023 by philipbrasor

Ever since his lead performance in Oldboy, Choi Min-sik has come to represent, at least to international movie fans whose diet of Korean films tend to center on well-known fare, the Korean idea of the antihero: a deeply flawed individual … Continue reading →

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Review: The Highway Family

Posted on April 21, 2023 by philipbrasor

Character actors, especially those who specialize in villains, are by definition cast within a fairly narrow range, while marquee stars prefer to work in their wheelhouses because that’s what makes them and their movies money. Jung Il-woo is one of … Continue reading →

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Review: Red Rocket

Posted on April 20, 2023 by philipbrasor

It was obviously going to be a tall order for director Sean Baker to top or even equal his last film, The Florida Project, an epic exploration of 21st century survivalist poverty in the capitalist milieu represented by the titular … Continue reading →

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Review: Mariupolis 2

Posted on April 15, 2023 by philipbrasor

Because of their nature as recordings of real events, documentaries often come with their own dramatic context, and in the case of Lithuanian filmmaker Mantas Kvedaravicius’s sequel to his 2016 film about the titular Ukrainian port city, much has been … Continue reading →

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